THE HONEYMOON IS OVER

[Anonymous]

MT FROSTY MAY 16 2010

THE HONEYMOON IS OVER

I am sure the question is being asked for anyone that has nothing better to do with their time then read this trip report “what does a honeymoon got to do with hiking Mt Frosty”?
Skipping the details and not using any names to protect the innocent this is what happened:
While sitting around Frosty Camp at 1920 m (6300 ft) NSH Boss Lady/Pres and today’s CD was complaining that her intestines were cramping.
Somebody else said the same and let out a little ‘duck squeeze”.
Boss Lady/Pres laughs and says “the honeymoon must be over”.
The ‘duck squeezer’ says well “in that case” let one’s rip that even scares away the birds and Boss Lady hair stands on end.
Then on that note everyone packed up in silence and started to move higher.
I know, bathroom humor at best but at the time and place it was a defining moment for the entire trip!

Everyone has climbed Mt Frosty, the highest peak in Manning Park at 2409 m (7904 ft), so I thought. Arriving at Franklin for 7 am I expected a few others but not 14. Yes 14 people decided this was a good day to attempt Frosty. Half were joint members with the Korean Hiking Club and the rest I had met on other hikes over the past year including Bob, the guy with six foot legs and no knee cartilage and a NSH member forever. I have hiked with Bob before and for someone that has no knees left he has five foot strides and can motor both up and down with the best of them. In his youth Bob must have been the Caroline of his time.

I enjoy hiking with the Korean’s because they are always so polite and respectful as well as they have every gismo made by man…..in reproduction of course.
We left the parking lot late because they were organizing, then reorganizing and repacking things like rice pressure cooker, chairs, cameras micro waves and anything else that you would never think of bring along. Obviously they love their comforts. I cannot forget to mention the matching shirts with pants and bandana’s, backpacks, hats, poles and boots. If anything ever happens to one of them at least they will be found looking good. The exception was one female hiker named ME ME which I quickly renamed her Yu Yu. She pipes up “no, no” it is Me Me and her friends repeat the same Me Me. It sounded like I was hearing double but perhaps I was getting blinded by the pink rain poncho, green shorts and yellow gloves with long black tights. Later someone would correct me and inform me that Yu Yu was Japanese. Now that explains the wardrobe light show.

Once we got to Manning Park we quickly put on our boots and backpacks ready to get the hike going. Standing around for say 10 minutes, then 15 and maybe as much as 30 minutes waiting for our new found friends to pack camping chairs, pressure cooker, gas stove ect into their backpacks we finally broke trail at the crack of 10:17 am! Normally this is a 7.5 hour hike but I had this nagging suspicion today might take some what longer.

Regressing for a moment I did something several days ago I would quickly regret on this fine sunny morning. On Thursday I reorganized all my hiking gear in different spots of my home to make things look neater and be more efficient. That was my first mistake. The second mistake was not double checking my packed backpack before leaving home. You know when you stare at something thinking I am missing something and then proceed to do nothing about looking into why your brain and gut thinks that way. Third mistake is when you realize you screwed up on the first two points and think you can do without those missing items. Fourth mistake is leaving the parking lot feeling cocky about your mistakes and how tough you are because you will never need those items that day anyways. Finally, the fifth mistake is when somebody offers you assistance to break trail (thanks Alex) when you are in shorts, no gators, missing a strap on your snowshoes and the snow has that razor sharp morning edge to it and you stubbornly forge ahead.

Of course you have your snowshoes packed on your back and the very first step you take you break through the razor sharp snow crystals up to your knee. As you pull your leg back up through the hole you can see little trickles of blood dripping down your shin. Then you think I might as well have matching shins and sure enough several steps more your other leg breaks through and you now get to share the pain with your other leg. Then to add insult to injury you dig your poles into the semi hard snow to left yourself out and you sink down to your shoulder. Somewhere between your first step on the snow and the third or fourth you have left the basket off your pole behind in one of the many holes that now exist with everyone following behind you. Sometimes I hate being mortal and constantly being reminded of it!

Just when you think you’ve hit rock bottom, someone tosses you a shovel….that is the kind of day it is going to be.

One of the downsides of the Korean Hiking team is they do not distinguish between who is an ‘A’, ‘B’ or ‘C D’ hiker for any trip. Everyone who wants to join comes along. Therefore, you have all levels of fitness and skill on the same trip. The positive side is they mostly all assist each other whether its waiting or cooking a pot of rice on the summit. Very friendly jester. For everyone else it means if you’re on a ‘C’ hike you politely wait for the last person which on today’s hike meant a loooooong wait.

Waiting for the last person ended up being good for me. I was not exactly having my best day with equipment, bloody legs, first wet then nearly frozen toes from the start. So I sat back after we made it too the camp and had a great chat with one of my new acutance talking about sex, religion and politics for the next hour or so. It was relaxing easy going. He was always stopping to catch his breath so I worked with him focusing on moving slower but never stopping. “One foot in front of the other” became our chant. Within a short while we caught up to several of his friends as they took off their snow shoes to scramble up a rock ridge to the East Summit.

At that point my new friend started to cramp in his adductors. I was not really keen to give him a rub down in that area so I let one of his closer friends help him out. Yea, I know that maybe that sounds a little selfish of me to dump him when he need some assistance but I figured I had done my part so I made a quick exit and was gone within seconds.

Scrambling up to the East Summit took maybe 15 or 20 minutes. Once again magnificent views surrounded me from all directions. Yu Yu came along with Mie Mie and we took a moment having fun snapping some pictures of each other. I was wondering if I had ever met someone from Asia that does not have a camera? Does that sound like a stereotype, then I am guilty.

To my surprised everyone else had scrambled up to the West Ridge so I jogged up to see what was happening at the summit party. Some of the people were sitting on cold hard rock’s eating dried out sandwiches trying to look comfortable. Boss Lady/Pres CD leader was still complain about her intestines but I decided to avoid that subject this time. If I was ever going to get stuck on a summit then I want to be with the Korean’s. They have everything of comfort unpacked at the top. Foam cushions, lawn chairs cooking burner, telecommunication system between members, fresh warm tea, you name it they had it. This would have been a perfect Colman advertisement. Canadian Tire could not have set the stage better.

Did I say pictures were taken? Pictures of every conceivable item, rock, mountain within 100 km and summit sign were snapped from angles that I did not know even existed. You could see Manning Provincial Park below and off in the distance the peaks of Hozomeen Mountain in the North Cascades across the International Boundary. The best moment was when the guy that I ditched when he had to have some cramps messaged out came around the corner into the sun light approaching the summit. He had a grin from ear to ear. Man, that must have been some rub down!

Going down was not much of an event except the guy with the messaged adductor issue miss placed his snow shoes during his moment of self indulgence and Dave Mid Night Blue fell into a sink hole up to his shoulders. Both survived with no damage done except for Dave’s pole breaking.

The big surprised when the person that did all the trail breaking for the day had several water melon waiting for each member when they got back to the parking lot. Alex, you were a hero. The second surprised was when I thought I would take a short cut approaching the car and went to cross a small log across a creek running into the lake. Considering how the day started the end is pretty much predictable……I slipped and fell in. I can still here Boss Lady/Pres CD laughing. I guess I was just a serious case of roadkill for the day.

Just to end things five of us stopped in Hope for a very late night dinner after leaving the Korean’s who were heading to Chilliwack for some food. We ended up at one of those places that advertise ‘Mother’s Cooking’. When you walk in ‘Mother’ was some 450 pound gorilla behind the grill with long oily hair hanging in the pot he is stirring. Saying that, the long awaited dinner went down well and even the Boss Lady/Pres CD for the day intestines were feeling better. On that note The Honeymoon was over for this day.

Thanks everyone for an event full day.

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