Backpacking

Justin and I went backpacking last weekend with our friends Locke and Katie and their little girl Armanie. We drove down to Henry Coe State Park which is just a little south of where we live. When we got there we could see smoke from a fire that was burning in the Santa Cruz mountains. It was bright and sunny everywhere else. It was quite a sight to see. I know the second picture is hard to see, but this is Katie Anderson and I on the trail. If you look closely you can see the sun trying to shine through the smoke cloud. This picture doesn't do it justice, but the sun was a dark red color. It was kind of creepy. Anyway, let's get back to the hiking portion of our backpacking trip. We ended up hiking 4.1 miles each way. On the way in we went up a hill, then down and up then down again. I think I was by far the most out of shape in our little group. Justin was very patient with me and helped me make it up the big hill in the beginning of our hike :) This is random, but we came across a pregnant lizard on our way into our campground. I love it's colors! The last stretch of the hike to our camp was all down hill. It was really steep and we were glad when we finally came to our camp. Justin and I really worked up a sweat! We got to our camp when there was just enough light to set up our tents. We camped close to a small stream which was nice. It was fun to fall asleep and listen to the water run down stream. Locke brought a small gas burner so we could boil water for our dinner. Justin and I ate minute rice with cheese and some spices and other flavoring. Justin and Locke made up stories all night about ticks, bears and bobcats to scare Katie and I. We knew the stories weren't true, but it didn't help that we could hear small animals in the bushes all night as we attempted to sleep. We were a little sore when we woke up in the morning, but we were ready to tackle those hills. The first and worst part of our hike back to the car was all uphill. The trails we hiked were big wide dirt roads. The roads were so steep for me that I could barely make it up them. I'm a wimp when it comes to hiking uphill. Also, we didn't get on the trail until late morning so we ended up hiking during the hottest part of the day. We were dripping with sweat... again. Justin found a big stick on the trail and made a walking stick out of it. He even carved the bark off with his handy dandy leatherman knife. I think it turned out really well! This is a close picture of Justin's handy work! :) Alright, so we obviously made it back to our car alright otherwise I would not be writing this. After we got back to the car and drove back to civilization we went to get some real food, then it was back home from there. Now that my legs have recovered I would go on another backpacking trip, but it's only because I've already forgotten how hard it was! Here are a couple more pictures from the hike. We stayed at "upper camp." That picture was taken in the morning right before we started hiking again. I was still smiling because I didn't know how steep those hills were going to be! This last picture is of us toward the end of the hike back to the car. We made it past all the tough parts and it was all downhill from there. Yeah! We made it!!!! I'm sorry that this was a long post, but I love picture. I hope you all enjoy!