To read part fourteen of day seven, click here.

I looked down at my pita, almost afraid to keep eating. I was still hungry, and I’d already eaten over half of the pita. That was the most I had eaten in the past week!

After a couple of minutes, my pita was gone. I wasn’t hungry anymore, but I had finished the pita. This might not seem like such a big deal, but to me it was. I hadn’t been eating enough since I started the trip. For me to actually finish a whole serving was amazing.

I was cleaning out my bowl when Luke elbowed me.

“Are you going to finish yours?”

I showed him my empty bowl.

“You finished all of yours? I think that’s the first time you haven’t given me some of your food…”

Luke passed his bowl up for seconds, since I didn’t have any extra for him. 😀

After dinner I started cleaning the pots, glad that it was my last day on clean up. I didn’t like clean up. LOL

When we were all done with our duties, we split up for the night. I watched as the boys headed further down the trail before heading towards my own tarp. I wanted to dip my head in the creek before I went to bed!

Click here to read the next part of Day Seven.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part fifteen of day seven, click here.

It was dark as I started walking back to my tarp, so I switched on my headlamp. The light was definitely dimmer than it had been at the beginning of the trip, but it was still bright enough to show me the path.

I could hear the other girls following me and I slowed down so I could walk with them. They caught up to me and I fell to the back of the group, content to follow them because their lights were brighter than mine.

The creek seemed louder than it had been before dinner, and I couldn’t wait to go get wet. I wanted to get my hair rinsed out – it was so greasy, and so nasty. It makes me feel gross just thinking about it.

When we got back to the tarp, I put my food stuff away. A couple of the girls were upset, and I had no idea why. I knew better than to ask though – asking would just make them upset with me, and I didn’t want to start that.

Jen came down to our tarp to check on us.

“Are you girls mostly ready for the night?”

I answered her, glad that even though she wasn’t camped next to us she had come to check on us.

“I think so. I’m pretty sure the tarp is set up well, and I’ve got my bed all laid out.”

“That’s good. Do you want to come down to the creek with me? I want to rinse my hair out.”

Now I could go down to the creek and rinse my hair, but I wouldn’t have to do it alone! That was even better!

“Yes! I would love to. I was actually planning on doing that…”

Jen called out to the other girls “Anyone else who wants to join us is welcome to!”

We started walking towards the creek, being careful to not slip on the mossy rocks as we got closer to it.

Click here to read the last part of Day Seven.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part sixteen of day seven, click here.

I heard footsteps behind us, and it wasn’t long before Jordan caught up to us.

“I want to get my hair wet too! I feel nasty.”

We reached the edge of the creek and I could feel the fear almost immediately. It took me a minute, but I was able to talk myself out of it before it was my turn to dip my head.

When you think “creek”, you don’t think huge rocks, lots of little waterfalls, and water rushing through, around and over rocks as big as a toddler. That’s what this was. It wasn’t a river though – my past two days on the river had taught me that much.

There was a spot right next to the edge of the water where there was a waterfall. We took turns dunking our heads in the waterfall, gasping when the water hit our scalps. It was freezing! I ran my fingers through my hair, brushing it out.

I backed away from the waterfall, letting Jordan have her turn. I didn’t stand up until I had wrung out my hair, trying to get as much water out of it as I could. It was already chilly out, and the water was freezing. I had taken my shirt off so that it wouldn’t get wet, and I didn’t want to have water dripping all over my bare back.

Jordan had brought her comb down, so I asked her if I could borrow it and combed my hair out. When my hair was combed out, I wrung it out again. I stood up, holding my (still dripping) hair away from my back while I put it in a ponytail.

Once Jen and Jordan were done rinsing their hair out, I took my headlamp from the rock I had set it up on. I held it in my hand, deciding not to put it on my freezing cold head. Jen and Jordan grabbed their headlamps too and we headed back up to our tarp,

I said goodnight to Jen and sat down on my sleeping bag, pulling my boots off. I took everything out of my pockets and set it all in my boots, which I put by my head like I normally did. I turned my headlamp off and snuggled down into my sleeping bag, ready to sleep. We were going to be doing our last Service the next day, and I wanted to be ready.

The other girls were talking, and their lights were still on, which made it difficult to fall asleep. As I was waiting for them, I thought about the good things, and the bad things that had happened that day.

That dream had been interesting, and I wondered if I was going to dream the next part of it that night. I made a face as I remembered the grape nuts from breakfast, and I prayed we wouldn’t have to have those again. The crew journal had the food plan – I’d check in the morning.

The fact that I was so scared of the river was not cool. I was still embarrassed of the way I let my fear control me. But that was behind me, and I wasn’t going to think about it anymore.

It was really cool that I was going to be able to send the family pictures of me while I was still on my trip. And the lunch was pretty yummy. But flipping was not cool, at all.

Everyone else hadn’t liked cleaning the gear, but other than the way I felt disgusting afterwards, I didn’t mind it. And rinsing my hair out in the creek had totally made up for it!

Dinner had been pretty good, but the fact that I ate all of it was even better. There’s nothing that came even close to beating the fact that I had washed my hair though. That was the best part of the entire day. LOL

Well, I was done thinking about what had happened that day. The girls were still talking though! I prayed that they would shut up soon and rolled onto my side so I was facing out of the tarp. I looked around for the boys tarp, and felt really lonely when I realized it wasn’t there.

I shouldn’t have felt lonely, but I did. I don’t know why I did – I had five other girls at my back, talking and laughing as they got ready for bed. But looking out of the tarp and not being able to see and hear the guys as they got ready for bed too was weird. Even though it was a nice campsite I couldn’t wait to get out of there and move to a new campsite where we would all be together. I couldn’t see Jen and Katie’s tarp from where I was, and I didn’t even know where the guys were.

It took me a little bit of time to stop freaking out because we weren’t all together. By the time I had stopped worrying about that, the girls were mostly done talking, so I said good night and fell asleep. It was still relatively early, but I was tired!

And it was really good that I got some extra sleep – we were going to have a busy day the next day!

Click here to read the first part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part seventeen of day seven, click here.

Waking up to crickets is actually quite enjoyable. It was a gorgeous morning, with the exception of the freezing cold air that made my nose tingle. I burrowed deeper into my sleeping bag, my eyes barely peeking out over the edge.

I pulled my watch out to look at the time. It was 6:03! I sighed and woke up Rebecca, ready to move out of the way in case she woke up violently. She woke up relatively easily, which was good. I pulled my sweater out from the bottom of the sleeping bag, wrapping it around myself as quickly as I could.

Getting out of my sleeping bag was not easy. I didn’t want to. It was so cold out! But we had to be down at the trailer, ready to go by 7:00, and we weren’t going to make it unless I got out of my sleeping bag. Everyone getting up was the first priority.

Within fifteen minutes, we were all sitting up. Ten minutes after that we were out of our sleeping bags. And fifteen minutes after that, we were still getting ready for the day. (We being most of the other girls – I was ready to go after the first twenty minutes).

It was 6:45, and we hadn’t even started to take the tarp down. I pulled my pack out of the tarp and started to dismantle the side that everyone’s feet had been on. By the time I was done with the second knot, most of the other girls had joined me.

We packed up the tarp and I stuck it in my backpack, wishing I didn’t have to carry it. When everyone was ready we headed up the trail, stopping at Jen and Katie’s sleeping clearing.

Most of the boys joined us and I grinned, feeling better now that we were together again. I don’t know why I needed to be with all of them. I just know that whenever we weren’t together I felt an anxiety that I can’t explain.

We headed for the van, where breakfast was waiting for us. We were having oatmeal, and I was hungry!

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part one of day eight, click here.

It felt good to be hiking through the woods again. Yeah, my calves didn’t like it. But it was great to be with my crew, in the cool (ok, cold) morning air.

We got back to the van and started getting breakfast ready. I helped where I could, but whoever had cook duty that day was doing fine without me.

I sat down and talked with some of the guys. We talked about our favorite parts of the river, (mine was being done with it) and we wondered what we would be doing that day. All we had been told was “service”, and we had no idea what that meant.

While we were talking, a pickup truck pulled in next to the van. A guy stuck his head out of the truck, looking at Jen.

“Hey, are you guys ready to come up yet?”

“We got a late start. Is it ok with you if we eat breakfast before coming up there?”

The guy laughed, nodding his head. “That’s fine. Come on up when you’re done – Hanni and I will be waiting for you.”

The truck pulled through the gate and Jen spun around to face us. “You heard Jamie – they will be waiting for us. I don’t want them to have to wait any longer than necessary, so let’s hurry up.”

I grabbed my bowl and went to sit in the circle near the cooks. The oatmeal was done, and we needed to eat quickly!

After eating breakfast we put everything away as quickly as we could. Then we were told to take our “stuff sacks” that held our clothes, empty the clothes out into our backpacks, and fill the stuff sacks with a couple of things. We needed our eating utensils, both water bottles, and a sweater if we wanted one.

There was a pile of other stuff that also needed to be carried. Someone grabbed the poop bag, someone else grabbed lunch, and a couple of the guys grabbed baby seals. We started off, and I started wishing for my backpack after the first couple of feet. The straps on the stuff sack were so uncomfortable! They dug into my shoulders, and the weight wasn’t distributed evenly.

But there was no way to make it any better, so I said nothing about it as we headed up the trail.

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part two of day eight, click here.

Instead of turning left, which would have brought us to our campsite, we stayed to the right. The trail became steep, the ground under our feet getting muddier and muddier the farther we walked.

The air was still chilly and I was glad I had brought my sweatshirt. We stopped near the pickup truck at the top pf the hill and I pulled my sweatshirt out of my bag, putting it on quickly while we got into a semi-circle around the truck.

There were piles of tools on the ground, with piles of safety equipment all around them. A woman and the man Jen had spoken with earlier were pulling the last of the stuff out of the car, and it wasn’t long before they finished.

“Hello, I’m Hanni and this is Jamie. We are with the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy, and we’d like to thank you for coming out to help us today. We do have a couple of rules.

The first rule: You must always wear your safety equipment. That includes your hard hat, gloves, and safety glasses.

The second rule: You are responsible for the tools you carry in there. You can switch them around while we are working, but at the end of the day you need to carry out everything you carried in. Almost like Leave No Trace, which I’m sure you are familiar with by now.

And the last rule: Safety is everything. Make sure you are keeping yourself safe, and make sure you are keeping everyone around you safe. “

She paused, looking at Katie. “Is it possible to meet everyone? In a circle, the way you do it?”

I was getting tired of circles. But I didn’t say anything, and I circled up with everyone. Everyone introduced themselves, saying their name, where they were from, and what they would like to be when they grew up.

“Everyone needs to grab a couple of tools. If some of you stronger guys want to grab the heaver ones, those would be the mcleod and the big loppers. Some of the lighter ones are the small loppers and hoes.”

I grabbed the two things Jamie had said were the lightest – the small loppers, and the hoe. I joined the line of people who were waiting to get a hard hat, eye wear and gloves. By the time I got to the box of glasses, most of the smaller ones had already been grabbed.

After a couple of minutes I was able find a pair that didn’t fall off my head if I moved it. I grabbed a hard hat and a pair of gloves, moving out of the way so everyone else could get their own gear.

I grabbed my stuff sack and put it back on, putting the hat on my head and grabbing the tools I had to carry. I was ready to go!

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part three of day eight, click here.

When the tools were all split up and everyone had their safety gear, we circled up again. We had to split up into two teams – a team who would work with Hanni, and a team who would work with Jamie. We were going to be building a trail, and I was excited to get to work!

When Jen came around to whisper in my ear, she whispered “meow” and moved on to the next person in the circle. When she had told everyone a sound, she went to stand next to Hanni.

“All of the cats, come with me and Hanni. Elephants, you are with Katie and Jamie.”

I went to stand by Jen, along with Sarah Margaret, Maggie, Jordan, and Tullia. All of the guys and Rebecca were with Jamie and Katie.

“I’m the only girl with the guys? Really?”

Rebecca wanted to be with the girls, but Jen said she had to stay with Jamie and the elephants. I felt bad for her, but I didn’t have time to think about it.

“Ok, let’s do this!”

We followed Hanni and Jamie up the trail. The breeze had died down and it was warming up, the sun beginning to peek through the trees in places. The trail seemed really long to me – I could see it going off into the distance. But it had been a good morning, so I was in a good mood, which made everything better.

After hiking for ten minutes or so, the trail got really narrow as we started hiking up the hill. Then we stopped, the trail in front of us splitting two ways.

“Everyone, put your personal gear down here. Elephants, Jamie is going to take you that way,” Hanni pointed to the trail that branched off to the left. “and I am going to take the Cats this way.” When she started marching to the right, you could hear bags dropping to the ground as people went the way they were supposed to.

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part four of day eight, click here.

Hanni stopped a few feet after the trail split.

“Go ahead and put the tools down, the business end facing that rock there. Then everyone needs to pick a tool to use. We need one or two loppers, one McLeod, a pick ax, and a couple of the other tools. So go ahead, pick your tools. You can always switch around later.”

I ended up with the McLeod. (Here’s some pictures and a description of a McLeod.) I was going to use it for three things:

• Using the rake to spread the dirt
• Using the sharp part to cut any roots in the way
• Using the flat part to flatten the dirt and push it down

I don’t remember who had what tool. I just remember that I had the McLeod most of the day, and that Hanni had a pick ax most of the day. We worked next to each other, Hanni breaking up the dirt for me to manipulate.

While we worked, we talked. I don’t even remember everything we talked about, but we talked about a lot of things. We talked about how I was homeschooled and had my own family business. We talked about how she loved doing her job.

We worked for about four hours, until 12. That was when we called for a lunch break.

Everyone gathered at the split in the trail to grab our eating things and water bottles. We were going to eat near where the Elephants had been working, on a rock slab near a waterfall.

The trail that the Elephants had been working on was wet, the ground slippery and muddy. I was grateful for my own dry work area as I tried to navigate through the Elephants territory. There was this one rock you had to cross that was especially treacherous – it was so wide that you had to step on it, and if you stepped on it you were going to slip.

I slipped the first time I walked on it, one of the guys behind me grabbing my arm so I wouldn’t land on my butt. I thanked him and kept walking, glad that I hadn’t slipped.

Rebecca was pointing out the parts of the trail that she had worked on and I tried to keep from laughing. We each had our own little part that we were particularly proud of. Mine was a little spot in the trail where it dipped so that the water could run off. I had made that little spot look so pretty….

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part five of day eight, click here.

We reached the waterfall and I couldn’t believe how beautiful it was. We were standing on a rock that was big enough to hold over twenty people – it was more than enough room to have lunch on.

I don’t remember what we had for lunch, but I remember that I enjoyed it! It might have been peanut butter and jelly on tortillas again, but I’m not sure.

When I had finished eating, I rinsed my hands off in the river and headed back to the split in the trail so I could put my eating things away. I could see the slippery rock that I was going to have to cross and I almost turned back – I could wait until someone else could come with me, to catch me when I slipped. But everyone else was still eating, so I kept going.

There was water coming down the hill and going under and around the rock, and there was nothing to grab. I looked all around the rock, trying to decide what was the best way to attempt this. I could step right into the middle of the rock, where it was mossy and slippery. I could step into the mud on the one side of the rock, with a drop off right there.

Or I could step on the side where the water was coming down the hill. It was muddy, and the water would splash me, but it was the safest option. It also gave me the best chance to make it across without slipping.

I gingerly put my hiking boot right into the mud. The water was splashing my leg, and it was cold! I reached across the rock to grab a plant that was on the side of the hill, praying that it would be strong enough to support me.

Thankfully the vine held, and I pulled myself across. I had just put my bowl away and was putting my safety equipment on when Bruce came bounding down the trail.

“Hey Brett, they want to take a picture back at the water fall. Can you come back?”

I didn’t really want to cross that rock again, but I knew that I had to.

“I’ll be right there. Let me take all this gear off first.”

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part six of day eight, click here.

Crossing the rock was relatively painless this time. I didn’t even put my foot in the mud! I just grabbed that vine and slid my feet across the rock.

I joined everyone on the rock again, standing in front of Tullia. Hanni took Jen and Katie’s camera and took a couple of pictures.

All of us with Jamie.

(If you click on the picture it will get a lot bigger.)

I think this is one of my favorite pictures of us from my trip. It was also the only day I had my hair mostly down. 😀 I was tired of keeping it in a braid or ponytail all the time.

When we were done taking pictures, we went back to work. We had gotten really far before lunch, and we were going to try to make it to the tree that was in the way before we left around three. They were going to have to come in with a chainsaw to take care of the tree, and we were going to make it as easy as possible for them.

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part seven of day eight, click here.

After lunch, Katie and Jen switched places. I was in between Hanni and Katie, and I was actually feeling great. It was nice and warm out, I was working (most of the time that’s something I enjoy. :)) and I was talking with some amazing ladies. So yeah, I was feeling pretty great.

After a while Jamie sent Bruce and Luke over to help us. Hanni sent them to look for some rocks to bridge a gap in the trail, on the hill above us.

They were gone for almost an hour, and I was starting to wonder if they were both ok. That was when I heard them stomping around above me, and they started rolling rocks down the hill towards us.

I jumped to the side as a rock veered from its course, coming to rest right where I had been standing. I thanked God before picking up the rock, bringing to over to where it should have landed.

The guys were done throwing rocks at me rolling rocks down the hill, so they went back to Jamie to see what they could do next. By then it was almost three, and we had reached the dead tree.

“Hey girls, we’re going to go see where Katie’s old group did service with us. Let’s go put our tools back and we’ll get the Elephants.”

All of the tools were put by the split in the trail and everyone hiked back to where I had been working. We bush pushed up the hill, because we needed to get around that tree. There wasn’t really a trail, and it was really, really steep. But we were done working, and we were going to go see where Katie had worked before.

Within ten minutes we were done with our bush push and we were back on the trail. The trail that was already there looked really good – a lot better than ours did. But ours was also on the side of the mountain, and this one was winding through a forest.

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part eight of day eight, click here.

When we reached the end of the trail, a beautiful sight was waiting for us. The forest ended abruptly, leaving us standing in a meadow surrounded by mountains. There were a few trees here and there, but other than that it was just a meadow.

Jamie and Hanni were pointing out certain mountains, naming them. Some of the names were really cool – I wish I remembered them. They were going along the ridge, naming the mountains, when they pointed out a bunch of moving spots.

“See those moving spots on the mountain right there? Those are goats.”

Of course, I was interested in the goats.

“Hanni, do you know what kind of goats they are?”

“I really don’t. I wish I could tell you.”

“Do you know if they are full size? Or if they are pygmies?”

She laughed at me. I grinned back at her, knowing that she wouldn’t know the answer. I had to ask it anyway, but I knew she wouldn’t know. People normally can’t even tell me if the goats had floppy ears or pointy ears. There was no way she was going to be able to tell me the size of the goats.

“Nope, I don’t know. Sorry.”

We headed back to the van – we were going to go get resupplied! I couldn’t wait to get more food (really, I couldn’t wait to get more of the best trail mix ever, Banana Split. :D)

As I walked the trail I had worked on, I was proud of what we had done. We had worked together as a crew, accomplishing something that was going to make things easier for other people. Because of what we had done, people were going to be able to go see the beautiful meadow and the goats on the mountain.

When we reached the split in the trail, everyone grabbed their bags and the tools they had walked up with. We walked down the mountain much faster than we walked up it – we wanted to get to the air conditioning and radio!

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part nine of day eight, click here.

When we reached Jamie and Hanni’s truck we all set the tools down. We helped pack it all up before continuing down the mountain. As we walked through the meadows and forest we had walked through that morning, I felt ready to go and do whatever we needed to do. (I wish I had felt the same way that night. LOL)

After we reached the van, everyone put their stuff away in their backpacks. I pulled out my bag or writing supplies – I was going to write some postcards in the car.

I climbed into the car and took the seat I liked. Everyone settled in around me, talking and laughing about the things that had happened. Like the time Maggie’s hard hat went rolling down the mountain and she had to go get it. And the time Bruce and Luke almost flattened me with a rock.

When I pulled out my writing things everyone realized that we were going to be able to send letters at resupply.

“Jen, I forget to grab my postcards. Can I get them before we leave?”

“Oh, if she’s going to get hers, can I grab mine?”

“Katie, do you have any pens? I forgot to grab mine and I don’t want to have to find them – my backpack is in the back of the trailer.”

Almost everyone went to the trailer to get their letter/postcard writing things. I gave two people my extra pens – I didn’t need them, and they could use them.

At the end of my postcard to the family, I put a couple of words that I hoped would help them find the pictures of me on the river. When I got home, I saw that Dad had sent the following email to all of my family.

(I included that so y’all could see them too. :))

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part ten of day eight, click here.

It wasn’t long before we had stopped in a gas station.

“Hey Jen, where are we?”

“This is a town called Jonas Ridge.”

I thought that was really cool. When my Dad was little, they had taken a road trip to see Jonas Ridge. Dad says it was pretty much just a post office at that point in time.

The Jonas Ridge Post Office (photo credit)

A truck pulled in next to us and Josh got out of the drivers side. A young man who looked like he could be Josh’s son also got out of the truck.

“Look, guys, is that Josh’s son?”

“It looks like he could be!”

“Did Benji come? I want to see Benhamin again!”

“I don’t see Benji. But Josh’s son is cute…”

“Are you sure that he is Josh’s son? He looks to old for that.”

We all got out of the van, standing in a group around the doors. Josh and the other guy walked over to us, telling us to circle up.

“Ok, kids, this is Christopher. He’s going to help you with your resupply while I talk with Jen and Katie. Listen to him, ok?”

Josh, Jen and Katie walked back over to his truck and we all looked at Christopher.

“Everyone, lets get to work. We have a lot to do, and we need to do it all quickly. Unless you want to have a night hike tonight.”

We all looked at each other and silently agreed that we did NOT want a night hike.

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*

To read part eleven of day eight, click here.

Christopher had us get everything out of our packs, placing it in the appropriate piles. He split us all up, giving each of us a job.

Bobby, Rebecca and I were refilling all the food bags. We tried to sort everything into meals, but it didn’t really work out. We could only identify so many of the white powders that made up so many of the meals. We went and grabbed the crew journal with the menu in it, but that didn’t help either.

Looking back, I wish we had been able to tell what the white powders were. It would have made dinner that night a LOT better.

Resupply took at least an hour. Bruce was refilling all of our spices, everyone telling him to make sure we had plenty of Texas Pete. Some of the girls were washing our bowls, spoons and water bottles, and everyone was telling them “make sure you wash mine really well!”.

Luke was refilling the first aid kit, and he was told by at least three people to make sure to grab extra moleskin and “itchy cream”. (I think it was cortisone cream.)

Bobby, Rebecca and I were told twice to give certain people less of a load. Basically, everyone wanted to make sure that we had everything we needed, and they didn’t have to carry most of it. 😀

I don’t remember what everyone else was doing. I just remember that everyone was doing something.

When I was filling food sacks, I didn’t want to be selfish and give myself a really light load. But at the same time, I didn’t want to give myself a heavy load and not be able to carry it. I was actually trying to split everything up equally, but in the end Bobby just starting throwing things in bags. I gave up and decided that God would make sure that no one had a load they couldn’t handle.

Christopher brought a box over to me, Bobby and Rebecca. He set it down and told us to make sure each person had one before he hurried off again. We opened the box and grinned at each other. There were 13 beautiful, bright green, Granny Smith apples in the box.

I wanted to take mine out and eat it right there. It was fruit! And it was green too! It wasn’t vegetables, (which is what I was really craving) but it was something other than cheese and carbs. 😀

That was when Christopher brought the cooler over. “Split this up too – everyone gets a banana now, and everything else goes in the food sacks.”

We opened the cooler and gasped. We were going to be having that for dinner??

Click here to read the next part of Day Eight.

*Everything here is from my own memory and may not be correct. Outward Bound is not responsible for anything I post here. Thanks too NCOBS for letting me use their photos.*