What could go wrong?

Yvon Chouinard says that it isn't an adventure until something goes wrong...

It was the first trip of the season, and we were a little slow at getting back into the swing of things. But what could go wrong? We’d done this many, many times in the past. Well, we are pretty darn experienced, but we still run into a few challenges along the way.

Of course, we were not quite in hiking shape, so we were moving a bit more slowly than usual. And it was really hot, so we were drinking more water than usual, and consequently pumping more water than usual.

And the mosquitoes were really going gangbusters for the first few days as well. That was no fun. We now have two kinds of trips in our memory: regular trips, and mosquito headnet trips. This was a headnet trip.

And then P threw out his back on the morning of the second day, and M discovered that she had somehow forgotten to pack her foam seat pad. It seemed as if the fates were against us. But a series of stretching exercises, a lot of patience, and some determination got us going again. And that got us over the pass and into Yosemite.

That hot weather began to change, but not necessarily for the better. We went from very hot and dry to cloudy and then thunderstorms for the rest of the trip. But the rain came only on one afternoon, and by then we were set up in camp, with the tent ready for the lightning, thunder, rain and blustery winds.