Preparing

  This weekend I took my Cub Scouts to the annual Klondike Derby.  For those not familiar, the Klondike Derby involves a dog sled type sled that the scouts pull around to different stations where they need to work together as a team to accomplish the tasks involved.  At the end of the day, they work together to pull the sled in a race.  It was a fun day, but that's not really what I was focusing on here.  Because there was so much walking involved, I decided to work on breaking in my new hiking boots and wear my pack.

There isn't really much time before we head out again to finish our first section hike, so I used my scout weekend as a "get ready for my hike weekend".  There was a lot of snow, a lot of mud, a lot of mucky water and a lot of change in the temperatures (cold in the morning and night, warm in the afternoon).  I'm happy to report that the boots worked beautifully.  Other than about 20 minutes of feeling a little cold in the morning, my toes were fine.  I trudged through melting snow, mud and a few inches of water and my feet stayed dry.  I didn't have any issues with my pack, and I'm sorry I didn't add a little more weight to it.  I only had a few pounds in it and no where near the weight I know I'll carry on the hike.

All in all, it was a good day.  I was exhausted and my muscles ached, but it felt good.  And it was great being in the mountains close to the Appalachian Trail (the trail actually passes by the Camp's property).  Soon I'll be taking sunset photos from the AT!