I should have gone to work........

Friday, I took the day off work to hike with "The Women Who Do It"

This year instead of a 3-4 day adventure, due to conflicts in schedule's etc.,

we decided to do "Day Hikes" to local trails we have not hiked.

Remind me.....Whose idea was this?

So Connie and Brenda put together what I thought was a 8-9 miles Hike.

NOT!@!!

It was 11.5.miles.

With a vertical rise of 11,000+ Elevation.

We left a car about 1/4 mile north of Sherwood Hills at the trail head.

We then drove to Mendon and left a car at the trail head there where we started to hike.

The 1st three miles were up and up and up.

This is Connie, me, Brenda, Jen, and Olive [dog]

At this point I am thinking, well, that was not too bad, I did OK.

There was two other hikers we saw, a father and a son and when the dad heard that we were hiking across the top, past three peaks and down the other side, he said " You are? Going down is really steep......and then I saw that look in his eye, and could tell what he was thinking......"Do these ladies know what they are getting into????

The next 4 miles were up up up.

Seriously, any other year I would have been in shape and strong enough to do this hike with no injuries......but with the health problems I had this last year, I had no business going on this hike. I was a whiner, complainer, and an "are we there yet-er."

The good points were the views:

This one is looking toward Honeyville and Bear River.

This one is toward Logan, Mendon, Wellsville

This is towards Brigham City.

And finally.....this is Sardine Canyon.

We also enjoyed the wild flowers......

and many different rocks, some with orange moss/lichen...

and we even saw rocks with fossils on them....

[but I was way too wasted to care about taking pictures at that point]...

so if you want to see them, you will just have to hike there.

It was beautiful on top. and the weather was perfect....but the mosquitoes..

and fly's and horsefly's were like the plagues of the last days.

I would say that 2/3 of the way was uphill with very little reprieve from the up or down. It really did not flatten up on top at all. We hiked three peaks [Box Elder Peak was one and I don't know the others because I did not plan this hike, remember?], and 2 mounds.

The last 4 miles were STRAIGHT DOWN DOWN DOWN.

At sometime during the the hike we lost the trail and bushwhacked a little. I twisted my knee and that was it for me. The pain was excruciating in my left knee and in my toes. Those last 4 miles were pure hell. I literally hiked down sideways. Any time I came to anything that was flat at all, I had some reprieve from the pain, ....but there was very little of that. I think I will lose both of my big toe toe nails as the downhill was so steep and my boots were so hard. At one point Jen traded me shoes and that gave me some hope. Enough hope to finish. I could not have done it with out my TWWDI hiking friends. Jen literally got me down that mountain by breaking my falls and holding me back so I would not fall. A hike that should have taken us about 6 hours, took us a little over 11 because of the decent and my knee. My friends were so patient. When I got home, I was so fatigued, and in so much pain, I thought for sure I had torn my meniscus. I soaked in a hot bath, and then iced my knee and went straight to bed. And then the miracle happened.... I woke up the next morning and I could walk normal. It still hurts to go down stairs ...but no one would believe how much pain I was in the day before.

PROLOGUE: At sometime during the hike, I looked at Brenda and said "I'm done". She looked at me and said "You are not done".

At that moment, I remembered being in the bottom of the Grand Canyon with a hiker we will call "Laura" that was so "done". It was about midnight at the "Phantom Ranch" in the bottom of the Grand Canyon and we were leaving about 3AM to hike back out. Laura was throwing up from heat stoke, and said she was "done" and Brenda just looked at her and said "You are not done". There is a sign in the bunk house that says something like "There is only one way to leave the Phantom Ranch, and that is the way you got here." Yesterday I had my "done" moment. But I knew what Brenda meant when she said I was not done. We have been through a lot, and this was nothing compared to everything we have been through.....and I wasn't "done' because I hiked out of that trail the way I started..... on my own two feet.[minus my left knee and two toe nails.

Hey, anybody want to go hiking?