Ryan, Scout and I attempted to go to the mountains to hike last weekend. The short version (if you want to stop reading here) is that it did not go well. It started out with Ryan and I making a compromise to go to Saluda, NC because it was closer to Greenville than the other places Ryan had researched. Since we went to Saluda on a whim, we had not idea about any of the trails there. We found one on Google and decided to try it out. It took an hour and some help from the locals to point us to the direction of the trail. We basically had to just go down a road until we saw cars parked and we would be there.
We made it to the "parked cars"...which was fairly easy to find, but there were only about 6 other cars parked there for two different trails. You should know that I do not like to hike if there are not a lot of people around. I like to be with a group of people or pass a lot of people as we are hiking. Well, neither of these wishes came true on the trail. We did not pass another soul and it was just the three of us. I was crouching and searching with every noise I heard...you know, just in case it was a bear that was going to eat us. My nerves were really getting the best of me. I know I was so frustrating to Ryan, but he hung in there trying to reassure me. That is, until we went about a half a mile and saw a small memorial and ribbon set up. Ryan says to me, "Anna, it looks like someone died right here". This was not the thing to tell a terrified woman, I promise you. Meanwhile, Scout was taking a dip in a little creek that we were passing and almost broke through the dam that was set up and was about to be washed downstream to the river. I started bawling, Ryan sighed and decided it was about time for us to go.
I felt terrible and apologized my heart out to Ryan. I had ruined his great idea of hiking. So, he decides we will give it another try at Jones Gap because the trail was much more populated and he thought I would be much more comfortable. So, we went. We had to wait to park for about 45 minutes which was another bummer, but we persevered. We start off and I am pretty happy because there are a ton of people around. We decide on taking a different trail and ventured off the worn path...our other bad decision of the day. This trail ended up having a cluster of mountains with a rope to assist you to climb up them. We still had Scout with us and we could not figure out how we were going to get our 90-pound lab up this rock face. Miraculously, Ryan pushed Scout and he made it to the top just as happy as a lark. We ended up turning around on this trail after we hadn't passed any humans for a while. We had to go back down the mountain. At that exact moment, I heard some noises and was sure a bear was headed for us. So while Ryan was trying to coax Scout back down the mountain, I was trying to leap frog Scout to get away from the "bear" as fast as my little legs would carry me. No one got injured, praise the Lord.
The day did not go quite as we had hoped, but we got a lot of laughs and Scout had fun playing in the streams and climbing mountains, I think. Some of my favorite memories are things like this, where your plans don't succeed but you end up laughing hysterically in the process (and shed a few tears never hurt anyone). Hope you enjoyed the hiking humor for the day!
We made it to the "parked cars"...which was fairly easy to find, but there were only about 6 other cars parked there for two different trails. You should know that I do not like to hike if there are not a lot of people around. I like to be with a group of people or pass a lot of people as we are hiking. Well, neither of these wishes came true on the trail. We did not pass another soul and it was just the three of us. I was crouching and searching with every noise I heard...you know, just in case it was a bear that was going to eat us. My nerves were really getting the best of me. I know I was so frustrating to Ryan, but he hung in there trying to reassure me. That is, until we went about a half a mile and saw a small memorial and ribbon set up. Ryan says to me, "Anna, it looks like someone died right here". This was not the thing to tell a terrified woman, I promise you. Meanwhile, Scout was taking a dip in a little creek that we were passing and almost broke through the dam that was set up and was about to be washed downstream to the river. I started bawling, Ryan sighed and decided it was about time for us to go.
I felt terrible and apologized my heart out to Ryan. I had ruined his great idea of hiking. So, he decides we will give it another try at Jones Gap because the trail was much more populated and he thought I would be much more comfortable. So, we went. We had to wait to park for about 45 minutes which was another bummer, but we persevered. We start off and I am pretty happy because there are a ton of people around. We decide on taking a different trail and ventured off the worn path...our other bad decision of the day. This trail ended up having a cluster of mountains with a rope to assist you to climb up them. We still had Scout with us and we could not figure out how we were going to get our 90-pound lab up this rock face. Miraculously, Ryan pushed Scout and he made it to the top just as happy as a lark. We ended up turning around on this trail after we hadn't passed any humans for a while. We had to go back down the mountain. At that exact moment, I heard some noises and was sure a bear was headed for us. So while Ryan was trying to coax Scout back down the mountain, I was trying to leap frog Scout to get away from the "bear" as fast as my little legs would carry me. No one got injured, praise the Lord.
The day did not go quite as we had hoped, but we got a lot of laughs and Scout had fun playing in the streams and climbing mountains, I think. Some of my favorite memories are things like this, where your plans don't succeed but you end up laughing hysterically in the process (and shed a few tears never hurt anyone). Hope you enjoyed the hiking humor for the day!
baaaahahahaha!! i really did laugh out loud a little! :) thanks for sharing!
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