March 28

part2
The clock hits about 12:30 by the time we make it to Roy’s Peak trail. This trail is about a 6-7 hour total trip with 11km distance there and back and 1,300 meters of total climb (the part we went to was 1100-1200 meters). It is a trail on private property with sheep roaming everywhere. As we pull into the car park, it is still foggy and the rain is coming down again. We all have on our rain jackets and gather our stuff as we set for the track. You can tell we are all thinking, “this is a bad idea, it is raining and foggy, we’re not going to see anything, why are we doing this?” but nobody wanted to come out and say it. Nobody wanted to be the spoiler of the trip, so foolishly we march on. The first 30-45 minutes of the hike were unpleasant. Constant rain, clouds rolling in, wet grass, and a never ending incline. On the bright side, at least the sun wasn’t burning my face and arms up again, which, by the way, were peeling a bit (gross, I know). On top of that, my super dork hiking outfit is paying off again. I’m really glad I got the waterproof shoes. On the contrary, CG is wearing your European style skinny jeans and Adidas tennis shoes; some of us hike in style and haven’t crossed over to the dork side yet. Her feet have to be soaked right now.
“I have two new pairs of wool socks in my backpack if you need them,” I offer up. “Don’t worry, I’ve never worn them before. They’re brand new.” For you non-hikers, I usually hike with an extra pair or two of socks as wet feet are miserable for hikes.
She politely declines saying, “Thanks, I’m OK for now. My shoes are wet anyways. This was followed by a “thank you for caring about me.” or DB complimenting that I was looking out for them, I can’t remember.
In an effort to be witty, I nonchalantly reply, “Pfft, I don’t care about CG, I care about her feet.”
My mind instantly reacts. Wait a minute, what did you just say? Freak!
I immediately shout out, “Wait, no, that didn’t come out right, that’s actually kind of creepy, I don’t care about her feet, I umm….Ah, great hike right? I’ll just keep walking.”
Smooth Casanova, smooth.
The girls laugh it up as I speed away up the mountain. A few steps later, CG ends up stepping on pile of lamb poop which finally brought us some comedic relief at someone else’s expense. Finally.
We get a good laugh out of this and DB and I begin to sarcastically point out every piece of lamb shit in our tracks to her. We’re good friends, we are.
We continue walking uphill nonstop for two hours and DB patiently tries teaching me some Dutch (hoofd, schouder pronounced skhouder, knieën, tenen) during this time. It was about this time that you can see the skies open up and some scenery in the distance. Hey, this might actually pay off! We pause for a bit to get some pictures in case the clouds roll in again. At this point, I grab a Muesli bar and a power bar as I’m getting a bit hungry. Of course I bought another box of Muesli bars for this hike. Mmmm Muesli bar. We see a helicopter fly across and land on a peak in the distance. Looks like it might be a helicopter tour. We talk of how we will get the same experience for $400 less and I explain how we sometimes use “cheap” to describe a person’s attitude toward spending; such as I am too cheap to pay for that helicopter ride. They disapprove of the double meanings we have for many of our words. We regroup and set back on our track up the mountain. The break was great and we all seemed to get a second burst of energy. This was good because every time we look up the mountain, it feels like there is no end in site. At least the sun is out this time. We put some sunblock on during the break, but now with the sun out, I am back to a sweat factory. Looks like more sunburn for me.

The ascent was nonstop for over four hours. We run into a couple of groups of people but they are all going downhill already, we are the only fools that started while it was raining. My legs are burning pretty well (exercise burn, not sunburn) as we approach the top, but I can’t show any weakness. However, when we reach the skyline, it is well worth it. One of my favorite views of the trip. We are standing on the top of the mountain and you can literally look down either side of the mountain. One of the coolest feelings ever. You really feel like you are atop of the world. Especially after seeing nothing but wall and poop for four hours. To top it off, the clouds opened up and the views are fantastic on both sides of the mountain. We take pictures from all angles and towards all sides and then plop down at the top to have our reward/victory meals at one of the coolest dining spots ever, at least for me. The weather up here is actually a bit chilly and when the clouds cover the sun, it is actually cold, but it is too cool of a view to care (no pun intended). High fives all around!
After an hour or so at the top, we begin our descent back down the mountain. I won’t bore you with much here. We see quite a few sheep along the way and a couple are stopped on the trail right in front of us so naturally and touristically (is that a word?) we try getting some pictures as we slowly walk towards them. As we inch, err centimeter, forward, I suddenly feel a soft cushion below my foot as I am clicking with the camera. Oh shit! Literally. Dammit, and it is a fresh one. Karma sure is a B, even on the side of the world! Those damn sheep were just waiting for us to step into that. If they had fingers they would be high-fiving each other right now. The girls are keeled over in laughter.  Bah humbug, I’m going to eat some lamb chops tonight just for that. Good thing the grass is still wet from the rain. I proceed with dragging my foot for a good portion of the rest of the hike down. We make it back to the bottom where the weather now starts to drizzle for the last section. We’ve come full circle.
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She immediately answers back, “Oh, I am too cheap for that”
I reply, “Ah, don’t worry, I put enough for all of us” (based on their donation recommendation) not realizing that she was using a term I just taught them a couple of hours ago. It went right over my head. I was tired and my legs were noodles once again. My bad.

Later that night, the group got together for one last meal before we all split paths.  It was a good night and it was a lot of fun meeting these people.  Perhaps we may meet again on another trip.  Best of luck to all of them.

Cheers

P.S. CG has shared her pictures with me and they are mixed in with my pictures on the iPad now. So for these few days where we hung out, you will see some of her pictures as well. Her pictures are better than mine anyways; sometimes 🙂 She has some really good ones and I don’t want to steal credit from her for those shots. But if any of her pictures ever become famous and make lots of money, I’ll be sure to take full credit then.

P.P.S. I know I posted way too many pictures, but I really like a lot of these.  A lot of them show the same zones, but with different color, filter, and light settings which make different areas pop (e.g. grass, mountain, water, sky, etc.).  I hope you enjoy them as much as I do.

Cheers x2