Backpacking Adventure

Some of you may know that I have been away "playing" for the last few weeks while Eric slaves away at work. I do miss him terribly, however.

I spent the first week attending a Chief Conference to help me be a good chief next year. That weekend I spent at Advent HOPE with Aunt Dena, Uncle George, and new house. I was so happy/glad/excited to see med school friends the Vegas and the Shives. I also enjoyed a quick visit with Grandpa and Grandma Nelson (pictured below).

Aunt Dena took me to Epcot center on Sunday. Very interesting and lots of fun. I enjoyed the various exhibits of the different countries the best.

The next week I spent with my mom/grandparents Sherrard/and sister Ruthie. We got Ruthie all packed up to go to Ukraine. She left that Thursday. I was thankful I could be there to comfort my mom...

That weekend I went on an epic backpacking trip with Kristy (sister-in-law) and Mom and Dad Nelson. We hiked 25-26 miles of beautiful trail. Please see pics below for a shot vignette of each day.

Kristina Nelson, FNP was our fearless leader for this trip. At 6' she fit the part very well. Not only is she tall, but she is in GREAT shape having just finished a backpacking trip in Virginia where she hiked 15-20 miles/day. She did try and remember that we (mom/dad/myself) were definitely not in the shape she was in. She literally hiked circles around all of us the entire time (run up the trail, wait 20-30 minutes, run back down the trail and make sure we were OK, run back up the trail with mom Nelson's pack, wait some more, etc).

By the way, Kristy, I was so impressed with you that I've started running to try and get in shape too!

Sidekick to Kristy was the dog, Lewa--some sort of German Shephard mutt. She's actually Dorinda's dog (Kristy's roommate). The dog carried her own food/dish in a little pack that fit very nicely on her back.

The the rest of the crew consisted of me, mom, and dad Nelson. Three beautiful but completely out of shape/breath/energy musketeers.

Below is a great picture of mom and dad (this is on the last day of the trip, don't they look great!)

The picture below is me midway into the second day. By the way, that is a VERY pasted smile!

Our first day consisted of about 4 miles and 7 river crossings (the kind you take your shoes off and wade) to the top Panther Creek Falls. It really should have been named "Panter" Creek falls because to get to the falls you have to hike straight up the mountain side of a cliff. It was beautiful, but I was so hypoxic I didn't really appreciate it until looking at pictures later...

There was a nice campground just above the falls where we camped the first night. A funny story at that campground. I woke up Sabbath morning and wanted to take a quick bath. I didn't have my contacts in because I thought I'd wash my face and didn't want to get them dirty. I went to a spot in the river where I couldn't be seen by our camp. I took a quick back (in the nude) and scurried back to camp to put in my contacts/brush my hair (I'm not sure why I bothered doing that...). Imagine my horror to notice AFTER I put my contacts in that I had chosen to bathe right next to another campsite with a group of 5-6 campers! OOPS. Thankfully, I think they were all sleeping and didn't see me.

Below is an attempt to show the steepness of the trail by a top shot of the Panther Creek water fall.

Our "Sabbath day's journey" was an 8 mile hike that started steeply up. I thought our hike yesterday would surely put us well above the top of the mountain but apparently North Georgia Mts are higher than I thought. Kristy bounced ahead with the dog, occasionally running back to carry mom's pack/make sure we were all right/etc. I plodded along, trying to figure out how fast my breathing would have to become before I became hypocarbic and passed out. We finally crested the mountains and started back down. It was then I discovered back-packing rule # 1: what goes up MUST come down. Screaming in defiance, my rectus femoris, vastas lateralis and vastis medialis let me know in no uncertain terms that going up doesn't hurt as much as going down... Four more downhill miles later and a major river crossing later, we finally limped into the Jacks river basin. Not satisfied with the campgrounds, however, we hiked another 3/4 mile along the river to a more secluded spot. Along the way, we passed the beautiful Jack River Falls. I actually paused to adequately appreciate them, but don't have a great picture. On camp arrival, we all took a quick bath in the river (this time I had a swimsuit) before supper and Sabbath church/worship.

Below is a picture in contrasts: I'm all bundled up trying to get warm after my swim. Still hot and panting, dad is only in his swimsuit trying to get cool.

Sunday morning came all too quickly. After a scuffle about who would carry food (Kristy was determined to carry it all and I wanted to be strong and carry the share I'd carried yesterday) we were off. River crossings were in abundance on Sunday's hike. We had our deepest about 1-2 miles into our hike. The water came nearly to my waist, and the current nearly swept me off my feet several times. If I wasn't so mad that Kristy was in so much better shape, I might have asked her to carry my pack across... but I decided to risk a baptism than give in and ask for help.

The day was pretty much up and down and up and down and up and up and up and down. Eight miles later with still 2 miles to go, I was exhausted and afraid I'd not be able to do even one more step. Something had to be done. That's when I came up with the ingenious idea of a reward system. Every 15 minutes, I'd do something to congratulate myself for still hiking. Since I was pretty much hiking alone (I was a little faster than mom/dad Nelson and a LOT slower than Kristy) I figured no one would mind. My first reward consisted of screaming and hollering "well done RACHEL, I KNEW you could do it, GOOD job, KEEP IT UP!!" Unfortunately, Dad Nelson heard me carrying on and thought I was in serious danger and yelling for help. After clearing that little misconception up, I decided on a more tamer reward. My next reward was stopping to straighten my back. I bet you didn't know what a great reward just standing up straight can be. Trying carrying 30-40 pounds on your back up and down a couple of Georgia mountains and you'll understand. My third reward came a little earlier than 15 minutes. I wasn't watching the trail very well and managed to step into a mud wallow. My shoes sank down completely and I had mud all the way up to my shins. Gross. So, the third reward consisted of finding a stream and standing in it until the mud was cleared off of my shoes. Hiking the rest of the way in wet shoes wasn't comfortable, but getting that gross mud off was totally worth it. Amazingly the reward system really helped me pick up the pace and I cleared the remaining 2 miles in only three reward sessions! The 4th reward was getting to camp and setting up (after taking another dip in the river).

Mom taking a wash in the river:

Kristy's and my little tent:

Just hanging out cooking breakfast Monday morning. Well, to be more accurate, I was hanging out and KRISTY was making breakfast...

Our last day was the easiest. We were doing a loop and thanks to Sunday's 10 mile day, we had only 2 miles left on Monday morning. Of course, that's not enough for one day, so Kristy and I figured out a few extra excursions off the trail to make sure we got sufficient exercise. Even with that, we still finished the day's hike in about 2 1/2 hours, which is pretty good considering it was ALL up hill and our excursion took over an hour and we stopped several times for pictures (see below).

Kristy and me

Mom, Dad, and Kristy

Cute picture of Kristy at trails end.

Below is a map of the Cohutta Wilderness where we did our backpacking loop.

All in all, I had a grand time despite the aches and pains. The seclusion, lack of cell phones, sunshine, daily cold baths in the river, cool air, and exercise made me feel great. In fact, I cannot remember feeling this healthy in a long, long time. Thanks Kristy for all you did to make this a wonderful trip. Thanks for planning the route, food, gear, and everything else. I had a grand time!

We drove back to my mom's house for a post-hike dinner that afternoon. My grandfather (grandparent's live with my mom) remarked that all of us were "barely creeping around" except for Kristy, who was "bouncing everywhere" (I hope no one can tell that I'm jealous).

Monday night I drove to Greeneville with Mom and Dad Nelson. I've been hanging out here ever since and plan to drive up to Ohio to visit Grandma Mills and Aunt Linda this afternoon.

Maybe I'm becoming a masochist, but I'm already looking forward to another backpacking trip!