We woke with the sunrise and Kyle had coffee already started. Angel. We packed up while he made us warm oatmeal with raisins. Everything is wet and muddy, and not a one of us cares. What didn’t hurt last night, does now, but the boys are bouncing around, ready to go again, so all is good. Kyle assures me it is a short day today, we should cover the 5 miles before a late lunch and we can play and rest by the Colorado river all afternoon. We go “packs up” and head off. Christy and the boys are ahead, I am trailing them and Kyle is in the rear, leading from behind. Once we climbed out of the ravine we had slept in, I was so discouraged to realize that although we were traveling laterally, we were not moving horizontally. It was climb up one ridge, pick your way back down, over and over. Sweet Christy talked to the boys the whole way, discussing differences in vocabulary and such between Canada, Europe and America, and also teaching them hiking terms and methods. We learned all hikers have trail names, Kyle was “Trek.” we decided the boys were “Mountain” and “Goat,” since they were clearly little mountain goats, at home cliff side. My name was still undecided. We saw many varieties of cacti, and a slow rain fell on us all day. Again, I was thankful for the natural air conditioning. I was on the ragged edge of my capabilities and I felt the cooling rain was God giving me a little help. I think heat would have been one stone too heavy. We passed the impressive Monument spire and climbed down to its base and on further to take a break at Monument Creek. My lack of ability to “go” wilderness style was making me sick. I was trying, I promise! The boys? No problem. The heavy packs were strapped tightly across our chest and hips, closely aligning the weight along our strong spines, which sometimes made deep breaths heavy and hard to fulfill. I tried to ignore that the movement and breath restrictions made me feel claustrophic. After climbing up out of the famous Monument Creek, we made it over and d-o-w-n a rock facade into a dry creek bed that we followed for the last hour. It was all downhill from there. We still had to scale large boulders and descend what was once small waterfalls. We also had to watch carefully for inukshuks as the bed forked and turned. The boys were far ahead at one point, finding the creek bed a fun, easy run, with rainbows of pebbles from the colorful layers above beneath their feet. But they missed a marker and took a wrong fork. Kyle quickly realized it and reigned them in. A good life lesson boys, always watch for your inukshuks. When you are lost, find your markers, they are always there, even if you can’t see them at first. And how do you get where you are going when it seems beyond impossible? Put one foot in front of the other. Then keep doing it. Just as I was about to give up hope, we came upon a jungle of head-high rush and thicket at the edge of the Colorado River. We pushed through it, prickly limbs holding us back, to a sandy clearing above the Grand Rapids at the base of a black cliff with red veins. As promised, we were “packs down” by 1:00. I still wasn’t feeling well, so Christy gave me some nausea medicine I had never heard of and I gratefully laid down. A gentle rain was falling and I drifted in and out of sleep happily listening to the boys play in an eddy in the river. They used their new skills and confidence to climb the cliff for better views of the Rapids. I started to protest, but decided they had easily proven it was within their capabilities, and besides, now they weren’t even wearing packs. They quickly named all the landmarks they identified, as they love to do. They minted “Bird’s Eye View”, “Bear Ledge”, “Turtle Beach”, “Olympic Mud Bowls”, “Cozy Cove”, and “Fat Man’s Food Court”, which was obviously our kitchen cave. It was a shallow cave about 10 feet off the ground that was the best place to set up the camp kitchen so we could stay dry while we ate. It meant I had to force my tired self up there, over and over again as it was also our communal area. Once done hiking, the boots thankfully came off until the next morning, so we all scaled the wall into the cave flip flop style. It was tempting to use the surrounding brush for a helping hand up, but as often is the case in the desert, it was covered in thorns for protection from its harsh world. When reaching for help, reach carefully. Another life lesson. We had a yummy chicken salad wrap for lunch and a warm bean and rice burrito for supper with salsa, eaten by headlamp just after dark. We were adept at maneuvering through the foreign terrain at camps by headlamp by now. Small shuffling steps. I’m pretty sure Kyle is magic as he whips up warm yummy food from nothing over and over again. There is lots of dinner conversation, but I stay mostly silent. Kyle and Christy are both experienced world travelers and hikers and have lots of great stories to tell. The boys have heard all of my stories. I want them to hear and see the world through Kyle and Christy.