We've seen a lot of Mission Trails this past week... but because of our work schedules, much of it has been at night. The four of us (and Harlan!) hiked 6-7 miles up Mt. Fortuna. We couldn't have asked for a better night... the sky was even clear enough to see the stars. We encountered some wildlife on the trail including a "meadow" (Bryan's term for a mouse) and earthworm-like snake that appeared to not have a head. Upon further investigation we determined that it did indeed have a head. Bryan made a special request for Dan not to kick headless snakes at him in the future. Dan agreed to this request.
Last night Dan and I left the car at about 7 PM and hiked up to the Kwaay Paay summit and rappelled down the rocks on the other side. The adventure took a little longer than we had planned (possibly due to my inability to put on a climbing harness) and the second rappel and hike back were completed sans daylight. The hike up was pretty steep, and I was definitely feeling the previous weekend in my legs. Which brings me to my next point...
Kind of a spur of the moment decision... but Dan and I participated in an adventure race last weekend up in the Lagunas with Tony (one of Dan's buddies from work). We were given maps and plotted all the checkpoints then took off on our mountain bikes. We could immediately feel the 6000 ft elevation and wicked hot temperatures and knew we were in for a long day. Our team (Team Que Bueno!) made it to the transition area and started the 11 mile trekking section first. Thanks to the navigation skills of two Eagle Scouts... we found the first few checkpoints easily. After a long and quite bloody bushwhacking section we were passed by another team of three who seemed to have found an easier way across the mountain. We were close behind the team until Tony's IT band started acting up, making it extremely painful to run up or down hills (quite a disadvantage when you are in the mountains). We walked for a while but Tony eventually told us to leave him because his knee problems were not getting any better. Dan and I took off, finishing the run and starting out on the bikes, still behind the other team. It was a tough and HOT 20 or so miles but thanks to our sweet mountain biking skillz we managed to pass the other team (without seeing them... yeah weird) and finished in first place with a time of 7 hours 11 minutes. After the race many people were impressed to hear that this was Dan's first adventure race and only my second and the team we had passed was made up of some very seasoned racers (one of them even had ADVNTR RCR or something on his license plate). Any way, Tony's knee is okay, just needs some rest and rehab. Out legs are pretty beat up and bloody, resembling what would happen if you stuck your leg into a bucket of angry cats. But....
"Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming...Wow! What a ride!" ~Melvin Trotter
one of my favs.
Oh yeah... T-minus 10 days until we leave for the JMT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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