To read part one of day two, click here.

We hiked out from our campsite in good moods, ready to start our adventure. We hiked for about two minutes, and then we were at a road that we had to cross. We all lined up along the edge of the road, with Jen and Katie at the ends of the line. Jen and Katie called out “Clear!” after checking for cars, and we moved across the road in a line.

Then we started walking up the trail that was there, if you could call it a trail. It was more like a deer path. And it had a pretty good elevation change – I don’t remember what it was, but it was pretty steep! I was up close to the front – I think Bruce and Jen were the only two in front of me. We had not gotten far when we heard the first “Red Light!” of the trip.

This time it was because Jordann had fallen, and she was laughing so hard she could not get back up! She managed to get back up, and we started back up the trail.

I have no idea how far that first section of the trail was, but it seemed pretty far to me! I tried to just keep up, and I think I did a pretty good job of it. I only got caught on the thorns once, and I was able to get myself unstuck and catch back up to Bruce.

We reached the top of that little trail where it started going along the Blue Ridge Parkway. There was a huge retaining wall (it was way over my head)to our left, and a pretty steep hill to our right. So we stuck pretty close to the wall until it dropped down to probably about 2-3 feet tall. Then we climbed over it – at least, everyone else did. I got pulled over it. 😀

Then we had another road to cross. We did it the same way as we had crossed the first road, with everyone in a line along the side of the road.

Then we walked along the side of the road for a bit. The trail we were going to be taking started up in an parking lot somewhere ahead, so we did not have to worry about missing it.

I was just walking along, being amazed at the view. There were so many gorgeous views on this trip, and the crappy camera I had did not do them justice. But I took a couple of ok pictures, so I’ll include those with the proper day. 🙂

The view walking next to the Blue Ridge Parkway

After a few minutes we made it to the parking lot. There were several cars parked there, and just past them was the trail. I don’t know about anyone else, but I know I was very happy to see that it was a proper trail, not like the trail we had just been on.

We took a quick water break there at the bottom of the trail. The water break became a longer break when several dogs and their owners came by. Every time we saw a dog we would stop for a bit and exclaim over the dog. (Everyone was missing their dogs, so they all wanted to love on the ones we saw on the trail.)

Taking a break.  From left to right: Bobby, Maggie, Ben, Tullia, and Kayce

The road we walked next to, with the mountains in the background

After we started walking again, we only stopped 4 or 5 times for water breaks. I was a bit further back this time, since Luke and Bobby had gone ahead of me so they could talk with Jen. I’m not really sure what happened next – it all happened so fast! I just remember Luke down on the ground next to the trail, about to fall off the mountain. I remember that Bruce and Bobby had him by his ankle and his arms (I think that’s where they grabbed him…) They pulled him back up onto the trail and pulled him onto his feet. It seems that he had been stepping out of the way to avoid a bee, and he had gone a little too far. After he assured us he was ok, we started walking again. But I noticed that he was walking a bit closer to the uphill side of the mountain then he had before! 😀

We hiked for a good 2+ hours before stopping for lunch. It had been a busy day so far:

• We had woken up at around 6:30 (I think that’s when everyone else woke up… I know I woke up at about 6:00).
• We had packed up the camp, eaten breakfast, had the poop talk, and had our navigation lesson and were leaving the camp at about 10:00.
• We had taken somewhere around an hour to get up that one trail, so we had hiked that until 11:00.
• And then we had hiked for another two hours or so after we crossed the road.

So it was around 1:30 when we decided that we were going to get to the creek that was coming up before we ate. Everyone was getting hungry, and we were starting to run out of water. Lets just say that we were all really glad when we could hear the creek. 😀

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 my first day, click here.

To see a picture the instructors took of us in our campsite, click here.

I woke up the second day to the crickets chirping (they were even louder than they had been the night before!) just in time to see the sun start peeking out from over the trees. Since everyone else was still asleep and I knew that I was not going to fall back asleep, I pulled out some postcards and wrote to Mom, Grandma and Grammy, telling them a bit about my first day.

Then Jen and Katie were moving around in their tarp, whispering and laughing as they started putting their stuff away. I put the postcards away – I could finish them another day. I started packing up my stuff, knowing that I wanted to be ready as soon as I could be. No need to be the slowest person to pack up!

Jen came around to wake us up by whistling. She was really good at whistling! A few of the girls woke up, and we were able to get the other girls awake. The other girls started putting their gear away, (sleeping bags, black foam mats, and clothes sacks) and getting dressed, so I got back to work. I had gotten an ok amount of sleep, the birds were singing, Jen was whistling, I could hear the other kids talking… It was a pretty good morning.

It was made even better when I learned what was for breakfast. Bagels! I love bagels, and these were no exception. They were cinnamon raisin bagels with cream cheese and apple butter. It was delicious! And for a bonus? It tasted like real cream cheese, even though it was not. 😀

After we had cleaned out our bowls, (the water was not that bad this time… :)) it was time to learn to poop and still Leave No Trace. Someone went and grabbed the poop bag, and we all walked pretty far away from camp. You had to poop far enough away from camp that you could not smell it from camp, and your poop spot also had to be far from water.

Inside the poop bag was one roll of special toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and a folding shovel. The shovel had been named already – the first person to use the shovel on the course gets the honor. The name? Princess.

The boys protested. They wanted to call it Thor instead. But Jen insisted that Princess was it’s name, so Princess it was.

One of the things that was hard for me on this trip was that there was no privacy whatsoever. You needed to go poop? You had to ask around and find out who had Princess. You would get back and everyone would ask how your date with Princess went, and if you had had fun. That was a little funny, asking the guys how their date with Princess went, but it was also kinda embarrassing. All though, I think I was the only one who actually got embarrassed by anything there…

Once we were done with the poop talk, we went back to the sleeping area to split up the group gear. Katie asked us to each stand behind a pile of group gear. I chose a pile that looked like it did not weigh as much as some of the others. I did not want to take too much weight and make it harder on myself! I ended up with a tarp, extra strings, and the repair kit.

You know what I found out? Those tarps are surprisingly heavy! The repair kit and strings did not weigh that much, but the tarp was pretty heavy. But that was the pile I had stood with, so I was stuck with it! It did not really matter though- everyone else had pretty heavy piles too.

We each grabbed our group gear and dragged it up to where our backpacks were. We were taught how to load our backpack with craftsmanship. Then it was time for our compass and navigation lesson. We split up into two groups – one group went with Jen to learn about maps, and the rest of us went with Katie to learn about our compasses. We were told that we needed to have our compass and whistle with us at all times – even if we went to the bathroom in the middle of the night.

I knew how a compass worked, but Katie taught us some of the ways we would be using it on our trip. Then my group went over to talk with Jen and learn about how a contour line works on the types of maps we used. (I don’t remember what the maps were called – I forgot about 30 minutes after Jen told us…)

When we were done with “Navigation 101” we put our backpacks on and learned how to tighten up the straps so it would fit comfortably and put the weight where our bodies would carry it best. I don’t think I learned very well – Jen had to help me adjust it later on in the day.

Then we decided to play a game of Ninja before we went out on the trail. I had Rebecca on one side, and Bobby on the other side (I think…). I was doing really well! Over half of the people were out, and only a couple of the people left had both arms. I still had both of mine, and then when I was talking to Bobby, Rebecca came and hit my arm so hard it gave me a bruise. LOL

So I had one arm left, and I managed to get one of Bobby’s arms. I think Rebecca got my other arm then so I was out, but I’m not 100% sure.

Later I was talking with Bobby, and he asked me why I was so good at Ninja. While we were playing the game, I had thought he was actually scared of me. Now I know that he was just playing. But back then I thought he was actually scared of me. Let’s just say I learned a lot about the kids on my crew by being with them for two weeks. 🙂

I told him that I had five brothers and he just grinned at me. I don’t think he believed that was the reason I was so good at Ninja. Now I have to admit, it was probably the best game of Ninja I’ve ever played. But my brothers have taught me to always be on my guard, and I have gotten good at avoiding anything that might be coming at me – a punch, kick, or an arm that is trying to hit mine. 🙂

After we decided that the game was taking too long and we were going to need to have a Ninja face-off later, it was time to go! I looked around at our campsite one last time – it had been a good place to start this trip.

As we marched down the trail, I prayed that our next campsite would be as good as that first one!

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 one of my first day, click here.

After we had introduced everyone, we did some group exercises. I don’t remember what it was, I just remember it was something about being a team. Then it was time to start the “duffel shuffle”. Gavin (the driver) had pulled all of our duffel’s out of the trailer and placed them in a pile. We all grabbed our bags and went back to sit in our circle again. Then we all went over to the tarps to get the backpacks out from under them. We started sorting through our clothes, making sure everyone had what they needed. We sorted through everyone’s bug stuff, making sure that there was not too much DEET in them. (Mine did not have any DEET in it… :D)

Then we started packing things in our backpacks. It was amazing how little we put in! We had the clothes we were wearing, and we put a long sleeved shirt, long pants, a fleece jacket, a pair of long underwear, and extra socks in our backpacks. That was pretty much all we had in there! We put two pairs of clean clothes in the resupply bag, and left the rest in our duffels.

Then we took care of all toiletries. We each got our teeth stuff, a hairbrush, sunscreen, and bug stuff. No soap, shampoo, razors, or anything like that. At least I was able to bring some soap to clean my retainers with! (I feel like it gets them cleaner, and towards the end of the trip I was extremely glad I had a way to get them really clean).

Taking care of all of that took forever. It was starting to get dark by the time we were done, and we had not even had dinner yet! At least Katie had gone to make it, so we knew it was coming!

When we were done with the clothing it was time for personal gear. We each took two water bottles and labeled them, we each took out our spoon and bowl and labeled them. We made sure that everyone had different marks on their stuff so no one was mixing them up.

Once we were done with the personal stuff, then it was time to explain how to pee. I know I was embarrassed for this part, but I don’t think anyone else was. Towards the end of the trip, I started to not mind as much. Just a word of warning – I am going to be writing about this trip like it was. I want to be able to read this and remember exactly what happened. If talk of going to the bathroom bothers you, you might not want to keep reading my story. Just sayin’. 🙂

Anyway, it was time for the pee talk. Katie explained that you have to go 200 feet away from camp. (I honestly don’t remember why…) Then she told us all about the “pee rags”. Each girl had a bandana that she kept tied on the side of her backpack. The boys were warned to stay away from these bandanas at all cost. 🙂

I don’t really remember what happened next. But after whatever we did then, I am pretty sure we each picked a pile of food to carry. We stuffed them into our food bags, carefully identifying what kind of food we had, and which food bag was ours. I had something that did not weigh a lot, (don’t remember…) and my food bag was the orange one with the little purple patch on the bottom. That food bag was then mine for the rest of the trip.

I think after that it was time for dinner. We had already labeled our bowls, spoons and water bottles so we grabbed those and headed down to the kitchen. We were having Mac and Cheese for dinner, and everyone was so excited! We were all really hungry, since it was after 7:00 and we still had not eaten.

The Mac and Cheese was amazing! It was just the first example of how anything can be done in the wilderness with some hard work. 😀 We all really liked the food, just not the clean up part.

To clean your bowl, first you licked it clean or used your finger to clean it. Then you poured some water from your water bottle in it, and drank the water. It doesn’t sound that bad, does it? But I can tell you this – it was REALLY nasty when you had Mac and Cheese for dinner. All cheesy and greasy… *insert an involuntary shudder*

When we were done with dinner, I think we cleaned up and went to bed. I don’t remember exactly… It happened almost three weeks ago, and I can’t even remember what happened less then a week ago. That happens when I get really tired. 🙂

I sat in my sleeping bag, listening. All of the other girls were in their sleeping bags next to me, Jen and Katie were setting up their tarp, the boys were all talking in their tarp. I sat up and looked to see if I could see the guys – they were being so loud! I could see a couple of headlamps under their tarp, but other then that I could not see anything. I lay back down and looked out from under the edge of the tarp at the stars. Since I was on the edge, I could see the stars pretty easily. The trees made it kinda hard in places, but from the clearing I was able to see quite a few. There were so many of them! They were beautiful.

I don’t think anyone (other then the instructors) slept well that night. I know I didn’t! The crickets were so loud, that even when everyone else stopped talking the noise was just so loud that I had trouble falling asleep. And then I woke up and had to pee, which was quite an adventure.

All in all, I think I managed to get around 5 or 6 hours of sleep that night. It’s not enough, but it was not bad for my first night of sleeping outdoors!

And now that I am looking back, I realize that overall it was a really good first day!

Click here to read the first 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.*

**Just so you all know – I am mostly just writing this to preserve my memories. So I am sorry if it is not perfect grammar, or if some of it does not make much sense. :)**

I woke up Friday morning extremely nervous. I was going to be leaving my family for the first time ever, and I was NOT ready.

Cole, Mom, Dad and I were in a hotel room in Ashville, NC. We had gotten there late the night before so that we would be able to sleep in before getting to the airport (where everyone was meeting) by two.

Then Dad’s phone alarm went off. At 6:00. And I could not fall asleep again. So I got on my computer, worked on a blog post and took care of a couple of things that I had not gotten to earlier. By then it was 7, and the hotel breakfast was open. So Colter and I went down to the breakfast room. I tried to eat, but I could not get anything down. I think I had a half of a yogurt container, which is not enough for me. I knew I was going to be hungry later, so I grabbed a bagel and cream cheese to bring back to the room, and some coffee for Dad. Then Colter and I went back up to the room to drop off the food and get into our bathing suits.

The hotel pool opened at eight, so we took our time getting ready. We were down at the pool room by 8:10, ready to get into the water. I did some half-hearted swimming in the pool, and then decided to get into the hot tub. I was hoping that it would calm me down and help me relax. It helped a little bit, but not nearly enough.

I think it was around 10:00 when I decided that it was time to go back to the room and get ready. I was so nervous! I had just been talking to this nice guy in the hot tub about my trip, and all it had done was make me even more nervous. At least by then I had stopped crying – for the past week it seemed like all I had done was cry every time I thought about the trip. It was not like I was trying too… The tears just spilled out everytime I thought about it.

We went back up to the room and I took a nice hot shower, knowing that it would be the last one that I would have in two weeks. It would have been a really long shower, but we had to be out of the room in an hour, and I still had to finish packing up my stuff.

I got out of the shower and got dressed in my outward bound clothes. I regretfully packed my comfy cotton shorts in my bag, knowing that I would be wearing the “quick-dry” shorts for the next two weeks. And I don’t care what they say about quick-dry clothes – they never dry as fast as you want them too. Just sayin’.

We got in the Hulk and started driving to the airport. That was when I started crying again. I was starting to wonder when I was going to run out of tears, and hoping that it was before the rest of my crew got there. I knew that I was going to be the smallest, youngest kid there – I did not need to be known as a cry-baby on top of that. Mom kept trying to point out the beautiful scenery, but I could not appreciate it then. I had been able to appreciate it the day before, but then? I was too busy trying to cry all of my tears before we met the rest of my crew. 🙂

We got to the airport at about 12. We still had two hours before we had to leave, so I had a feeling that we were going to be the first kids there. We walked through the door of the airport and saw a guy with an Outward Bound t-shirt on. We walked over to him and introduced ourselves, and a lady with a clipboard came over too us. We told her our names and she gave me a blue dot to stick on my shirt, and she gave Colter a yellow one. I looked around – there were two boys with a yellow dot sitting in chairs, but no blue dots yet. Mom and Dad told Colter to go over and introduce himself to his crewmates, but all he did was walk over and sit in silence with them. Honestly, I don’t blame him.

I kept watching Julie, the lady with the clipboard. There were a few more boys with yellow stickers, and then there he was. The first guy with a blue sticker. He looked big and shy, and my first thought was, “crap!” Actually, I don’t even remember why I thought that, I just think it is funny. Because looking back at my time with Kayce, I realize that I had nothing to worry about. 🙂

The next person there for the blue group was a big, tall, blond guy. He went to the bathroom to change, and when he was on his way back Dad pointed at him. “You see that guy, Brett? His name is Robert, and you better make friends with him because he is the guy who is going to help you carry all of your stuff when it gets too heavy for you”. I shook my head at Dad and stayed sitting. I was not going over to where the blue group was sitting until I had a girl there. That was when Mom asked me if I was hungry. I told her no, and she dragged me over to buy some snacks anyway. I did not want anything -I actually had not eaten that bagel from the hotel breakfast. I was too nervous to eat anything. But, we got some chocolate covered pretzels and a granola bar, and I stuck them in my bag.

And then the first girl arrived.

It took me a few minutes to realize that she was actually on my crew. I saw the blue dot, but it did not actually sink in until Mom nudged me and told me to go sit by her. I felt like I was going to start crying again, but walked over to her anyway. She was sitting there texting someone, and I don’t think she really noticed when I sat next to her.

She looked up from her phone, and I held out my hand for her to shake. Her name was Maggie, and she was from Pittsburgh. We sat and talked about how nervous we were, and we agreed that we could be nervous together, and that we could cry together when we got homesick.

After that, I forget who came and when. We met one of our instructors, Katie, and we each talked with her about any last minute concerns. By then we only had 2 more girls that we were waiting on.

My crew was starting to know each other – we were all talking, laughing, and starting to have a good time. I kept looking over at Colter’s crew. They were all just sitting there. Actually, I think Colter was talking with one of the other boys. My crew and I agreed that we were going to have more fun then Colter’s crew, since we were only at the airport and already having fun. LOL

We had a girl whose flight was delayed, so we were at the airport till three. Once Tullia got there, it was time to go. Mom and Dad came to me, gave me a hug and said they were leaving, and left. I am surprised that I did not cry – I think it is because I did not have time to realize what was happening.

We got the two crews together in a circle, where Josh, (the course director) handed out some slips of paper with things on them that might happen that would make it hard for us. Things like “you get into camp and it is midnight” and “you have to hike over a 1/4 mile just to get water”. Then he told us a few other things, (that I don’t remember anymore…) and then it was time to load up in the 15 passenger vans. My crew put our duffel bags in the trailer, and then Colter’s crew put their bags in. There was only one trailer, but we were going to meet up with a truck for their duffel’s an hour or so after we left the airport.

I was sitting in the front seat with Maggie and Tullia. At first I was sitting right behind the driver, but then Maggie asked if she could sit there so she could sleep against the window. We switched spots, and Maggie and Tullia both fell asleep. I spent most of that car ride just listening to Luke and Bruce talk in the back seat.

We drove for an hour or so, and then stopped at a Food Lion (a local grocery store, kind of like Kroger) so we could get rid of Crew Nine’s duffels. Colter and I waved goodbye at each other through the car windows, and then we left. After that, I did not see anyone that I had known before Outward Bound, for 12 days.

Camp was still a good hour to an hour and a half away. I ate some of my chocolate covered pretzels and put the rest away for later. I sat and stared out the window, trying not to cry, looking at the gorgeous scenery. I listened to the conversations going on around me, and put in a few words when I thought the other’s might find it interesting.

At about 5:00, we made it to the mountain. We started going up the mountain and kept going. And kept going. And then there was a lady standing on the side of the road, waving and motioning for us to drive off the road onto this little trail. I honestly did not think that we were going to get on that trail with our fifteen passenger van and trailer, but apparently Gavin (the driver) is good at manipulating the trailer. 😀 He managed to get us through, and in about three minutes, we got our first look at our camp.

Two tarps set up in a clearing, with backpacks under them and piles of gear set around the clearing.

That was our camp.

We all got out of the van and stumbled into the clearing. (Literally – I tripped on my way in and almost fell. :)) There we got into a circle, (we were quick to learn that Outward Bound people like circles) and introduced ourselves. That was when we learned that our other instructor was the lady who had been waving, and her name was Jen.

**OK – that’s all I have time to write tonight. Hopefully I can get more written before next Sunday! 😀 **

Click here to read the next part of Day One.