Bennett Fam: July 2009

Wow what an adventure! Last week-end Chris and I hiked the lower Rouge trail! It was amazing! We started almost at the coast and hiked our way back to Graves Creek, or Merlin! It is about 45 miles! There is no rodes in once you start, so you have to carry all your supplies, food tent, clothes, soap...lots of stuff. My pack ended up weighing 27 pounds and Chris's weighed 50...ya he carried all the heavy stuff, tent, stove! But he was happy to do it! Chris has hiked this trail 3 times before and has really wanted me to go for a long time! I am so glad he convinced me! It was one of the best times we have ever had together!!

The river is so beautiful! It is so untouched, so different from the upper Rouge!!

Our packs, his is a Mars and mine is a Venus! Kind of funny!!

Day one!

After our first day we hiked ten miles, set up camp and them, Chris tells me we are hiking again...up to this water slide! I was so scared to do it! The water was freezing, first you have to swim over to this rope ladder thing....I was kind of scared of all the stuff in the water so Chris carried me on his shoulders across...you climb this rope ladder thing, which is so much harder then is looks.....

next you sit up here and stop the water for a minute, to give yourself a little push...

...then lay down real flat as you slide cause at the end the rock comes out at the top, if you sit up, you'll need stitches!!

It was so much fun!!! I did it twice!

This, is our stove, it's how we cooked all our meal!! We also had hot coco every morning and every night!! We'd be cold after swimming!!

Day 2...

This sign was the half way point from were we started!!

We camped on beaches right next to the river 2 of the nights!! It was beautiful! We swam in the river twice a day...and in a couple streams along the the way!!! The streams and water fall are amazing!! Pictures don't do them justice!!

We also ate, any and all black berries we could find!! Yum!!

Day 3, despite all our efforts...changing socks mid-day, mole skin, I got huge blisters!!! A total of 13!!

We ended up doing 18 miles day 3, our camp we were going to stop at...we missed and there is no where to stop on the trail...I was dead!!! But don't you love my cute hiking skirt, Chris got that for me, picked it out all by himself!!

People told me that I would hate my pack during this hike, I never had any problems with my pack, my upper body never even got sore...I did however hate my boots!!!!

There are beautiful wild flowers every where on the trail!!!

This is how we got water, we pumped it from a stream ,with our water filter!! I was a little weirded out by this at first, but got over it pretty quick and it tasted, fresh and cold and delish!!