(Sorry Mom, but "tough cookie" didn't really capture the tone I wanted.)
Monday, March 15th, was the official start to our spring break here at the University of Alaska Southeast. Robert, Kari and I set forth plans to hike to Windfall Cabin for a three day, two night, stay. I think we can all agree we needed some time away from the dull housing apartments.
We left UAS around 11am and picked up Robert, parking at the trail head around 12. This was supposed to be an easy hike and at first it was. In order to actually get to the trail we had to walk down a snow/ slush covered road about half a mile, which turned into a dead end, the trail leading off to the right. Everything seemed great. The weather was a bit damp, around 40 degrees, but hey that's better then freezing! Then we hit "the hill." That's how I will remember it in my head because it took me so long to get up it. It was covered, I mean COVERED, in Ice. And I thought to myself, "My gosh! Is this how the whole trail is going to be?" Well, I should have knocked on wood or something because, five minutes later, once I had used small trees to help me up "the hill" I saw that my fears where confirmed. Everything covered in ice so thick, it looked like snow at first.
Nevertheless, we hiked onward! Every step was planned, with near falls here and there to make sure we were awake. I would like to say that the scenery was gorgeous, and I'm sure it was, but I didn't get the chance to look at it. We were all staring down at our feet.
What made this hike worse was the wooden boards that were supposed to be steps. Steps up, steps down, small boards serving as bridges over creeks, sometimes random useless boards that made no sense at all. However, these were not just pieces of wood. These were ice covered traps! One wrong step and you would be falling down several icy steps, possibly knocking out everyone in front of you. At one point I tried walking along the snow on the side of the steps. Well, apparently, these steps where not useless because the snow gave in and covered me to my knees. It was a guessing game...I lost that round.
The worst part of the whole trip came about .25 miles from our destination. There was this horribly long foot bridge covered in a foot thick of ice. Kari was first to walk the plank with Robert right behind her, me bringing up the rear. The bridge really got to Robert who ended up on all fours crossing. The bridge didn't really bother me personally, but it did bother me how nervous the others were about it. I really didn't want to have to rescue someone from the icy river below. (not that I could, if I wanted too). Along the way Robert dropped his water bottle. No big deal, it was right on the edge of the frozen river, maybe only a foot deep. I took a couple steps down to retrieve it. Standing on what I thought was the icy bank, I quickly realized the water was much deeper and couldn't see the water bottle at all. Unfortunately, this all happened in about a 2 second frame of time, as the ice below me gave way and I fell into the VERY cold water, a little over knee deep.
I don't remember too much at this point. I think I began to panic but jumped out of the water, scooting back away from the hole. I remember Kari saying I should move farther back because it could break again and I reached up, gabbing someones hand. The next thing I know I was on my knees almost having a panic attack and very very cold. I got to my feet back on the path and was ready to get my pack back on when the hands of the snow pulled my left leg down again, knee deep. Great! I heard some profanity...I like to think it was Robert haha...and I got back to my feet again.
.2 miles is what the mile marker said. Only .2 miles. That's not far. Not far at all. But it was far. It felt so incredibly far as I lost feeling in my legs, began to shiver and watched as my cohorts marched on without me. It felt like I was moving fast. As fast as I could go but I couldn't keep up. Every man for himself I suppose. I started thinking about my school, exchange, Missouri, my family and I became very homesick (or familysick as I like to think of it).
Boards...More stupid wooden boards...
I realized in that moment how much I love talking to my family on the phone. Even when they have nothing important to say to me or nothing at all, I love hearing that everyone is okay and sharing my experiences with them.
More Boards...wooden slippery stupid steps! But wait! This time they actually went down a long distance! AND down the hill was a cute little cabin, which I would have assumed was vacant had I not known that my hiking buddies were already inside. It took forever to get down those steps even though they were not covered in ice. Once I reached the bottom I stumbled inside, pulled out a change of clothes, stumbled into the outhouse to change, stumbled back into the cabin, pulled out my sleeping bad and blanket and curled up on the hard wooden bunks.
I am not normally a complainer, and I consider myself a semi-experienced hiker. However, this hike out was just different, like the world was against me this day.
Robert cooked steaks on the camping stove. It was really good. He made garlic potatoes as a side and we sat around talking and eating. Before leaving home I downloaded an episode of Desperate Housewives on my iPod for some added entertainment. Kari and I watched it and got some good laughs out of it before making our beds and having some "Read Aloud" time. There happened to be a Tidal Echos (book of random writings by random people) in the cabin and Kari and Robert took turns reading funny stories from it. I read from Anthem, by Ayn Rand. I think we all enjoyed the book, especially me, since it is one of my all time favorites!
Then we crashed.
March 16th.
We woke around 10:30am. It was a horrible nights sleep for me. I think I was just to chilled to sleep and when I finally did fall asleep I had the weirdest dreams about demons. It was odd...
Anyways, we started the day with scrambled eggs on the camping stove, and man they were great! After, we washed our dishes and gathered drinking water from the lake to boil. Kari and Robert sat out build a fire but the wood was way to wet from the previous days rain. The weather cleared up nicely. I managed to get some good pictures of the scenery and even sat outside reading, soaking in the sun. ( I think it cured my deadly case of the chills)
I noticed some tracks on the ice/snow covered lake, which was first discarded as dog paw prints. However, later in the evening we read some of the logs at the cabin from last month. They found wolf tracks across the entire lake. It seems likely that it could have been the same, as the paw prints were very big and appeared over night. It was a little exciting!
That night we played cards, and read aloud some ridiculous logs. Some dealing with broken bones and kegs. Who would haul a keg all the way out there anyways....ah college life.
I started boiling water for my soup, which I accidentally dropped candle wax in. FYI It is not fun cleaning candle wax out of a boiling pot of water. I know for a fact that I was unable to clear out all the wax and am therefore positive that I currently have wax inside of me right now. Lets hope I don't catch on fire anytime soon.
That night I finished reading Anthem aloud and read a bit aloud from Educating Esme, finishing it as well. Robert told ghost stories, and other weird stories about Wizards and unicorns...It seems odd now but was quite funny at the time.
Then we crashed again.
March 17th
We had pancakes for breakfast. It tasted great even if they were a bit deformed. Ha! Robert had eggs with his and fried ham as well. We threw out the leftover food, cleaned up the dishes, packed our bags, burned the little bit of trash we had (so Robert could get his fire fix) and cleaned the cabin. We left the gorgeous cabin and lake around 11am. We had to be out no later then 12 as the cabin was reserved at that time.
And it was back to those dang wooden boards again.
I led the way out which was a nice change. I could actually see the scenery around me rather than someones pack in front of me. When I am following someone I often catch myself staring at their heels most of the way, watching the steps they are taking. Of course, I was still watching every step I took but it was nice looking up every once in a while. We got to the foot bridge again to find it in the same condition we left it. We all made it across safely, without loosing any water bottles...or legs...
The trail seemed much shorter on the way back. Probably because our packs were not as heavy. The ice seemed to be on my side for once as it rarely even felt slippery. An hour and thirty-five minutes later we were at "the hill" again. The beginning of the trail. I had this great idea to sit down on the ice....okay, that is a lie. I fell! I made it the whole trip without actually falling on the ice and there at the very end I fell right on my bum. It turned out to be kind of fun because I decided to just slide down "the hill." It was a good 10 or more feet slide. I was laughing, Kari and Robert were laughing, and it was fun. I tried to convince them to do the same. But they decided to try and side step the ice. Both ended up falling and ...well....they weren't laughing.
After the ten minute walk on the icy road back to Kari's car, we headed to Donnas, a cute small town feeling restaurant that serves breakfast all day. Then it was home.
I was a bit anxious to get home (aside from wanting a shower) as I have been waiting to hear from the Nation Student Exchange coordinator about where I will be exchanging schools at next fall. Also I was waiting to hear back from my advisor on what classes I am to take this summer and next year. My advisor was very helpful and it looks like I am right on track. It's great because on exchange I don't have to take any serious classes, other then Government. I can take whatever I want and come back to Juneau in the Spring, take 12-15 credits and still be set to graduate on time! SWEET!
Then I got this email from the exchange coordinator:
"Congratulations! You have been placed through the National Student Exchange (NSE) program.
How awesome is that?! Of course, I will be accepting that offer! I am excited to see some new sites and travel a bit. I suppose that also means it's time to start getting in shape.
I guess the week is going pretty great compared to how it started off. I have learned many things on this trip that I am sure will help me on my way to the Virgin Islands. The main one being: You can make it through any experience as long a you have some hand sanitizer and some toilet paper.
Hehehe!
Perhaps this blog should be more simply named: Melissa Goes.
♥ Melissa
PS:pictures can be found at:
http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/music_map/1/1268842523/tpod.html
Monday, March 15th, was the official start to our spring break here at the University of Alaska Southeast. Robert, Kari and I set forth plans to hike to Windfall Cabin for a three day, two night, stay. I think we can all agree we needed some time away from the dull housing apartments.
We left UAS around 11am and picked up Robert, parking at the trail head around 12. This was supposed to be an easy hike and at first it was. In order to actually get to the trail we had to walk down a snow/ slush covered road about half a mile, which turned into a dead end, the trail leading off to the right. Everything seemed great. The weather was a bit damp, around 40 degrees, but hey that's better then freezing! Then we hit "the hill." That's how I will remember it in my head because it took me so long to get up it. It was covered, I mean COVERED, in Ice. And I thought to myself, "My gosh! Is this how the whole trail is going to be?" Well, I should have knocked on wood or something because, five minutes later, once I had used small trees to help me up "the hill" I saw that my fears where confirmed. Everything covered in ice so thick, it looked like snow at first.
Nevertheless, we hiked onward! Every step was planned, with near falls here and there to make sure we were awake. I would like to say that the scenery was gorgeous, and I'm sure it was, but I didn't get the chance to look at it. We were all staring down at our feet.
What made this hike worse was the wooden boards that were supposed to be steps. Steps up, steps down, small boards serving as bridges over creeks, sometimes random useless boards that made no sense at all. However, these were not just pieces of wood. These were ice covered traps! One wrong step and you would be falling down several icy steps, possibly knocking out everyone in front of you. At one point I tried walking along the snow on the side of the steps. Well, apparently, these steps where not useless because the snow gave in and covered me to my knees. It was a guessing game...I lost that round.
The worst part of the whole trip came about .25 miles from our destination. There was this horribly long foot bridge covered in a foot thick of ice. Kari was first to walk the plank with Robert right behind her, me bringing up the rear. The bridge really got to Robert who ended up on all fours crossing. The bridge didn't really bother me personally, but it did bother me how nervous the others were about it. I really didn't want to have to rescue someone from the icy river below. (not that I could, if I wanted too). Along the way Robert dropped his water bottle. No big deal, it was right on the edge of the frozen river, maybe only a foot deep. I took a couple steps down to retrieve it. Standing on what I thought was the icy bank, I quickly realized the water was much deeper and couldn't see the water bottle at all. Unfortunately, this all happened in about a 2 second frame of time, as the ice below me gave way and I fell into the VERY cold water, a little over knee deep.
I don't remember too much at this point. I think I began to panic but jumped out of the water, scooting back away from the hole. I remember Kari saying I should move farther back because it could break again and I reached up, gabbing someones hand. The next thing I know I was on my knees almost having a panic attack and very very cold. I got to my feet back on the path and was ready to get my pack back on when the hands of the snow pulled my left leg down again, knee deep. Great! I heard some profanity...I like to think it was Robert haha...and I got back to my feet again.
.2 miles is what the mile marker said. Only .2 miles. That's not far. Not far at all. But it was far. It felt so incredibly far as I lost feeling in my legs, began to shiver and watched as my cohorts marched on without me. It felt like I was moving fast. As fast as I could go but I couldn't keep up. Every man for himself I suppose. I started thinking about my school, exchange, Missouri, my family and I became very homesick (or familysick as I like to think of it).
Boards...More stupid wooden boards...
I realized in that moment how much I love talking to my family on the phone. Even when they have nothing important to say to me or nothing at all, I love hearing that everyone is okay and sharing my experiences with them.
More Boards...wooden slippery stupid steps! But wait! This time they actually went down a long distance! AND down the hill was a cute little cabin, which I would have assumed was vacant had I not known that my hiking buddies were already inside. It took forever to get down those steps even though they were not covered in ice. Once I reached the bottom I stumbled inside, pulled out a change of clothes, stumbled into the outhouse to change, stumbled back into the cabin, pulled out my sleeping bad and blanket and curled up on the hard wooden bunks.
I am not normally a complainer, and I consider myself a semi-experienced hiker. However, this hike out was just different, like the world was against me this day.
Robert cooked steaks on the camping stove. It was really good. He made garlic potatoes as a side and we sat around talking and eating. Before leaving home I downloaded an episode of Desperate Housewives on my iPod for some added entertainment. Kari and I watched it and got some good laughs out of it before making our beds and having some "Read Aloud" time. There happened to be a Tidal Echos (book of random writings by random people) in the cabin and Kari and Robert took turns reading funny stories from it. I read from Anthem, by Ayn Rand. I think we all enjoyed the book, especially me, since it is one of my all time favorites!
Then we crashed.
March 16th.
We woke around 10:30am. It was a horrible nights sleep for me. I think I was just to chilled to sleep and when I finally did fall asleep I had the weirdest dreams about demons. It was odd...
Anyways, we started the day with scrambled eggs on the camping stove, and man they were great! After, we washed our dishes and gathered drinking water from the lake to boil. Kari and Robert sat out build a fire but the wood was way to wet from the previous days rain. The weather cleared up nicely. I managed to get some good pictures of the scenery and even sat outside reading, soaking in the sun. ( I think it cured my deadly case of the chills)
I noticed some tracks on the ice/snow covered lake, which was first discarded as dog paw prints. However, later in the evening we read some of the logs at the cabin from last month. They found wolf tracks across the entire lake. It seems likely that it could have been the same, as the paw prints were very big and appeared over night. It was a little exciting!
That night we played cards, and read aloud some ridiculous logs. Some dealing with broken bones and kegs. Who would haul a keg all the way out there anyways....ah college life.
I started boiling water for my soup, which I accidentally dropped candle wax in. FYI It is not fun cleaning candle wax out of a boiling pot of water. I know for a fact that I was unable to clear out all the wax and am therefore positive that I currently have wax inside of me right now. Lets hope I don't catch on fire anytime soon.
That night I finished reading Anthem aloud and read a bit aloud from Educating Esme, finishing it as well. Robert told ghost stories, and other weird stories about Wizards and unicorns...It seems odd now but was quite funny at the time.
Then we crashed again.
March 17th
We had pancakes for breakfast. It tasted great even if they were a bit deformed. Ha! Robert had eggs with his and fried ham as well. We threw out the leftover food, cleaned up the dishes, packed our bags, burned the little bit of trash we had (so Robert could get his fire fix) and cleaned the cabin. We left the gorgeous cabin and lake around 11am. We had to be out no later then 12 as the cabin was reserved at that time.
And it was back to those dang wooden boards again.
I led the way out which was a nice change. I could actually see the scenery around me rather than someones pack in front of me. When I am following someone I often catch myself staring at their heels most of the way, watching the steps they are taking. Of course, I was still watching every step I took but it was nice looking up every once in a while. We got to the foot bridge again to find it in the same condition we left it. We all made it across safely, without loosing any water bottles...or legs...
The trail seemed much shorter on the way back. Probably because our packs were not as heavy. The ice seemed to be on my side for once as it rarely even felt slippery. An hour and thirty-five minutes later we were at "the hill" again. The beginning of the trail. I had this great idea to sit down on the ice....okay, that is a lie. I fell! I made it the whole trip without actually falling on the ice and there at the very end I fell right on my bum. It turned out to be kind of fun because I decided to just slide down "the hill." It was a good 10 or more feet slide. I was laughing, Kari and Robert were laughing, and it was fun. I tried to convince them to do the same. But they decided to try and side step the ice. Both ended up falling and ...well....they weren't laughing.
After the ten minute walk on the icy road back to Kari's car, we headed to Donnas, a cute small town feeling restaurant that serves breakfast all day. Then it was home.
I was a bit anxious to get home (aside from wanting a shower) as I have been waiting to hear from the Nation Student Exchange coordinator about where I will be exchanging schools at next fall. Also I was waiting to hear back from my advisor on what classes I am to take this summer and next year. My advisor was very helpful and it looks like I am right on track. It's great because on exchange I don't have to take any serious classes, other then Government. I can take whatever I want and come back to Juneau in the Spring, take 12-15 credits and still be set to graduate on time! SWEET!
Then I got this email from the exchange coordinator:
"Congratulations! You have been placed through the National Student Exchange (NSE) program.
University of the Virgin Islands, St. Thomas for the fall semester 2010 - Plan A
At this time you need to decide if you want to accept or decline your placement. There are three meeting times arranged next week for to do just that – accept or decline. Please be sure to make it to one of the meetings to obtain your Placement Acceptance Form (PAF) and possibly information from your host school. Also, I have more paperwork for you to complete and will explain some of the ins and outs of your exchange while away from UAS."
How awesome is that?! Of course, I will be accepting that offer! I am excited to see some new sites and travel a bit. I suppose that also means it's time to start getting in shape.
I guess the week is going pretty great compared to how it started off. I have learned many things on this trip that I am sure will help me on my way to the Virgin Islands. The main one being: You can make it through any experience as long a you have some hand sanitizer and some toilet paper.
Hehehe!
Perhaps this blog should be more simply named: Melissa Goes.
♥ Melissa
PS:pictures can be found at:
http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/music_map/1/1268842523/tpod.html
