Day four dawned on us like a sigh of relief. Day three was brutal, but was also planned that way. From here till we crawled back to civilization, we would only have to walk 5-6 miles every day with a bit of climbing. Waking up on day four felt like a vacation within our vacation.
We had camped just below Cloud’s Rest and KB had not let us forget that she had gone to the top while all of us bottom feeders sat on our bottoms and waited. Granted some of us didn’t look like we could make it around the bend, let alone to the place where clouds went to rest, but we gathered our things, carefully packing our bear canisters into our packs and then set them in a pile so we could climb back to the top of our current world.
We walked the half mile or so back up the trail and found our way up to the edge of the rock that allowed us to look off into the valley we had ascended the day prior. We were in awe of the scenery, in awe of the fact that we had made it the day before, in awe that we had just left our packs with all of our food on the ground for bears to carry away..
Ben took off running to do what he could to ensure that our packs were in deed there when we got back. You see we were still under the impression that there were bears around every tree and under every rock, and there only reason for existing was to steal our food. And we kind of needed that food. So Ben ran.
The rest of us hurriedly walked. Luckily for us, the bears were on break and Ben found our packs exactly where and how we left them. At this point, we had but one thing to do and that was to walk to our next camp which was about 5-6 miles away. We weren’t expecting it to be very hard and we weren’t surprised with any high passes. The hardest part of the day was deciding at which of the three lakes we were going to camp. We settled on the middle one.
What we weren’t prepared for that day was the mosquitoes. And by not prepared for, I mean the bug spray had spilled in my pack on day 1, we had planned to replenish and then didn’t. This left us with about a third of a bottle of bug spray between the four of us for the entirety of the trip. This was also the amount of my flask left over from the night before, leaving me a bit dry for the rest of the trip.
Once we stopped moving the swarms of angry, bird-sized mosquitoes would come in for the kill. We resorted to wearing our rain jackets to keep them at bay. Even inside the tent, they would swarm around and if any of our flesh touched the side they would attack through the tent. On a positive note, there had been clouds building for a while and we had intermittent relief from the potency of the sun. Making the wearing of our jackets bearable.
Ben had been carrying his weather station for two full days now and he finally got to use it. He disappeared to the lake to fish.
I’m one of those people who, for whatever reason, bugs love to bight. I get bit by ants, at home, at least once a month. If there are mosquitoes in the vicinity, they will find me and they will eat me alive. Seeing that we had no where to go and nothing to do, I retired to the protection of the tent and enjoyed my air mattress’s comfort. After a bit KB joined me. And then Shelby disappeared.
The clouds were rolling overhead and the breeze felt nice through the mesh. KB and I began to get friendly just as the first lightning strike flashed overhead. Followed by some very loud thunder. Maybe camping on the ridge wasn’t the best idea. KB and I have a thing for thunder storms, we love them. Our favorite evening activity is sitting on our porch as the lightning strikes around us and we hear the thunder rolling through the city. If some rain comes down, it’s just an added bonus.
We began to watch and count. Watch the lightning strike over head and then count how long until the thunder cracked. When the two started to happen simultaneously, we decided it was best to head down hill for a bit. Which we did. We found Shelby and Ben coming back from their weather station foraging bit and the thunder started to move on. We returned to camp.
I don’t recall exactly what we were all doing, but Ben was walking in front of me when I hear this loud thump. Ben stops and picks up a quarter size hail stone that just about hit him in the head. For whatever reason, we stay where we are and begin discussing the hailstone and how lucky he was. Then Shelby gets hit and another one comes down next to us. KB and I run for our tent and duck inside just in time for the hail to really come down. We watched as they bounced off the taut nylon and were careful not to get close to the edge of the tent. Shelby also made it into his tent.
Ben did not.
Rather he made for a tree and stood under it while the stones fell from the sky for about three minutes. Then it rained a little bit and the storm passed. And nobody died, however, it would probably be a better story if someone had, so let’s pretend that our friend Jim was with us and he didn’t make it to the tree in time and we had to bury his pummeled body next to the lake.
Now that I remember Jim, he was a really great guy and it was a difficult thing to tell his wife and 17 children that he didn’t make it back. They have all now moved back to Russia.
It seems that I got ahead of myself as well. So while we are pretending, let’s imagine that the hail storm hadn’t happened yet and Shelby and Ben had just returned from the lake with fish. Ben cooked the fish and then the ravage beasts that I was sojourning with ripped the flesh off the grill with their ferocious claws.
I was told they tasted awesome. I’m also sure that it was due to this karmic violation that we were hit with hailstones only minutes later and why Jim had to die. He had eaten two of the fish all by himself.
After we had finished burying Jim, this happened,
I’ve posted this picture before, but I would like to point out what exactly is going on. Starting on the right, you have been who is wearing shorts because he washed his pants and is now drying them next to the fire using Shelby’s trekking poles. He was careful to ensure that his pants were drying but also that they didn’t get too hot. He did this by adjusting the angle of the poles. Shelby, in the middle, is resting. Which in and of itself isn’t weird, but what you can’t see is that he is using his bear canister for a pillow. This was not one of the approved uses and I think he was the only one tall enough to pull this off. KB has a rock in her hand, it’s a piece of granite. She had been hiking exclusively in Chacos. Her feet were a little trashed and she was using the granite to scrape the dead skin off her feet. All around a campfire that we probably weren’t supposed to have.
Just a typical Mooseknuckler Alliance back country camp.
During the day, we all went swimming as well. The lake was frigid but it felt awesome to wash off some of the sunscreen and trail that was stuck to sunscreen. KB and I went in twice. And if I remember right, there may have been some skinny dipping happening as well, but this isn’t an adult website, so we can’t deny or confirm that fact. There was also a sasquatch sighting.
And then we went to bed.