A liter and a half into the shakedown hike, tragedy struck. I picked up my pack, swung it over my shoulder, and, almost as if in slow motion, my water bottle took flight down into the Himalayas. Luckily, G saved the day and made the treacherous journey into the thicket to save my precious water bottle. This wasn’t my lowest point, but it certainly was for my water bottle.
On this shakedown trek I learned what ‘mind over matter’ really means. There were definitely points in the hike where I knew my legs could keep going, but the incline never seemed to end, and I really wanted to stop. In the end, I did make it to camp in relatively good spirits I think the hardest part for me was how long it took. I heard seven miles and thought a few hours, but it took all day, and it took some heavy breathing and affirmations to make it to camp at the end. I severely underestimated how long it would take, and it’s really hard to go into things without expectations, but that’s something I just need to let go of for the long trek, no matter how hard it’ll be. I know for the longer trek that I will be carrying more weight, and I’ll have to do it for ten days and not just one. That thought does tighten the knots in my stomach, but I know it’s going to happen, and I know I will make it. As Miley Cyrus once said: “Ain’t about how fast I get there / Ain’t about what’s waiting on the other side / It’s the climb.” That’s truly what was playing in my head as we hiked. I had to remind myself that the hike itself is the experience for which I signed up even though I just wanted to get Poop School over with and go to sleep.
Ben was our fearless leader for this trek, and he did a great job checking up on the morale of the group. I felt like we were moving at a pretty fast clip, but it was sustainable for the entire duration of the hike, even when we were silently locked in at the end. Stopping for scheduled breaks made a world of difference because it gave us a chance to refuel and rehydrate before we got to the point of painful exhaustion. Ben also kept us on a strict sunscreen regimen on our breaks which saved my skin for sure. I would not have remembered to reapply had our breaks not been aligned with the sunscreen schedule.
As nervous as I was, I kind of took over lighting the stove, but because I did it the first time, I felt much more comfortable doing it the next morning. Now that I know how to do it, I feel more comfortable being out in the back country because I know I can get food cooking if the environment was to be unkind to my group. Especially in the kitchen, I’m very independent, so it was a learning curve for sure to cook with not just one but two other people. In the end, we did a pretty good job communicating to get dinner made, and the pasta was a much-needed reward before cowboy camping at the end of the day.