Fall

It's amazing how you can go to bed one night, wake up the next morning and all of a sudden, the light has changed and it's Autumn.

It has left me feeling very nostalgic, longing for Exmoor, and my friends in England.

Rockford Inn - Where our great adventure as an MA class started Oct. 2009

ADVENTURE!!! - Part 2

Lesson 3: It will all be OK, DON'T worry.
After about 30 minutes of rest Igor reluctantly tells me we need to get going. I begrudgingly put back on my pack. Just so we are clear Igor's pack was quite a bit heavier than mine. He had our camp stove, fuel, pots, food (mostly trail mix and space food), bear canister, which may beg the question, what the heck was I carrying. I had our toiletries and liquids (not that heavy), potty stuff (not heavy), the water filter (not heavy), and the tent (6.8 lbs). Some how we were still packed quite on the heavy side even though both of us only brought a minimal amount of clothing. We are working out how to lighten our packs for next time.

Anyway, we got back on the trail. Igor ambitiously thought that we could make it 12 miles to the Upper Merced Pass Lakes. I on the other hand had serious doubts based on the state of my legs after the butt shaping Four Mile Trail. We agreed to try and get as far as we could. Oh and by the way Igor at this point still believed that we could do the 50 mile Red Peak Loop trail, I on the other hand, knew that was out, at least this time based on how tired I was, our late-ish start (10:20 am) and our food situation (only enough to last us 'til Monday afternoon). We walked and walked. By about 4 PM I had very little left in my legs, so we decided to try to get from the trail marker at Illiouette Creek to the next water source, just under 2 miles away. This plan would have been perfect but... As we are approaching our desired spot, I keep thinking that we should be soon following a medium sized creek. I keep waiting. We keep walking but all I am seeing is lush green vegetation in what might have been a creek and hoping that I am wrong that we just haven't hit where the creek is yet. I keep thinking, "maybe I just misjudged how far it was on the map." But the further we go, the deeper that feeling gets that this vegetation is where the creek used to be. Sure enough when we get to what used to be the crossing we are struck with a new problem. The creek is dried up.

So what do you do when there isn't any water where you thought there would be?

Well in our case we had 2 choices: walk the 2 miles back to where the way we came where the other water source was, or keep walking to the next water source. I put my faith in Igor's judgement and we walked on. At 6:30 PM, about a mile further down the path we found it!! WATER! and just in time, as we found discovered when we took off our packs and found that neither of us had any water left. Igor found the perfect camp site for us, previous tenants had left us wood and a lovely circle of benches to sit on. I went and filtered us some water. Igor started our food and I set up the tent. We had a lovely, all be it short evening, hitting the sack at 9 PM, with a new plan in mind.

Lesson 4: Day Trips can be just as hard/fun as a loop trail
In the morning we took our time making our breakfast and getting ready of our day. We had decided the night before that the 50 mile Loop to Red Peak Pass was out this time and that we would do a day trip to the Upper and Lower Merced Pass Lakes. With that in mind, we hit the trail at 9:30. As we walked the 6.5 miles to the Lakes the subject kept returning to how glad we were to have found the water and how glad we were that we didn't decide to keep going. Igor admitted that even he would have had to push to get up to the Ottoway Lakes 3 miles further up the trail from the Merced Lakes.

We had a great day of it, stopped at a cascaded river pool system and went for a quick dip! Then on again to the Lakes where we had to climb through a rock slide boulder field to get to the little rock cropping where we dove into the icy water and had a great lunch.
We made it back to the camp by 6:00 PM, total of approximately 15 miles round trip made for a very long day but it was lots of fun.

Picture from our lunch spot

Looking out on some mountains from lunch

Lesson 5: You're Stronger than you think
On our last night, after our Lake day I ended up with a bloody nose. I am not sure how many people know this, for sure Aunt Dawne and Uncle David as they have experienced backpacking with me before, but I am afraid of sleep out in the wilderness. I don't sleep well as I am on auditory overload and ever sound makes me jump. Well as Igor was kind enough to inform me when I told him about my bloody nose:
Igor: "You're joking, right?!"
Me: "No seriously, look" shows bloody nose
Igor: Looks very serious "You know that wolf you were afraid of last time, animals like that are actually attracted to blood, so that might be a valid concern now."

I still don't know if he was kidding or not but needless to say I was not able to fall asleep for a good couple of hours, until I was convinced that any animal that wanted to come a get me would have done so by now.

Monday morning we woke up. We took our time packing out, had a lovely breakfast of our remaining food and packed up our camp. Double checked our camp site, said good bye and started the 9 mile walk down to the Valley floor.

The first four miles had some really large downed trees that we had to roll or jump over. Even with our packs slightly lighter, it wasn't exactly the easiest thing and the trail went through some areas that if there was actually water where there was supposed to be, it would have been challenging to cross. We made it to where the trail split to Nevada Falls in 2 hours, averaging 30 mins a mile, which is a pretty quick pace. That's where things got hard for me. We had done a lot of down hill come out of the Lakes the day before and my bumb knee from forever ago had started aching. When we hit the 4000ft descent to the Valley from via Vernal Falls my knee was in full ache mode.

After two miles of this with my 35 lbs pack:

my poor little knee and legs were about to buckle. I made it down the stairs with legs shaking so bad they were barely working and even walking on flat surfaces, Igor said "they looked shaky and almost deformed, the way you were walking." I had a mini emotional break, not sure why, but after a few minutes of rest I was fine. I got back up on to my shaky legs and ran down the hill, which sounds counter intuitive but really it was easier to free run, than trying to control each step. 

Anyways, we made it down to the valley floor by 1:30-ish!!! 9 miles in approximately 4 hours and yes it was almost "break neck speed." We walked all the way back to Curry Village were we had parked the car, took off our boots, both blistered and tired we got into the car, happy to finally get to sit and started our drive home by 2PM.

P.S. It was over 80 degrees the whole time we were there even up at 8,000 ft. eww. There were fires outside the park to the South and apparently 2 people have gotten the plague, yes "that" plague, you know the one from the 1300's that wiped out 1/3 of Europe's population. But not to worry so far we are fine and with 30,000 people a day visiting Yosemite to only have 2 people who have contracted it, I would say were are going to be fine. (our full trail here http://www.wandermap.net/en/route/create/#/z11/37.73216,-119.55596/terrain)

Here are some more of our pictures. 

Tired backpackers leaving Yosemite

ADVENTURE!!!! - Part 1

What do you do when you decide to take a spur of the moment backpacking trip through Yosemite? Just get in the car and go! With little in mind other than to get into the back country of Yosemite and no particular trail picked out, Igor and I got in the car and headed out Friday afternoon to the great, wide, beautiful Yosemite. Two years and a few months from our last visit which you may remember was full of new and crazy experience such as Katie the Nativgator, Trail Guide, and Proctor Extrodinar, what happens when one of your crew gets altitude sickness, and what not to bring on a backpacking trip, our journey this time was full of equally exciting experience.

Yosemite Lessons

Lesson 1: Don't worry, it will be ok

I am going to preface this all by saying that I usually need/like to have a plan. I am told that my dad loved to not plan things, just spontaneously get on the road and go... Not sure if that is true or not but he can attest or deny and he sees fit. Well, Igor is much like my dad in this case, as he finds it exciting and challenging to charge in, no particular plan in mind. So I decide to take a page out of their book when Igor suggested on Monday night that we take our much anticipated, much postponed backpacking trip to Yosemite. We have been trying to go back since May but something always got in the way, work, getting sick, climbing trips, etc. Anyway, I was so busy at work that I really didn't have the time or the desire to plan this trip to Yosemite so when we got in the car Friday afternoon I knew of 2 possible trails we could take, and no place to stay, but figured that we would just ask the Rangers.

While making the 4+ hour traffic filled drive to Yosemite, I fessed up to Igor that I really had no plan and that I didn't even know where we were going to stay when we got there because I didn't make us a reservation at a campground. As is his way Igor simply said, "We'll figure it out, don't worry." I unfortunately...or fortunately come from a line of particularly adapt worriers. Don't try to refute it, I know who you are. lol Let's just say I was a little stressed out not knowing where we were going to sleep when we got to the gates at the park entrance and they had a lovely sign that said " All Campgrounds Full."

So I followed Igor's lead and we went to the Valley anyway, hoping to find something, or somewhere to sleep. Apparently it is illegal to sleep in your car in Yosemite, and no we didn't find that out the hard way. It turns out that one of our acquaintances from the climbing gym was there as well and we ran into them at the general store. After some talking, they made some suggestions to us on what to do. We ended up finding a campsite and sleeping quite happily.

Lesson 2: Know Your Limits
We woke up Saturday morning, got to the wilderness center at 8:00 AM to get our Wilderness permits to go into the back country. After a particularly long speech about how to leave no trace by a new park ranger, which included some new policies by Yosemite since last time we went such as:

• hanging food in a tree isn't a valid method of bear prevention, 
• you have to have an impermeable surface under your tent, and best of all,
• pack out your TP, yes even the special backpacking kind (ewwww)

We got inside finally after 30 minutes of wilderness "training",  to get our  permits. This is where it gets a bit sketch. Since I didn't really know which trail to take I tried asking the ranger helping us. Other than seeming very annoyed with all my questions He pointed us towards Red Peak and Ottoway Lakes. So we decided on the Glacier Point to Illiouette Creek - Ottaway Lakes Trail. I didn't know that you had to specify an exit point but the ranger was insistent so we were supposed to come out at Glacier Pass, which would have been a 50 mile loop. With permits in hand we got coffee, ate our breakfast, got in the car when Igor asked the all important question:
Igor - "Ok where do we go?"...
Katie - "Trail head = Glacier Point - Illiouette"
Igor - "Where is that?"
Katie - deer in headlights look "Umm... at the trailhead?"
Igor - "Ok, but where is that?"
Katie - messing with GPS, only thing that comes up shows top of Glacier Point 1 hr 5 min drive from Valley floor "I don't know, the GPS doesn't show it."
Igor - "Isn't that something that you should have asked the guy when you got the permit?"
Katie - "Umm... well, I... uhh"
Igor - "Whatever let's just go back and ask, right?"

So we go back to ask. Turns out it is a 1 hr 5 min drive to the trail head, at the top of Glacier Point. So my brilliant idea, let's just take the "Four mile trail" up to Glacier Point from the Valley.

Here is the Yosemite Hiker description of the Four- mile Trail

"Difficulty:  Call it a 4 out of 10 going down and 7 out of 10 going up. The trail is wide and smooth, and not nearly so steep as Upper Yosemite Falls, whose own valley-floor-to-valley-rim trail is a mile shorter. By the time you finish the second set of switchbacks on the way up, though, you'll know you've been on a hike." (http://www.yosemitehikes.com/yosemite-valley/four-mile-trail/four-mile-trail.htm)


This is a rather deceiving description, it may not be the "Mist Trail" to Nevada Falls, which if I had ever walked up would hit a 10 out of 10 for me, and I have not done the Upper Yosemite Falls trail, but if it's harder than the Four-Mile Trail booty buster, I will not even consider it with a 35lbs pack on my back. This Four Mile Trail was still one of the most challenging hikes of my life.

The name should be "almost 5 mile switch backs to make you seriously question your personal resolve and reason of continuing Trail." It took me over 4 hours to walk up the 4.6 miles, 3,200 ft elevation gain, during which I had serious discussion with myself about not being a quitter, about my options none of which were being able to stay where I was, and having to push myself ever step of the way up, to the point that I was counting my steps at the very end "1, 2, 3, 4, ...30. ok Now 30 more.." See Google earth image of the trail:

I had a cheering squad of various different hikers from all over the world who were fabulously encouraging including the one South African gentleman, in a lovely bright green shirt, 0.6 miles from the top who let me know that Igor, whom I had told to go ahead of me, was "not that far in front of you and don't worry, he's sweating too." HAHAHA I loved it. It definitely put a smile on my very tired face. 

I did make it to the top and had Igor waiting for me there to take a break and enjoy the scenery, which was spectacular and I wish I could have enjoyed it a little more. It's the best glut work out I have ever had and I seriously could have been done for the day at that spot. The trail did have some amazing views on the Valley, especially from the top (Glacier Point). (Mom, avert Emery's eyes he will have vertigo). FYI these are not my pictures as I didn't bring a camera, other than my phone with me, and all my concentration was on just trying to make it up the hill.

Travel Lessons From White Russia

We are very, very happy to be home. We learned many things on this vacation of ours, here are a few for you:

1. Make sure to put a couple extra days on your visa, just in case. 
2. You have to push airline people to take care of you 
3. If they say there aren't any other flights, you ask/request/require/demand them to put you on another airline and you get the heck out. 
4. Make sure you ask  what the cap is on your food allowance if your flight is cancelled
5. Luggage tags with hand written labels do make it (at least sometimes)
6. Belarus is a lot harder to get out of than into.
7.  Katie is not allergic to wasps (but would still rather not get stung)
8. Sometimes cutting in line is a necessity.
9. 3 hours is not a long enough layover in the Frankfurt airport. (we joked that 9 hours would have not actually been so bad, at least we could have relaxed)
10. Belarus has wonderful people but terrible customer service.
11. Giving towels as gifts is a very popular thing (at least in Igor's family).
12. Belarusian's make really great food.
13. You can sleep 7 people in a one bedroom apartment
14.  Chickens eat everything and flies bite

I am sure that there are many, many more things to add to this list but those are at least the initial ones. Thanks for reading and travelling with us. it has been fun. So until I have some new adventures to post, I'm signing off.

Lots of Love.

Part 2: You didn't think your were leaving did you?

The next morning we got a wake up call, dressed quickly, went down stairs, checked out, they made up breakfast bags with some meat, cheese, apples, oranges, and waters. it was very sweet of the girl at the front desk we had met the night before. We got into the cab and went to the airport. This time we made it through the first security area where they just send your luggage through a scaner, and up to the check in counter.

You know how in the US and in most other countries, or at least rather ever country I have ever flown to/in, how there are airline representatives who check you in...yeah, well not in Belarus. Nope here you have airport personal who check you in and as we found out upon trying to check in our luggage that hey they don't even have the same computer systems. How awesome! We handed the lady at the check in desk our luggage and passports, and I asked if there was anyway that they could check if Igor and I were sitting together on the Frankfurt SFO leg of our trip, the woman responded not to me but to Igor in Russia, "where are you going?" Igor says San Francisco, woman "I don't see that flight in the computer", WHATTT!!!??

Igor and the woman had quite a discussion back and forth, of which the jist was that she couldn't find our second flight in the system, she told Igor to go talk to the woman at the customer service counter, who told him to go back and talk to the woman at the check in counter. This back and forth went on for about 25 minutes at which point they hand wrote our luggage tag for Minsk to SFO, couldn't put it in the system, so to find the Lufthansa rep at Frankfurt and have them do it. All this after it being suggested that we pick up our bag in Frankfurt and re-check ourselves in, to which we replied that that was ridiculous and there was no way that we would have enough time to do that.

It took another 30 minutes to get them to print our tickets. They wouldn't really even talk to Igor. One guy who we had talked with briefly the day before told Igor to "shut up" several times and what Igor had done the day before was enough. We're guessing he was referring to how we asked them to call us a cab and take care of our hotel arrangements. The tickets that they finally printed us were just for Minsk to Frankfurt, we were to pick up the second set of tickets in Frankfurt when we took care of the luggage. So with 10 minutes to spare before our flight was supposed to leave we finally had at least some tickets in hand and went to the customs counter.

I should say that my Visa was only good through the last real day of our trip which was the day before and when they cancelled our flight they told us that it was ok and not to worry about the Visa. After all that we had gone through in the last couple of days you can imagine that I wasn't really sure if what they had told us was true or not. Just a minor hiccup at the customs counter, which was cleared quickly and we were boarding our plane shortly three after.

We arrived in Frankfurt about 10 minutes late, ran to the service counter, they got our luggage all worked out, though we weren't really convinced that it was actually going to make it, with its' hand written tag.  We got our tickets but there were no seats together left, no great shock there, ran to the train to get to the other side of the terminal and, crash! about 300 people all trying to get on the train! After waiting about 10 minutes Igor and I shoved our way on to the train, barely I might add. got to the A,Z section of the terminal and another 300+ person line was ahead of us to get documents checked and get through Security. So at this point it was 9:10 AM our next flight was to board at 9:35 and take off at 10:25... we're not proud of it but we cut about 1/2 the free formed line to get our documents checked. We still stood in line for about 30 minutes, finally got a documents checked then another 10 - 15 minutes to get through security. Once through we speed walked,/ walked really really fast to our gate which was #66 out in a hall that went from 50 - 69 (so pretty much at the end of the hall). And WE MADE IT. We were on the plane home.

Well after all that bad luck we finally caught a bit of good luck. Since we were both in middle seats we figured no one is going to want to switch with us. Well turns out that the woman who was supposed to be sitting on the aisle seat next to me had two small kids on the other side and wanted to switch with me. then Igor asked the gentlemen sitting next to him if he wouldn't mind moving to my newly acquired aisle seat so that we could sit together. the gentlemen of course agreed and so Igor and I enjoyed sitting next to each other for our lovely 11 which was really more like 12 hour flight back home.

Other than that we made it home safe and sound. Our bag did make and we worked hard to stay up as late as we could.

I'm sorry did you want to go home? Part 1

We had a very early start  to our day to go home. We arrived at the airport at about 4:45 AM went through security, checked our bag, went through customs and the second security (when I say security it's not like in the US I will explain later) and then we were in our terminal. Hoping to buy a bottle of water it seemed that all the shops were either closed or the ladies working them were "on a break." We found this problem other places in Belarus as well and I will explain in a little bit what to expect as far as customer service if you ever go to Belarus in about one more paragraph.

Exhausted and ready to go home we waited, and waited, and then waited some more. Our flight was scheduled to board at 6:10 AM. Well 6:10 came and went and there was no one from the airline at the gate. We had seen the pilot and crew get on about 30 minutes earlier but to this point there was no communication from anyone on why we weren't boarding. At 6:45 AM, twenty minutes after the flight was supposed to have taken off we finally got some information. "There is a technical problem with you plane, the flight will be approximately 1 hour delayed." Ok, fine 1 hour no big deal we have a 9.5 hour layover in Frankfurt so no problem.

30 minutes later this announcement it made. "your flight has been cancelled please go to the customer service desk." YOU MUST BE FREAKING KIDDING ME RIGHT??? Wrong.

We exit the terminal and are told to wait. about 25 minutes of waiting and we are told that we are not allowed to go into the customer service line on the other side of security until we have our luggage and they can't tell us when we are going to get it. So we wait. Since there are two of us, Igor decides to go wait in the customer service line while I wait for the luggage. 45 minutes later I finally got the bag and Igor had moved 1 person up in line. I took his place so that he could go walk around a bit. 1 hour passes, 2 hours pass. Finally by the third hour we get to the front desk, but oh yeah that is right only one of the clerks is actually working with the customers, the other wont even look at you or acknowledges your existence at all. so then another 30 minutes pass and Ahhhh we finally get to talk to someone!

Igor takes the lead because their English is terrible. After quite a bit of discussion we are told that they can get me home but not Igor because he would need a visa to make more than 2 stops in Europe. The lfight would be Minsk to Prague to Frankfurt to SFO. Then when we said "no" to that they put us both on similar flights to the ones we were supposed to have that day, with less layover in Frankfurt, 3 hours instead of 9.5 hours. They asked if we were from Minsk, which we assumed was because they would have just told us to go home and come back tomorrow. Since we weren't and did not feel like bugging Igor's relatives they said "ok well get a taxi and a hotel and make sure that you hang on to the receipts". I told Igor to ask them who we were supposed to give those receipts to, they said Lufthansa. I said ok but how?, they said I don't know bring them to any Lufthansa office, or at the airport maybe in SFO. Seriously??? So Igor told them that was ridiculous and how could they expect Lufthansa in the States to understand Belarusian receipts and how do we know that they would accept them etc.

After a bit more bickering we got them to call us a cab, pay for our hotel room, get us lunch and dinner, as well as get us a cab back to the airport in the morning. Which would have been better if they had bothered to tell us that there was a cap on the cost of the food. We got to the hotel, which was pretty nice. the people there were pleasant and after some discussion with them about why there was a food cap, which we weren't told about, and why we were only getting dinner when at teh airport we were told we would get lunch and dinner not just dinner, we were set for the evening. It was raining pretty much all day and was nice a cool, of course. lol

View from our hotel room

Last Days in Minsk

On our way back to Minsk with Igor's great Aunt (Zena) and Vasil (her husband) we stopped at a WWII memorial to the town of Khatyn, which was burnt down by the Germans who locked the people of the town in a shed and burnt them alive. You can read about this and the supposed 243 other villages that the Germans burnt down in Belarus HERE. It is a beautiful but sad place. They have put small towers with bells that ring sombrely to represent each house that was burnt in the village.

bell tower

Each of these graves has the name of a village that was burnt

leading up to the Memorial

On our last couple of days in Minsk we decided to do some sort of different stuff. On Sunday we met up with Igor's friend Anton again. We found a gym that had a swimming pool attached and spent a couple hours avoiding the heat in there. It should be noted that there was only one day during our whole trip that it was less than 86 degrees outside and that was the one day in Narich where it rained.

We had a fun time working out and swimming, although I did get lost in the gym. I thought that the boys were going to meet me in the lobby and then go out to the swim floor, they thought that I was just going to meet the out on the gym floor. So after 20 minutes of me standing in the lobby in my swimsuit waiting for them, a very nice young lady came in and asked me if I was looking for the swimming area and to follow her, where I found the boys already wet as they had been swimming in the pool. Anyways, communication is key and when you don't speak the language you can find yourself waiting half naked in a pool lobby. lol

After our fun exercise work Anton had to go so Igor and I decided to walk around Minsk. We went into the biggest shopping store in Minsk to see if we could find any fun souvenirs for you lovely folks back home. We did have some luck but not a lot.

A little later we met Igor's friend Serge and his wife Nastia (short of Anastasia) had a little dinner and then went for a lovely walk around the oldest part of Minsk. Apparently there is an archaeology museum in Minsk, so I made Igor promise that on our next trip to Minsk he would take me there lol. While walking in this section we saw a folk band play outside one of the churches so we stopped to listen and watch some spectators dance. We also visited a park that is called the Island of Tears, which has a memorial to the Mothers and Soldiers who died in the Afghan War (Soviet War in 1989.)  Apparently it is tradition for newly weds on their wedding day to walk over the bridge to the Island of Tears and for the Brides to touch this statues little winky so that they will have many healthy children.

Serge and Nastia said they didn't do this. Overall it was a very lovely day.

Goodnight Minsk

On Monday Zena and Vasil, were kind enough to drive us to the castle Mir (pronounced Mear). It was a lot further away and not what I had expected but I still thought it was nice because of all the history. You can red up on it if you want HERE.

Katie at the tippy top of the tower

"lovely plumage"

Once back from Mir, Igor and I went back into Minsk and spent the day walking to a couple of the places that he had lived while in University and we broke my mom's rule of never eating at American restaurants and ate at McDonalds for lunch!! Then later in the afternoon we met up with one of his friends Anya (pronounced An-yah) and her son and just set and chatted in a park.

We returned to Zena's where we were staying, at about 9:30pm had some dinner packed and tried to get some sleep as we needed to get up at 3:45 AM to make it to the airport in time for our flight home on Tuesday.