Strawberry Peak 6,165 feet May 13

 Here is today’s story and highlights. Five of us headed out on a hiking trail destined to bring part of the group to tears.

Here is the end of the trail. We would have started here and had a very easy hike but our trail guide said the road was closed so we had to start on the other side of the peak.

By the end of this day our feet would ascend 3000 feet from the trailhead and put 9 miles on our shoes to achieve our destination hiking over 7 hours. 

Wait until to hear the story before we made it to the top! Its better to hear the end of the hike before the start of the hike.

View from the summit! Yes, that is snow on that peak. 

Here is the view looking up to the peak. From the other side, very easy but from this side rock climbing with our hands and feet.

A picture can't show how much elevation or how scary this was. A couple of the gals begged me to push my GPS button for a helicopter rescue of the ledge. With much encouragement, we all got up to the top.

What saved us was a decision to take a different trail back to the car and not have to come down the crazy, crazy boulders and risk falling off the mountain. Did I say that I was the oldest and I had trouble keeping the pace of the girls?

    Here are my hiking friends. Tanette on the left is the leader and planner!
                                     

Prior to the summit on the first rock scramble, I made it to the top but the girls went back down to find another way. When they didn't show up, I decided to go back down and find them.  Can you picture a 20 foot slide and a sand dune that one step and you can just end up at the bottom on fast mode?

That's what happened to me, wrong step and I was on my seater sailing down the ravine. No injury but when I completed  the ride, my phone had slid out of my pocket and no where to be seen. i watched more rocks and sand continue to slide past me and wonder if my phone had sailed along down to the bottom? I sure didn't want to go down because I had to figure out how to get back up on the trail. It became a God moment to realize I would never find my phone on this mountain with 20 feet to climb back up hanging on to trees and rocks. It was probably buried or down the mountain. So I began to plan to finish the day without my phone and started back up. If God wanted to show me where to look for that phone that I need and depend on, well that would be a big miracle today. After about 5 minutes, my eyes saw a rock ledge and there was phone just waiting for me to find it. Thanks to the Maker! The girls concluded I was ahead and not behind so we were seperated for a couple of hours.

One more view to remind me of this day and God's care for me.