It was still a bit dark, so I put on the rose lenses for my glasses to help me see and started out towards the forest again. Found a trail I "thought" I could handle and headed up. Well, I ended up pushing the bike half the time and when I got to the top of the trail, it said it was a "medium" difficulty. Luckily the trail I came out on was marked easy. I headed up a bit more then turned around and headed back down.
At the bottom I found the exercise trail again so did a loop on that, then coasted back to the hotel. When I got back to the entrance I went to take my helmet off and it wasn't there. My first thought was it fell off, but then I realized I had never put it on. Went in for a quick shower then breakfast and a talk with the hotel staff to see if we could get rooms. Luckily someone cancelled and the room Tim and Michael were in was going to be available through Friday and we were able to get another double, but had to switch rooms, so Eric and I moved our stuff into Tim and Michael's room and headed to camp.
On tap for today is rappelling in the morning followed by navigation after lunch. We were warned that for the navigation we might want to wear long pants since we would be going through some thick brush. We asked what he was wearing and he was like just shorts and since we didn't really bring long pants we would all be wearing shorts. The rappelling was really cool. After some safety instruction we did one quick one then we were to learn a self rescue which meant stopping half way down, pretending that something was stuck in the ATC, create a foot hold, step into it, cleat the ATC then continue down, all while hanging 35 feet in the air. How much fun is that?
We asked what ATC stood for and Joe told us Air Traffic Controller. I thought he was messin with us, but a quick search later found that he was being straight. We ended up going 5 or 6 times each, then headed back for lunch. Today's lunch was at another local place which had mexican and american food. I got a big ass burrito and woofed it down. There we found out that for navigation we were going to the mountain and hiking, on the way we got a map and learned we would be hiking close to 3 miles. I wasn't expecting that much and had I known I would not have gone out mtn biking that morning, but off we went. We started down the trail and I hear this high pitched scream and Michael comes running to the back. I look up ahead and see a big snake headed into the woods.
The first part wasn't bad, I was leading with Tim navigating. I was thinking this is going to get a lot worse very soon, but for now I'll just enjoy the ride. Eventually we went off trail and the real fun began. We went straight up a steep hill and started getting into the thorny bushes. Wasn't long before my legs were covered in scratches. But we made it to the top and found the first target. At this point Tim took over the front and Michael was navigating. This was almost all off trail and took forever and we had to go up about 1200 feet over a 1 mile trek. let's just say it was more than painful and my legs were done when we got to the top. "luckily" the next part was all downhill, once again all of trail, but not as bad. Until I got stung by something. It felt like fire ants were all over my ankle. I was told it was probably prickly Nettles and it would go away soon. I have non idea what it was, but I suspect a wasp or some such creature since now that the rash has finally dyed down I can see a sting site. Finally we made it down to the road and Joe hitchhiked back to the car to come get us. Another tough day and I was beat, we headed back for pizza and beer, but first we had to go pick up Tim's truck and get some Bourbon for Tim and Eric. Tomorrow we had a 5 hour simulated adventure race so there would be no morning workout.
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