soggy-half-frozen socks

So maybe that last little blog was a slight exaggeration and glorification of my life. There have been many moments that have been borderline-miserable. So here’s the scene, life before lunch was all that breathtaking-once in a lifetime-beautiful mountains, rivers, waterfalls, etc… but after lunch we all learned what it looked like inside a cloud. Freezing, I decided to put on all the layers I had, knowing I had a waterproof shell to protect me. After a few hours of hiking, I discovered that waterproof doesn’t always mean waterproof. Soaked through and through, our weary bunch arrived at a sign saying campsite was 5 minutes away.

As our stomachs continued to eat themselves, our five-minute hike was mysteriously twenty-five minutes, hand over hand, climb under trees, over rocks and by far the hardest section of the hike yet. We finally arrived at a small gravel shelter, where we met Don. A quite, kind-hearted uncle, who went to visit his nephew on exchange in Auckland and now traveling/tramping by himself across New Zealand. Well, Don went to “check out the water” while us girls took off our soaking clothes and replaced them with the few dry layers we had, sharing and trading between us all. I ended up with a pair of dry pants, a dry t-shirt, and a wet wool hat. I proceeded to wear my mummy-bag for the rest of the night. All of us freezing and without means or hope of warmth, ate a dinner of beans and rice, crawled into our soaking tent, laying on large-grained gravel, within our soggy sleeping bags and attempted rest. Krissy’s sleeping bag was actually soaking and unable to maintain warmth, so we both climbed into my purple bag, discussing who would get the inside of the spoon.

Finally warm, we slept for a few hours, and then woke when we were ready for new sleeping position and realized we had one option and one option only. As the sleeping bag became smaller and more constricting, Krissy made the move back into her own, were a few more hours of rest were had before we were again awoken. This time it was the sound of Don rustling around in his tent. You could hear what sounded like him packing up camp. I looked at my ipod (that I had brought to avoid getting stolen and now was our only sense of time) it said that it was 3:06 am. Really? That couldn’t be…we had to catch a shuttle the next day, so worried about my ipod being the wrong time, I climbed outside the tent to talk to Don.

“Excuse me” I said, as his head jerked up from packing. “Do you know what time it is?”

“Um, Well, I actually lost my watch back in Queenstown, but guessing it around five or so.” (it was still dark of night)

“I think its 3:00” I replied.

“Oh.” He looked awkwardly at his packed campsite and fully loaded pack. “Well, I got a headlamp and guess I’ll just head out a little early, have a nice hike.”

“You too Don” I replied as I watched him wander off into the dark bush, the glow of his headlamp illuminating the few feet in front of him. I realized, shivering back towards the tent, that the end of the trail was only another four hours, the sun will not have even risen. Was Don going to experience the breathtaking views by means of headlamp? It may have lost some of its splendor…

Well, we woke up, soggy, cold and exhausted. Put on wet clothes, wet/half frozen socks and boots, then ate breakfast as we began our hike, anxious to pump blood to our quickly freezing toes. After about forty-five minutes, we warmed up, clouds lifted, rain stopped and it was back to amazing adventure, beautiful waterfalls, lush rain forest and breathtaking views.

Each adventure we have gone on has had its misery moments, but luckily there is people like Don to lighten the mood at three-am, leaving us with a few laughs and handfuls of memories.