Mount Mitchell, Third Time's A Charm (October 2014)

So after two failed attempts at the measly Mount Mitchell summit, Cortney and I decided to get serious and drop the rest of the crew.  The men could stay at home while we scaled the beast.  I had been training for a marathon, and she has always been in great shape, and it was time to finally put this one under our belts.  After all, we have our sights set on Colorado fourteeners and Mount Ranier, so how could we possibly proceed without putting the 6,683 foot peak of the east on our list.

I had a blast.  Not much of a struggle on the way up at all.  The weather was absolutely perfect for the entire trip.  We set up camp at Black Mountain Campground on Wednesday night and set out Thursday morning for Higgins Bald where we determined to spend night one.

Note to self: if you are two women leaving a campground, you might let the camp host know you don't intend to return for a day or so.  More on that later.

We found a site early in the afternoon among the pines at Higgins Bald and played cards, experimented with camp recipes and kept the dog entertained.  Rook proved to be the most entertaining card game though Cortney beat me at just about everything we played that afternoon.  We got to bed at a reasonable hour and decided to set an alarm for five am so we could get an early start and catch some of the hike before the sun rose.  Ideally, we would have made it to the summit by sunrise, but that would have required us to wake up at 3am, and let's face it - we completely underestimated how long it would take us to get there.

Could not have picked a better day to reach the top.  We had it nearly to ourselves at eight in the morning, and enjoyed the opportunity to snap photos and relax for a little while.  The blue ridge around us was completely lit up with fall colors.  On the way down we passed a number of bear hunters and bear hunting dogs.  No sightings on this trip however.

When we finally finished our hike at the base of the mountain, we walked back to our base camp site at the campground to a crowd of worried onlookers.  "Are you Holly?" one of them asked to which I responded, "yes."  "Oh we have been SO worried.  The Sheriff was JUST here."  Turns out the couple camping next to us saw us depart the prior day expecting us to return that evening.  When we didn't show by noon the following day, they alerted the camp host who alerted the cops.  Thank goodness we didn't stay for a second night or we would have had the entire family scared to death.  So, no, it's not necessarily enough to let your loved ones know of your plans (which we had).  We ended the trip with a delicious bowl of chili and our sore feet propped up by the fire.  Great trip.  Colorado here we come.

Cortney's Dirty Thirty (August 2014)

I love camping with my husband, but there is something special when a large group can get together to backpack into the woods and share a weekend together.  For Cortney's thirtieth birthday in August, that is exactly what we did.  Cortney and I are perfect backpacking partners and have already done several trips in the North Carolina mountains this past year - one to Joyce Kilmer, and one to the top of Mount Mitchell.  Apparently the boys don't like the uphill hikes (though that never stopped us!)  

The location was Wilson's Creek, a hop skip and a jump from Aaron's folks' place in Lenoir, North Carolina.  Wilson's Creek is well travelled, often crowded and has tons of camping spots.  We had been there once before, but this time we were with about twelve people and we hammock camped.  I swear I always sleep better in a hammock than on a little inflatable air pad.  Perhaps I need a new pad...GEAR TIME!  Ok, here's the video version of the trip:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NVZ5-PAo0ig&feature=youtu.be