To read part eleven of day three, click here.

I clutched at my ears. Rebecca had been standing right next to me, and she had hurt my ears really badly when she screamed. I almost fell against the platform and managed to catch myself before I got hurt. I wondered what was wrong with Rebecca, and ran to catch up to her. I did not know what had happened, but I wanted to make sure she was ok.

Rebecca had stopped before the trail leading to the kitchen, and was sitting on a rock. I don’t know if she was crying – I don’t think she was, but it was hard to tell in the dark, and I did not want to shine my light in her face. Bobby was squatting down next to her asking her what was wrong.

She started stuttering, her breath coming so fast she could barely get the words out.

“I st-st-stepped on a s-s-snake!”

I instinctively looked at the ground around where we were standing. No snakes! Bobby was trying to calm Rebecca down, but I don’t think he was succeeding very well. I realized that if Bobby could not cheer her up, I could not. Bobby was one of the best at cheering people up. 🙂 So I headed on up to the kitchen, so I could tell everyone what had happened and warn the other girls.

When I told everyone that Becca had stepped on a snake, most of the other girls went back by the platforms to talk to her. I stayed in the kitchen and “offered moral support” to the people who were cleaning.

After a little bit the girls and Bobby came back up the trail. They all sat down and we commenced Twilight Meeting.

First Katie told us a story. She had asked me earlier if it would be ok for her to tell this story. Because this was not a normal bedtime story. This was the type of story that we called “war stories”. Basically, stories of things that were really uncomfortable for me – drinking, smoking, partying, etc.

So she told her story. And I think it made the rest of the crew feel uncomfortable.  Then she asked the crew a couple of questions, and asked if they had any questions. Someone asked if that was a true story, and she told them that it was not.

I think they felt betrayed. They felt that she had been lying, and they felt that she was trying to manipulate them. I know, because they were talking about it in the tarp later.

Once they were done asking questions, she said that she had told them that story for a reason. She asked if any of them had liked hearing that story. When everyone said no, she nodded her head thoughtfully. Then she said “Lets try to keep the rest of the war stories to a minimum, ok? Because they are not fun to hear, and I would rather not hear them.” (It was something like that – I don’t remember exactly what it was.)

We sat in silence for a few minutes before Jen spoke up. She said she had a go around question, a question that we all took turns answering until everyone had answered.

“What are your trigger words? And I don’t mean words that get you all excited, and stuff like that, I mean words that upset you. Words that make you mad. Anyone can start the circle, and you can pass it to the left or right.”

We all waited as everyone thought over theirs. It did not take me long to think of mine – curse words, and using the name of the Lord in vain. Just as I was about to start talking, Bruce spoke up.

I don’t remember what he said. I remember a few of the trigger words:

Retard/ed
Stupid
Weird
I can’t
Any cursing
And there were a couple of really weird strange ones that I can’t remember.

Once everyone had said their trigger words Jen asked us to make an effort not to say everyone’s words. We covered a few more things before heading back to the platforms. I don’t remember if we actually had one of the guys check our platform for snakes… I know I thought about it!

There was a lot of looking around before you did anything, making sure the ground was clear of any wriggling things. There were a bunch of girls who got on the platform and did not get off again. I know that when I was trying to get something out of my backpack I did NOT put my feet on the ground.

I warned whoever was sleeping next to me about my claustrophobic panic attacks (if I get stuck in the blankets, or in this case a sleeping bag, I freak out) and rolled over and shut my eyes. The girls were all talking about what Katie had said.

It was really funny, listening to the conversation. Every three or four words, you would hear “Sorry, ____” because they had said someones trigger word.  We did hear “Sorry, Brett” more then we heard anything else. 😀

I finally gave up trying to sleep and rolled back over so I would be facing the girls. We kept talking, just random stuff. We could hear the guys talking all the way across the entire campsite. It was the farthest we had been apart, and they were louder than they had been any other night. Rebecca decided that it was time for them to be quiet.

“Bobby!”
“What do you want, Becky…”
“We want y’all to hush! We’re trying to sleep here!”
“Oh, really?”
“Yes, really!”

Then Jen cut in.

“People might be trying to sleep, so can we keep it down?”

I tried to hold it in, I swear. But I could not help myself and soon half of us were cracking up. We could still hear the guys, and by this point I am sure they could hear us too. Oh well.

We were able to stop giggling for a bit, and then the talking and the “Sorry!!” started again. After saying that it was ok a lot of times, I told them that I knew they were going to curse. That for them it was a part of their vocabulary, they did not see it as wrong and it did not annoy them. That I knew it was going to happen. I just asked them to try to cut it back a bit. They said they would try, and started talking again. Somewhere around that point in time is when I fell asleep. I had been reviewing my day, and it had not been a bad one!

Yeah, having a bad ankle was not fun. But getting ready for Newlyweds was! And maybe picking up the trash was not my favorite thing in the world to do… (I found some nasty stuff!) But lunch was yummy! Ok, the ladders were not fun. Period. But reaching the summit was probably one of the proudest moments of my life! I had come together with a bunch of complete strangers, lived with them for three days, and together we had climbed up a mountain and part of the way down! How awesome is that? Yes, the water run turned out to be the worst water run of the trip, and I did not really enjoy it. But I was able to talk with Ben and Kayce, something that I had not really had the opportunity to do before. And they were these really nice guys that I could talk to now! The snake? Um… Can’t really come up with a good thing to counteract that. 😀 And what happened during twilight meeting changed the way I looked at some of my crewmates.

So yeah, Day Three was a good day. It was a really productive day too! I slept well that night, which was good. I was going to need all my energy for the hard day we would have the next day! It’s a good thing God did not give us the ability to see into the future, because if I had seen what was going to happen the next afternoon, I would probably not have slept a wink, trying to figure out a way to prevent what happened.

Click here to read the first part of Day Four.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part ten of day three, click here.

We filtered the water as quickly as we could. The sun was going to set soon, and we still had a mile back to camp. And we were going to have to do it in the dark, if we did not get going quickly enough.

I was kicking myself for not bringing my head lamp. I shouldn’t have been – there was still plenty of light when we had left, and I had no way of knowing that we were going to have to walk a mile just to get to the water!

Once the water was done filtering we gathered the stuff quickly and started our mile hike. Because of my ankle I was only carrying the water filtration bag and Jen’s sweater. Everyone else was carrying the water bottles and the baby seals. I told everyone that there was a bonus to this – we knew what the first mile of hiking in the morning was going to look like! They just stared at me blankly and kept going. 😀

We made it back into camp just as it was starting to get hard to see. I went straight to my pack and got out my headlamp. Then I grabbed my bowl, spoon, black mat and water bottle and headed up to the kitchen. Dinner was ready, and after those two extra miles, I was hungry!

I think that water run did a lot for me and my relationship with the crew. I started to feel like I belonged with the crew. It was also when we finally got Kayce to break out of his shell. Bobby and Luke both told me when we got back that they had never heard that much out of his mouth. He was a really quiet guy, and they had been trying to get him to “wake up” since they had met him. I think they were bummed that Ben and I were the ones who finally got him to start talking… 😀

Looking back, day three was a big day for me. I learned to trust some of my crewmates on the ladders, and I started to feel like I belonged with the crew on that water run.

On my way to the kitchen I passed Luke and informed him that he was extremely glad that he was not on Water duty that day. When he asked why, I told him that he would find out in the morning. He looked at me with a questioning look in his eyes, but I kept walking towards the kitchen. I was hungry!

Unfortunately, I don’t remember what was for dinner that night. I remember it was good! Since I was done early I went back to our platform with Rebecca. She wanted to get her headlamp, but did not want to go alone. So I walked back there with her and shone my light in the “brain” (the very top) of her back pack.

What happened next happened so quickly, it did not even register for a minute. Rebecca screamed, pushed me out of the way, and ran off as fast as she could.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part nine of day three, click here.

We were hiking down the trail that we had come by. It was not far to the intersection where we had taken a break to decide which way to go – probably not even a 1/4 mile.

We were all laughing, having fun. We were hiking without our packs on, and it was an amazing feeling! We were free!

It probably helped that we were hiking up a trail we had just been on – we knew exactly what we had been feeling when we hiked that with our packs, so doing it without them…

We got to the intersection and took the path that we had not been on before. As we turned I took a look at the sign – our campsite was .2 miles from the intersection. There was a place called Shanty Springs where we were heading – that was a 1 mile from the intersection. And back the way we had came earlier that afternoon was the summit.

I was glad that we were not going to have to go all the way to Shanty Springs – Jen had said the creek was not too far off the intersection. Pack or not, I did not want to walk over a mile just to get water. Not to mention the mile back carrying the water!

The trail started out mostly level, grassy, and over all very enjoyable to walk on. After that it started getting a little rocky, but not too bad. I was just careful about where I put my foot. I did not want to twist it again, without a pack on! At least if I had my pack on I had an excuse, right? 😀

I was in the middle of the group, laughing and talking with Ben and Kayce. It was the first time I had heard Kayce say more then five words in a sentence, and it made me happy. He was starting to come out of his shell, and we were all having fun! We were talking about books we had read, movies we had seen. For a while we were talking about Lord Of The Rings, and then the talk turned to Narnia. Ben and I had both read the books, but Kayce hadn’t. Ben and I told him that he really should read them, and listed all seven books in order for him.

While we were talking about the movies, Jen stopped walking and turned to face us. She told us to come look at this, pointing to the rocks beneath her feet. We came up and looked where she was pointing.

There was an arrow drawn on the rock, pointing back up to where our campsite was. And underneath the arrow were the words, “To Narnia”.

Ben, Kayce and I just kind of looked at each other. I think Kayce summed it up nicely when he said “Wow”.

We kept walking. And walked some more. And then we were at the creek! Or at least, what should have been the creek, and was now just a ditch. Jen said that there should be more water further down, so we kept walking. It was not like we could just give up – we needed the water!

Soon the rocks started to get bigger, until they were bigger then me. We were climbing over rocks that were bigger then me, bigger then Ben and Kayce… They were some pretty big rocks. I was really worried about my ankle. It was hurting already, and we still had to get back up to our campsite! Plus, the big rocks were at angles that would make it really easy to twist my ankle if I slipped even the tiniest bit.

Thankfully God kept me safe getting through there, and we were back on the smaller rocks. Yes, it would still be pretty easy to twist my ankle, but I had more control over it. At least, that is what I thought. (I just realized that sentence makes it sound like I twisted my ankle again. I didn’t. :))

We kept walking. More spots where there should have been water, completely dry or just damp. More walking. A little pool of water, but since it was not running we decided not to use it. Even more walking. A mostly steady trickle running off some rocks.

Jen told us that we might have to use that, but she was going to run ahead and see if there was anything else. We waited for a few minutes, and she was back with good news. The spring was right up ahead!

We started walking again. It turns out that “right ahead” for Jen was not “right ahead” for us. 😀 But after a switchback or two, (where the trail takes a big turn so you are headed back the way you came, but further down hill) we could hear the trickle of water! Let me tell you this – it was a beautiful sound.

We headed for the spring, a tube sticking out of the side of the hill. I stared in disbelief at the sign standing next to the tube.

Guess what it said?

“Shanty Springs”

Yes, we had walked over a mile to get water. And we still had a mile to get back to camp, going up those massive rocks, carrying 4 baby seals full of water.

Did I mention that it was getting dark quickly, and our headlamps were back at camp?

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part eight of day three, click here.

I went to check out the platforms and decided that the girls wanted the middle one. Then Jen said that she and Katie got that one. Then some of the other girls said that we got the one on the right. But Luke came up to us and said that the guys had already called that one.

So we walked over to our platform. There was a big hole in it! Half of a plank was just gone! I went up to get my pack and ran into Luke. He grinned at me and asked how our platform was. I glared at him and told him he did that on purpose. He told me that of course he had, didn’t I know that all he ever did was try to annoy the girls? He grinned at me and took his pack back to his (not broken!) platform.

I brought my pack over to our platform where the girls were trying to decide the best way to avoid the hole and get six girls onto that platform. We decided that it was not happening and Tullia volunteered to sleep with the instructors again. (She had slept with them the night before too.)

I set my stuff on the edge of the platform. No one else ever wanted the edge and I did not mind it, so I always took it. There were a couple of nights I wished I was on the inside (when it rained), but most of the time I did not care. It was also nice to be on the edge because I am claustrophobic, and the sleeping bag was bad enough without being sandwiched between two other girls. I actually don’t know why that sleeping bag did not give me a panic attack – it was so tight! I didn’t even zip it up all the way. I only had it about zipped about half of the way up.

I was always prepared to freak out – every night I told the person next to me what to do if I woke them up because I was freaking out. 😀 And every night I would pray that I would not freak out. I REALLY did not want to have a panic attack because of my sleeping bag. And I did not have one!! Granted, I came really close the last night, but I never actually had a panic attack!

We set our tarp up as well as we could. And then Jen came over and we completely redid it. LOL

Putting up the tarp.

Then I went around to start collecting water bottles. The guys were still working on their tarp – we had set it up, taken it down and set it up again, and they were still working on theirs. 😀 And ours looked good! Jen had not even done that much, just showed us how to tie the knots and pound the stakes in well.

The girls won the unofficial tarp competition that night. 😀

So after I had grabbed all of the girls water bottles I dropped them by the baby seals and went over to the guys tarp to ask them for their water bottles. We had to have every thing that could hold water filled to the brim – no more water until we were down the mountain the next afternoon. I told the guys about that and told them to drink any water left in their bottles so I could get them full. They told me that I was mean and I just looked at them.

Luke pulled out his water bottles out, drank what was left in one of them, and tossed them at me from the other side of the platform. Bruce told me that his were empty, and I needed to pull them out of his pack. I asked which one was his and he told me it was the one right behind me. I went to turn around and almost tripped over his pack. 😀 I felt kinda awkward going in his pack, even if it was just the water bottle pockets, but he had his hands full of tarp strings. So I pulled his bottles out, took a couple of others that were being tossed at me and went back up to the main clearing.

Maggie and I filled up as many of the water bottles as we could from the baby seals and loaded up the five or six left over into the water filter bag.

Jen asked who wanted to come with us. I think Jordan came, and I know Ben and Kayce came. We grabbed the empty baby seals, the water filter bag and a couple extra water bottles that people pulled out as we were leaving.

We started back up the trail that we had come from. As we started hiking up the familiar trail we were commenting on how easy this was since we did not have our packs on.

Ha. What we were about to do next was going to be the one of the hardest things I had done so far.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part seven of day three, click here.

Our next challenge was a short ladder, nothing bad. I don’t think it was even 6 feet long, so compared to the others we had done this was a piece of cake! The only problem? We had to go down it. Not up it.

Going down a ladder with a heavy pack on your back? Not the easiest thing I have ever done. Not the hardest either, but definitely one of the harder ones.

Since I was in the back of the line, I had to wait awhile. It was taking at least 4 or 5 minutes for each person to get down the ladder, and I was at the back of a 13 person crew. I took a couple of pictures, but put the camera away after a bit because I was not getting any good pictures.

Once we were all down that ladder, we started moving again. We had only been walking for about three minutes when we had to stop again. This time it was not a ladder – it was just a big rock that you had to climb over. And on the other side was a four foot drop. You could climb down the rock, (there were a few handholds) or you could jump. I climbed it. Or at least, I tried too.

This obstacle took even longer then the ladder. We were all told to drop our packs and line up to get down the rock. Bruce and Jen went down first, and they helped everyone else down. When the first half of the group was down there, they asked us to bring the packs up and pass them down. Because I was in the back, I carried most of the packs up. I did make Luke, Kayce and Bobby come get theirs – they were too heavy for me. I could lift Luke and Bobby’s packs about an inch off the ground, but I couldn’t budge Kayce’s pack!

I grabbed my pack and headed back to the rocks. My pack was passed down, and I went down after it. I was able to get about halfway down before I was stuck – my feet could not reach the next ledge. I don’t remember how I got down after that – either I jumped, or Bruce helped me. I do remember that I went to get my pack on and could not get up again – Bruce had to pull me to my feet. LOL

We lined back up and moved out. If I remember correctly, the going was pretty easy for a while there. It was going downhill gradually, with a nice even trail. Not very many rocks or roots, which was always a nice thing. After I hurt my ankle, I was always very careful of the rocks and roots, because they made it very easy to twist my ankle, which just hurt it more.

Then the trail got a bit steeper, so I had to be more careful. And then we were walking over rocks that (kinda) formed steps, but they were also wobbly. Thankfully despite the trail I was able to keep up, even though I was tiring quickly.

Then we came to a trail junction, and apparently the LOD’s (Leader of the Day) did not know which way we were supposed to go. So I sat down and took a break. I did not participate in the argument debate about which way we needed to go – I just sat down and rested so I would be able to continue hiking.

When the rest of the crew had decided which way we needed to go, I pulled myself to my feet and started moving again. I really wanted to just take my pack off and curl up in a ball, but I had to stay with the crew.

We walked for another 15 minutes to a half and hour. And then a cheer came from the front of the line – “We made it!”

We walked into the campsite and sat down in “pack circle”. For pack circle, everyone had to sit down in a circle and we talked for a minute before splitting up to take care of “EGGS”.

Essentials – going to the bathroom, getting a drink, etc.
Group – taking out all of the group gear and piling it up.
Group – taking care of setting up tarps, getting dinner going, filtering water, etc.
Special – Um… We never had anything “special”. LOL

On this particular night, I took care of my essentials, and then started unloading the group gear from my pack. Which means, I pulled the extra strings out and threw them on the pile. 🙂

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part six of day three, click here.

We hiked out from the rocks ready to go on. The next part of our journey would bring us to one of the peaks of Grandfather Mountain!

It was pretty hard – there were some rocks that were over half as tall as me, so trying to get up those, (even with the trekking pole I borrowed from Maggie) was really hard. The others had a hard time with it, but they were also taller then me. I think that was what made it easier on them – the fact that their waist was always taller then the rock and half of the time their knees were too. The rocks were almost always over my knees for this part.

But I managed to get myself up there, and I was not slowing the crew down too much! That was always a bonus, when that happened. It did not happen that often, so when it did it made me really happy. 😀

We kept climbing, and soon enough it leveled out a bit more. Actually, I think it just seemed like that because there were no more of those big boulders. That made such a huge difference!

Just hiking, hiking and more hiking. Then all of a sudden, we were standing on a bunch of rocks at the edge of a cliff! My crewmates who were in the front shouted that we had reached the summit and everyone cheered. We were so happy to be there! We had finally made it!

View from Grandfather Mountain.

One of Grandfather Mountain’s other peaks.

Like I said before, the pictures don’t do it any justice. I wish I had brought a better camera – Colter got the better camera, and he broke it. LOL

We all just stood around and stared for a minute. Katie told us that we had to stay one body length away. Like, if someone were to lay down with his feet at the very edge, we had to stay past his head.

Someone asked if they had to stay their body length away from the edge, or my body length.

I don’t remember who it was, I just remember that I glared at that person for the next couple of hours, whenever they looked at me. 😀

Ok, not really. By then I knew that I was going to be teased about my height, and I had decided to mostly accept it. LOL

Then the girls decided that they were going to get a girls picture at the top of the mountain.

Left to right: Maggie, Sarah Margaret, Tullia, Jordan, Rebecca, Me.

In case you couldn’t tell, we could not decide whether we were doing silly faces or not. 😀 I’m not sure whose arm that is, and that is Luke’s head behind my elbow.

The beauty was unbelievable. I wish I could find the words to describe it, but I can’t. It was just so gorgeous – and I had thought that the view from the rocks before was amazing!

Jen told us that we had to get moving if we wanted to get to our campsite before dark. We reluctantly shouldered our packs and started move out. At least, we thought we were. Then someone remembered that someone was going to the bathroom down the trail we needed to take to get down the mountain.

We waited for a minute, and then whoever it was came back. (Just another detail I don’t remember. :)) We all stood back up and got ready to move down the trail. Then out of the blue Bobby asked me to take his picture at the summit. I guess he wanted a picture with just himself, and waited for everyone else to leave? I told him we had to hurry and pulled my camera out.

I put this picture in so you could see the trash bag, not because it was a great picture. 🙂 That was the smaller of the two bags. The majority of that trash came from the hole in the ground.

Bobby on the top of the mountain with the bag of trash in his hand.

Then Bobby and I started down the trail at a fast pace, trying to catch up to everyone else. It didn’t take long – when we caught up to them the rest of the crew was standing still, waiting to get over our next obstacle.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part five of day three, click here.

With my broken trekking pole put away, I was free to look around. We were standing in a little (emphasis on little) clearing, with trees and rocks surrounding us. To my right was a big pile of rocks. It seemed that Bobby wanted to climb those rocks, but he had been told that it was his job to make sure everyone stayed right there and did not go wandering off. 😀 I had to keep reminding him not to leave while we waited for everyone else. Then he said he had to go to the bathroom, so I get stuck telling everyone that we all had to stay in the tiny clearing. LOL

By the time Bobby was back, we were all up there. We had all dropped our packs, so we were all just sitting on our packs waiting for the last people to get back from going to the bathroom. Then Jen and Katie told us we could go up over those rocks. I moved to the side just in time – I would have been knocked over by all the guys charging from behind me. 😀

Ok, just kidding there.

Mostly. 😀

When I got up there I was amazed! The view was so gorgeous! I remember turning to Jen and saying that it was amazing, and seeing her just nod her head.

View from the rocks.

View from the rocks.

*Let me just say, the cameras don’t show half of the beauty. You really have to go out there and see it with your own eyes. :)*

Once everyone had gotten enough pictures of the view, we gathered for a group photo. Rebecca and Tullia are not in this one, since for some reason they did not come up there for awhile.

From left to right. Standing: Ben, Kayce, Bruce, Me, Maggie, Jordan, Sarah Margaret. Sitting: Luke, Bobby

Everyone reluctantly put their cameras away so we could climb down from there. There were a lot of people looking back as they left, hoping to catch one more glimpse of the beauty around us.

I left those rocks, blown away by the beauty I had seen. And completely unprepared for what was going to come next.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part four of day three, click here.

The next ladder had two pieces to it. There first section was at about a 75 degree angle, and the other was probably a 45 degree angle. You can kind of see it in the bottom of this picture that Jen took.

I was starting to freak out again. I decided that I really, really, really hated ladders, and that I was never going to climb one (with something other then myself), ever again. I was the second to last crew member up this ladder – Maggie (the blond girl in the photo) was the spotter, so she was the last.

I started climbing up the first section. It was not much harder then the first ladder we had climbed. Then I got to the second section and stopped for a second to see how I was going to get into the position that the second part required. I was going to have to mostly crawl, but my knees could not go on the rungs. So it was this weird pose with only your feet and hands actually touching the ladder.

I’m not really sure how I managed to get up over the second half of that ladder. Maggie and Bruce were really supportive of me, telling me that I was going to make it, that I was doing just fine, and that they were not going to let me fall. Bruce told me I just had to get up to him and he would help me get off the ladder. That helped a lot, knowing that there was someone waiting to pull me off. 🙂

I think that this was when I finally started trusting my crew. I had been struggling with trusting my crew. It’s not their fault, it was all in my head. But climbing over those ladders, I realized how much I needed to trust them. Because if I was going to be spending two weeks in the woods with them, I needed to know that they had my back. And I also needed to be there for the rest of my crew, ready to help them when I could.

I got to the top, where I had to step over the top rung again. Bruce pretty much pulled me over that rung and kept me from falling flat on my face again. 😀 I thanked him and headed up the trail a bit to where everyone else was standing.

As soon as Maggie and Jen were up the ladder, we started again. I think there were one or two more ladders then, but I can’t remember exactly.

Then we came to these big rocks standing right where we needed to go, with no ladders. Katie asked who had the “bear hang” rope, and whoever it was pulled it our. Then Katie took the rope, took her pack off, and climbed up the rock to fasten the rope for us.

Katie climbing up to fasten the rope.

*Now that I think about it, this might have been before the ladders. I’m not really sure…*

We started climbing it, using the rope to pull our bodies up. The guys practically ran up those rocks – the girls took it a little slower. I actually went faster then I thought I would, because it was pretty easy. But while I was climbing it, my trekking pole broke! This was a big deal for me, because without the trekking pole I was going to go even slower. It is amazing how much those things help. Especially when your ankle is hurting, because you can put a lot of the weight that you would normally put on that foot, on the trekking poles.

Katie decided that it was not going to get fixed, and told me to put it in my backpack. I went over to Luke, who was standing right there. I held the poles out and said “Luke, can you…” He cut me off and said that Dora broke the pole, Dora had to carry the pole. I asked him if he would just stick it in my pack for me, and he did it.

Oh yeah – Dora was my nickname. 🙂

Apparently Luke bestowed that name upon me because I was short, I wore a purple shirt, I had khaki pants, and I had a huge backpack.

See?

I don’t remember when that started, but I do remember that we would start hiking every morning, and almost everyday someone would start singing the Dora the Explorer theme song. And there were constant references to Dora. And when Luke asked me if I knew Spanish, I knew exactly why he was asking. 😀

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part three of day three, click here.

We spent about a half an hour picking up the litter around the shelter. We were surprised – we had been told that there was a ton of trash, and there was barely any! Jen looked out over the cliff, saw a bunch of trash on a ledge off to the side, and took Luke down there to get that. There still was not that much, so we kept looking.

Then Katie saw some trash under a little rock overhang. There was an insane amount of trash in there! She and Jen spent twenty minutes getting all of the trash out from under there. They even had to get long sticks, because their arms could not reach to the back of the cavern. They used the sticks to pull the trash from the back, and then they would toss it over their shoulder to us.

(You can see a picture of them pulling the trash out here.)

After they had gotten all of the trash out, it was time to move on. We still had a lot of ground to cover! Jen asked who was going to carry the two trash bags, and we all just looked at each other. I don’t remember who ended up carrying them, because they were switching back and forth and no one had them for too long.

We started hiking. Past the shelter, past the rock ledge that had been hiding all of that trash, past the kitchen where we had eaten, and back out onto the trail. I was in the lead, since I was being the slowest. My ankle was still really bothering me, and it was affecting my pace.

We had been warned that morning that there were going to be ladders. We had been warned at lunch that they were coming up. But I was not ready to turn a corner in the trail and see a huge ladder going up over a rock slab.

Jen and Katie told us what we were going to be doing, and as soon as they were able to the guys were at that ladder. I let them pass me – I did not need to be the first up there! I was really starting to freak out about it. I was so small, and I had a huge pack on my back, and I was sure that my pack was going to pull me down off the ladder once I had gotten a little bit up there and I was going to get hurt.

When it was my turn, I climbed up the little ledge leading to the ladder, crouched the way they said would work best, and started climbing. I found that if I kept my back at a certain angle, it did not pull me away from the ladder as much. It was still pulling me down though, and it was tough making it over those last couple of rungs. It did not help that the rungs were so thick – they were about as thick as two or three 2×4’s stacked together. I could not get my hands around them, which made it easier for my hands to slip. I was able to keep my grip though, and got up to the top two or three rungs. There I was going to have to get off the ladder, and I started freaking out again.

The second to last rung was level with the ground, and I was going to have to step over the top rung. I started shuffling my feet, trying to get my body in the best position possible to make it over that rung. Bruce (who was waiting at the top) told me that I could do it, that he was not going to let me fall. I managed to get the first foot over the top rung and not fall over backwards. So far, so good. I tried to get the other foot over, almost made it, almost fell onto my face, and grabbed at Bruce so I wouldn’t.

He pulled me back up to my feet and I walked over to where all of the other guys were standing. They congratulated me on getting up, and then continued talking about how awesome that had been, and how excited they were to do another ladder…

I ignored them. I decided that I was NOT going to think about having to do any more ladders, and I was going to pray that God would make the rest of the ladders easier then this one. Since I had handled this one, I was going to be fine on the rest of them if they were easier!

The next one was one of the hardest.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part two of day three, click here.

We hiked for what seemed forever. I started out near the back, with Jen. Everyone was talking, asking their “newlywed” partner questions random questions. Like, really random.

 “If you were a creature from a myth, what would you be?”

“If you could be a character in a movie, what movie and who would you be?”

“How old were you when you lost your first tooth?”

“If you could learn any language in the world, what language?”

“If a famous singer was going to write a song about you, who would it be and what kind of song would it be?”

And then there were the not so random questions.

“How many pets do you have?”

“Are you a cat or a dog person?” (I think everyone on my crew except me was a dog person. :D)

“How many siblings do you have?”

“What is your favorite TV show?”

“What is your favorite food?”

 I warned Jen that we were probably going to lose, since I was not going to be able to remember anything she told me. When I am tired, things go in one ear and right out the other. I don’t even realize that it is happening, until someone asks me a question. Then I realize that I have completely forgotten whatever they were saying about 4 minutes ago. It’s not good, but I have not figured out a way to fix it yet. 🙁

After we had hiked for a couple of hours, we made it to where we were going to be eating lunch! It was a good thing – I was really hungry that day. It was also where we were going to be doing our first service project. We dropped our packs and looked around the place for a minute. There was a little clearing, and a shelter overlooking a cliff. Next to the clearing was an area of trees with spaces in front of them, with a bit of litter. There was also some brush on the other side with even more litter. When we were done looking around, most of us went and crashed in the shelter, glad for a break.

At that point, whoever was on food that day was getting it out. They were setting up the kitchen in a little clearing away from the shelter, so I grabbed my bowl, spoon, water bottle, and black mat and headed over there. I set my stuff down and headed back to the shelter. I asked Katie about something I could use to get the splinter in my finger out, since it was started to get infected. We disinfected a safety pin and I picked out the splinter, which took a while. By the time I was done with that, lunch was ready. I disinfected the safety pin again, put some triple antibiotic ointment on my finger, and walked over to the kitchen.

Lunch that day was simple – peanut butter and honey on Pita bread. It was not that bad!  It made me laugh though, because from what I remember most of us were not having plain peanut butter and honey. Some of us were adding cinnamon, (that was me… :)) and some of us were adding things like Texas Pete (hot sauce) and garlic powder. Honestly, I think that was disgusting. Everyone who tried it liked it though!

When we were done with lunch we cleaned up, and went back to the shelter. Jen and Katie asked who had the trash bags, and Luke pulled them out of his pack. Our first service for our trip was going to be cleaning up this campsite, picking up all the litter.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part one of day three, click here.

I’m not 100% sure what we had for breakfast that day. (C’mon – I can’t remember two weeks worth of meals. I’m not THAT good! :D) But I think it might have been granola. That granola was amazing! There were apple bits in it, and it was so sweet and it was just amazing. 🙂 I LOVED that granola.

After breakfast I grabbed my food bag and headed back to camp. I set my stuff down and went over to where Jen was sitting with the first aid kit and anyone with blisters. We decided that we were going to keep my blisters covered, and then we moved on to my ankle.

Jen had me take both of my boots off and she compared my ankles. She said my hurt ankle was swollen, so she wrapped it in the crew’s ace bandage. She also said that she would have the crew take the group gear from my pack.

She called the crew together and asked who would like to carry weight for me. She did not mention me by name, and I don’t know if anyone else knew it was me… But when Bruce and Luke said they would, I thanked them, so they knew then. I went over to my pack and found the tarp, and the repair kit. I kept the extra strings – they did not weigh much and they were kind of annoying to have in your pack, so I figured I could keep them. I brought the tarp and repair kit over to the guys, and Bruce took the tarp and Luke took the repair kit. I thanked them and went back over to my pack and repacked it a bit.

Then Katie called us all into a circle. She said we were going to play another game. She told us all to think of someone (who was in the circle) in our heads. Then when she said go, we were going to stare at that person as hard as we could. If you thought of each other, and your eyes met, you were out. And you had to remember who you had gotten out with.

It took three or four rounds, but in the end we were all paired up. I was with Jen. Then Katie announced that we were going to be playing a game called Newlyweds. We had all just gotten married!

Katie explained the game better. You had to answer questions (that she would think up) about your partner. And as she was turning to leave, she said, “And I’m thinking up the questions, so tell each other crazy things!”

I knew I was not going to be good at this. When I get tired, I can’t remember anything. Like, if someone tells me something to tell everyone else, when I go to tell everyone else (five minutes later), I can’t remember a thing I was supposed to tell them! That’s how bad it was.

So I told Jen that I would do my best, but I could not remember things. She said that was ok, we would just do our best.

Then we all put our packs on and stood together for our first group photo!

The crew, ready to leave camp!

(Jen and Katie have a better quality picture up on the NCOBS FB page. It’s larger, so you can see everyone’s faces better…)

Once we were done taking pictures with the 6 or 7 different cameras (including mine) that had been shoved at Jen when she announced that she was taking a picture, we left! We said goodbye to the ladies, (remember them from the last part?) and walked away from the sleeping area, past the kitchen, and back onto the trail, mostly ready to start again. 😀

Click here to read the next part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part five of day two, click here.

I woke up the morning of the third day and wrote in my journal.

Well, yesterday was our first whole day. I am so sore!! I mean, the pack weighs probably close to half as much as I do, and we hiked over four miles of steep mountain trails.

I felt so bad – I had to keep stopping everyone so I could get my breath back. And it seemed like every time we stopped someone would complain, saying that we should just keep on going, that they wanted to get to our campsite. At least everyone else appreciated the breaks! They did not say it, but I could tell that even the people who were complaining needed the breaks. But the complaining still made me feel bad…

I think I am going to become good friends with everyone here. The guys are really nice! Luke gave me his trekking pole because I was having trouble. It helped so much! And then Kayce helped Luke with my water duty while I was getting my blister looked at. Bobby makes me laugh – some of the things he says are so funny! Ben is different from the rest of the guys, but not in a bad way. And I have not seen much of Bruce yet, but he seems nice enough! He made sure that I did not get whacked in the face with branches coming up that first hill, so that was really nice…

Before I could write anymore, it was time to get up and pack up all the gear. We got the tarp down,  got most of our personal gear packed up, and then split up for our “roles” that day. I was on water again, this time with Maggie.

I think Jordan and Tullia came with us, and Rebecca might have as well. We grabbed the baby seals, the water bottles, and the red bag (with the filters and the bleach in it) and headed for the creek. On the way there my ankle started hurting again, but there was nothing I could do other then be careful about where I was putting my foot and being careful. I told myself I would tell Jen about it as soon as I caught up to them at the creek.

I got to the creek a minute or two behind the others. I had not lost sight of them, I had just fallen behind a bit. I got over to the creek and explained to Jen why I was behind them, and she told me she would look at it when we got back to camp.

We filtered the water quickly, because breakfast was waiting! We got back and I was surprised to see gear that was not ours sitting on the ground. A quick look around revealed that there were two ladies inspecting the different platforms, diciding which one they were going to sleep on. They decided on the platform Jen and Katie had slept on, and started setting their stuff up on it.

Then, I grabbed my stuff and headed over to the kitchen.

Click here to read the next part of Day Three

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part four of day two, click here.

Once the tarp was set up we grabbed our bowls and spoons, water bottles, foam mats (to sit on) and headlamps and headed for the “kitchen”, another room in our “house”. We set our stuff down and stood up for Dinner Circle.

For dinner circle, we all stood in a circle and held hands or linked elbows. I think everyone else preferred elbows, but I liked holding hands better. Because after our announcements and appreciations, and after the quote, we either squeezed hands or jerked elbows all the way around the circle. And if someone yanked on my elbow, it would pull me off balance. Plus, the people who I always sat next to were the tall ones, so linking elbows with them was not the most comfortable experience. 😀

After we had passed the movement the whole way around the circle, we all sat down again. You could bring your black foam mat (that you slept on) with you, or you could beg a seat on someone else’s mat. I brought my own mat most of the time, and I almost always shared it with one or two of the guys who had forgotten to bring theirs. (See, I was able to find a way to be prepared in the wilderness too! LOL)

We had a sort of stew with mashed potatoes that night, and I really enjoyed it! The mashed potatoes were really good, and the stew was not bad. And to make it even better, it was from my food bag, so it was less weight for me to carry! 😀

Once I was done eating I cleaned out my bowl, (it was nasty, greasy water again..) and headed back to the tarp to put my stuff away. I guess I did not see a root in the way, because the next thing I know I was down in the dirt, with my foot on its side in an extremely painful position. I hopped over to the girls platform and cried for a minute, holding my ankle. Then I tried putting a little bit of weight on it, and while it was painful, it was bearable. Then other people started coming back from the kitchen so I wiped the tears off my face and put on a smile.

After everyone had put their bowls in their food bag we took care of the bear hang. I stayed out of the way – I was too short to help much, and I just seemed to get in the way when I tried to help. So I stayed out of the way and gave everyone moral support. 🙂

When we were done with the bear hang we moved over to the open space in the middle of camp and played a game. The game is called Essence, and it is a guessing game.

The person who is it turns his/her back, and the other players decide on another one of the other players to be the person “It” is guessing about. They have to all agree, and they can’t make any noise while doing this because then “It” will know who the person they are choosing is. It was really funny watching everyone point their fingers at various people, realize they were not going to get that person and point at another person who had more fingers pointing at him.

The round I remember most had Ben as “It” and I was the person everyone was pointing at. They all put their fingers down and told Ben he could turn around.

Then “It” asks one of the people in the circle questions about the person they had picked, in this case me. Essence was a really interesting game to play at that point in time, because none of us knew each other really well. Because “It” can not ask questions like, “what color hair does this person have?”

“It” has to ask questions like, “If this person went into a hat store, would they buy a propeller hat or a party hat?” (yes, this was one of the questions asked).

I think Ben asked Bobby that, and he answered propeller hat. Which is wrong – I would have bought something like a baseball cap. 😀 But if I had to pick between a propeller hat and a party hat, I would probably pick party hat.

After a few other questions, (like “would this person rather wear blue jeans and a t-shirt or party clothes?”) Ben turned to me and asked me a question. I think it was something like “Would this person rather tell people that they had won a million dollars or _____ (I forget what the other option was)?”

I thought about it for a minute, and said the million dollar one. I thought I did a pretty good job at concealing that it was me, but after two more questions Ben asked the crew if it was me.

I told everyone that they had done a pretty good job – I was definitely a blue jeans/t-shirt kinda girl, but I would NOT have picked a propeller hat. Bobby’s reaction to that was pretty funny… He told me that he had me totally pegged out as a propeller hat girl, and that I had disappointed him. I just laughed at that. 😀

We played a couple of rounds of Essence, then it was time for Twilight Meeting. Since it was dark by then, Jen set up our “campfire” – a water bottle with a headlamp strapped to it. It made the whole water bottle glow, and sent a pretty glow around the circle. 🙂

Jen and Katie started off Twilight Meeting by telling us about how Outward Bound started, and explaining what the symbol means. The blue background with the white square on it is known as the “Blue Peter” flag, and it is the flag ships fly when they are going outward bound – leaving the known space, the safe harbor, the white square, for the unknown, the open sea, the blue background.

The Blue Peter Flag

They told us how, in 1967 a man named Kurt Hahn started Outward Bound to train sailors how to survive naval battles. Some of those sailors were younger then me! And they were getting killed right and left. So Kurt Hahn started a school to teach those sailors how to survive. And he did it, too! The sailors that went through his school were not quitters – they kept going no matter what.

There was more, but I can’t remember it…

After that we went to bed. I got the edge again, since no one else wanted it and I did not mind it. I actually thought it was nice to be on the edge -if you needed to pee in the middle of the night you were not crawling over people. 🙂

Overall, it was a great second day! I learned more about my crew, learned to trust them more, and had a pretty fun time while doing it, so that was a good thing. 😀

Click here to read the first part of Day Three.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part three of day two, click here.

We left the creek with full water bottles, ready to go again. We were hiking along at a pretty steady pace, not taking a lot of breaks. We did have to stop every once in a while, because Bobby would see a blackberry bush. And then he would stop walking and eat all the blackberries he could pick before someone would tell him to start moving again. 😀

Bobby eating blackberries.

I was never one of the ones who told him to get moving again – I was always glad for the breaks. I think my pack weighed about 40-50 pounds that day, which is almost or over half of my body weight! (I don’t weigh that much. :D) So the hiking was really exhausting me.

It probably did not help that my pack was not adjusted right! We were taking a break right before a big turn to the left, and I asked Jen to look at my pack. She pulled a couple straps, had me pull a few, and it felt A LOT better! The weight was sitting more on my hips, instead of my shoulders, the brain (top of the backpack) was not hurting my neck, and those two changes made a huge difference.

We started walking again. It got a bit easier for a little bit, and then got hard. I was having trouble keeping up, and there was a pretty big gap between me and Bobby.

What my view was supposed to be…

So I got put up in the front of the line, which was a lot of pressure. I felt like I had to go faster so I would not disappoint anyone, and I was just burning myself out. Katie (who was right behind me) told me to slow down, that it was ok to go a bit slower. I slowed down a bit and it was easier, but it was still really hard. I was able to keep going though!

We finally made it to the campsite! I was so happy – we had done it! We had completed our first hike with only a few small injuries. Mainly, blisters and bug bites. 🙂 There were times during that hike (during the last bit) where I had thought I was not going to make it to the camp site, that I was going to need to take a break. But I was always able to keep going, and because of that we made it to camp and were able to eat dinner in the light! Eating and putting up tarps in the light was always a huge blessing…

We all got out our group gear and put it in the room of our “house” known as the “Gear-age”. AKA a certain area by a tree. 😀 The cooks grabbed the food, pots, fuel and the kitchen bag and went over to where we were cooking that night. I pulled the tarp out of my backpack and the girls and I walked over to the platform that we were going to be sleeping on that night. Yep, we got platforms that night! Some of the people did not like the platforms – I did not care. It was a place to sleep.

Since Jen was helping the cooks, Katie showed us how to do the tarp knots. There was only one knot, but it was not a very easy one, in my opinion. I don’t know it’s proper name – we just called it the Four Knot.

We set up our tarp the best we could. The platforms made it difficult, since our tarps are rectangular and the platforms are square. And I did a horrible job with the knots – Sarah Margaret had to come and re-do my knots, since I could not figure out how to do it correctly. But we did our best, and we did not get wet that night!

The girls tarp the first night we set it up.

Now that I think about it, we probably did not get wet because it did not rain that night, not because we did a great job with the tarp. 😀

Ok, just kidding. We did a great job with the tarp, it was just that the platforms made it almost impossible to have a pretty tarp. 🙂

Click here to read the next part of Day Two.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*

To read part two of day two, click here.

As the creek came into view, I felt like cheering. I was so hungry! We got to the edge of the water and people started dropping their packs, only to hear that we were going on a bit longer to find a good spot to eat. We groaned, but put our packs back on. We walked up the trail a bit and then cut straight up the hill to a little open spot. It was on a ridiculous slant, but it was mostly open and it was close to the water.

While the cooks started getting the food out, (we were having burritos!! :D) Luke and I took the water filtration bags, empty water bottles, and dromedaries (we also called them baby seals or droms) down to the creek. He and I were on Water Management that day, so we had to filter water when we could.

To filter water you had to fill up the filters with water from a creek. They strained out anything that might be in the water. Then you added bleach to the water. 1 drop for a bottle, three for a small baby seal, and five for the large baby seal.

We had to get down the creek – there were a couple of trees down across the creek that made it hard. And we had to get in the water but not get our boots wet, so that made it harder too. We managed to do it without slipping, (which was pretty amazing…) and we made it to where there was a little waterfall (a couple of inches), so we could fill up the bags easily.

When you had filled the filter bags with water you had to hang them up somewhere because it was gravity that made the whole thing work. So you hung it up high and let the water come through the clear, plastic hose into whatever you were filling up.

Once we had water filtering into the baby seals we went up the trail to where we were eating. We passed our bowls and got our food. It was so good! We got a tortilla, salsa, beans and lots of cheese. Actually, on this trip we got cheese at least once a day, if not twice. It became a crew joke, how much cheese we were eating. 😀

When we were done eating, Luke and I went back down to the water. We finished filling up the baby seals and water bottles, and we were ready to move down the trail again.

I don’t really remember what happened then. I remember there was a lot more hiking…

A couple hours later we came to another creek. Kayce helped Luke with filtering water while I got a “hot spot” (possible blister) on my foot taken care of. I actually felt sorry for Rebecca, who had the first aid kit in her backpack. We had to get it out to treat blisters so many times! It seems like we were taking it out at every break those first couple of days…

We were still at the creek filtering water (I was done treating my blister by then) when all of a sudden a man came running down the trail ahead of us, barely slowed down to cross the creek and started running back where we had come from. I thought that he was insane – who would want to go running on a trail where he could hurt himself anywhere? I can tell you that I would never do that! I don’t have a problem with people who do, but I just think that is is asking for a hurt ankle or leg or something. 🙂

Then some of the guys found some crayfish upstream, so they spent some time trying to catch them. Luke abandoned me to go join in the chase, and Kayce came back and helped me finish filtering the water.

It was pretty funny watching Bruce, Bobby, and Luke chase that crayfish all around the creek… They did not actually catch it, but they certainly tried! 😀

Click here for the next part of Day Two.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here.*