Sunday, July 22, 2012

Day 5- Sand Beach to Antlers Campsite. 13.2 miles

Today was the game changer day. I started the day with a beautiful view from the beach and decided to eat breakfast there. It was such a calm beginning for the day.
The hike itself was extremely painful- it seems like everything on my lower body just hates me right now. I had the option to go to White House Landing for lunch, but I didn't stop there because I was scared I would never leave haha. They have rooms available and apparently amazing food and I just never would've left. I had to keep plowing on through the difficult part.
There was a really hilarious point in the day:  I was walking down the trail and came to a metal staircase (really strange to see in the 100 mile wilderness) going down to a river. Once I got down to the river it seemed like I was just supposed to walk through it. So weird to have a staircase but no makeshift bridge! Haha so I decided that I was still going to try to not get my feet wet (the metal staircase pumped me up with a little too much luxury) and so I found a log above the water that I could slide across on. I sat down on the log and proceeded to slide my way across. About halfway through I lost my balance and just flung my arms around the log so that I wouldn't fall off.....and just like a saddle rolls under on a horse, I rolled on that log. Now I was just hanging upside down, clinging on to a log. I'd definitely lost this battle, so I just had to drop my feet and wade across to the other side hahaha.
At the end of the day, I came to he most beautiful campsite I had ever seen in my life- Antlers campsite. It is right on the edge of Jo-Mary lake and the campsites seemed to be on a peninsula. The lake and mountains surrounding me at every angle was such a peaceful experience.
I met a SOBO thru-hiker named Faith at the campsites and he completely changed the hike for me. All of the darkness and pain I had been experiencing was turned into a beautiful humor  For the first time I was able to laugh about the hike and it felt sooooo good. It was such a release and a seamless transition from one frame of thinking about the hike to another. I asked him to hike the rest of the wilderness with me and he agreed- I think the hike will be much better from here on out!
There was a group of high schoolers there with 2 leaders and the leaders invited us over to try chaga tea. Chaga, as they explained, is full of antioxidants and all sorts of good body boosts and can be found on white birch trees. They even showed us how to find it :). When I drank the tea, I could tell that I was drinking something that was really good- my body liked it a lot!
This evening was absolutely perfect :)

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