Hiking Day

I don't know about most people, but for me the second night sleeping on the ground is always the worst: the excitement of being back in nature is still very fresh, you haven't really worked hard enough to be very tired and the aches and pains of the first night have yet to heal. Needless to say, I've slept better.Very quickly after waking up, eating a bit of food and packing everything away it was back on the trail with everything on your back. This day is all about reaching high camp. There is very little time for rest until then. The problem is you really don't know how much farther you have left to go. The most difficult part of the journey are the low water crossings on logs that have been placed over the streams.

The hike up is where Ian got his nickname 'The Mountain Goat'. It's also where the implications of being assinged to carry the condiments bag become all too clear. One of the jobs of the crew leader is to assign each team member something to carry that will benefit the whole crew. I was assigned to carry two different meals as well as the condiments bag which includes povisions for cleaning up after meals and some additional items that don't go with any particular meal. Our crew had two large containers to add flavor to drinks. Neither of these got any lighter during the whole week. Unfortunately, I was also assigned the 'Hike Lunch'. The bad thing about this meal is that not very many hikers are a fan of the main course, vienna sausages. At the end of the meal, uneaten portions go back in the bag they came from. Unoppened portions then get added to the condiments bag. Here's where I realize that the condiment's bag gets heavier and heavier as the week progresses and that I will have to carry uneaten vienna sausages until we reach base camp four days from now. Ewww. (What happend to kids who ate everything on their plates?)

Before we knew it we were at hight camp, which was beautifuly framed on three sides by aspen trees and to the south by a little stream.