Alright Already

So as you all can tell I have not been blogging at all. I have done so much that it is going to take me forever to catch up. In this post I am going to share about Summit. If you don't know what that is let me tell you. Summit is a program through the Rec department at BYU-I. In this program two teachers (Steve and Melissa) pick 13 students to come alone for the fun. What fun you ask? Well once we were picked we had meeting together about once a mouth in winter semester. They got more frequent as the semester went on. We then got to start Spring semester about a week to 10 days early. We met every weekday at Steve's House. (His family rocks for letting us be there.) In this time we talked about all the things we were going to get to do. We split up in our LOD groups (Leaders of the Day) and planned those days out from start to finish. We also learned things to help us out. Anchor systems, asending a rope, stemming and brigeing are just a few things we learned. (Those mostly would help us in canyoneering.) We also got to give lessons to everyone. So most of those were done at Steve's. We then spent a weekend up at Badger Creek. We mostly worked on team building things. It was great. The weekend before we left we did baptisms at the temple. It was wonderful. K so now the real party. Monday we met early and started our drive down south. Here are some picture from this first part.

This is at Badger. It is Steph raping.

Here are all of us students in front of the Temple in Rexburg.

We even had time to slack line.

Here I am learning to asending a rope.

This is uncle Kuggie (Steve) teaching us anchor systems.

We even had time to stop by a thrift store. We got the best deal ever. Everything we could stuff in a bag for 3 dollars. Oh let me tell you we got some very good things. You will see that later on this summit trip!!

Yes that says, "We will trade Marlayna for Steve." No feeling the love.

Here we are bright and early all pumped to head down south.

Once we got there we set up our camp. We were going to be there for just about a week. One of our longest camp places. Oh by the way this camp was just south of Hanksville Utah. Look it up. (it is west of Moab) We got to bed after a short dance party. We needed to get all the rest we could. Our next three days were going to be spent on survival. Dave our guide got there Tuesday morning early. We ate breakfast and then gathered together for a talk and prayer. We were then buddied up with someone. They were to know where we were at all times. My Buddy was Dave. I also had to learn about him and tell everyone about him at the end. I was super lucky to have this chance. So we then set out. We just started walking. We headed into the desert following Dave. He would stop every so often to teach us things. We learned things like to sleep on juniper bark. It is kind of soft and it will help you keep your heat in. As we followed we started down into this big canyon system. We got to do some short down climbs. As we dropped into the bottom we came across our first pothole of water. Once Dave checked it we all drank what we could. Man it was good!! Then we walked down the bottom of the Canyons. Then we started a very long drawn out climb out. We found one more pothole of water. This was to be our last water for about the next 16 hours. Our last bit of the out climb was long and very straight up. It took a lot out of all of us. Once at the top we had to make a choice. We were looking for a spot that we knew was water. So it was either stay where we were or go to the water. It was to the water we wanted to go. Once we hit the dirt road we to a right and started walking. In about 2 miles we hit a fork. We went left thinking this was were we needed to go. We started walking again. At this point it was dark we didn't know exactly where we were now and we were starting to slow down. It seemed like we walked for ever. I even threw up because I was dieing or at least felt like it. We finally stopped. After talking for a bit Dave told us to put down our bark and start spooning. So we did it. All 16 of us started spooning. Man it was a long cold few hours. After a few songs and one sweet steam roll we knew where we were and it was time to walk back in the dark about six or seven miles to water. It took a long time to get there, but once there they gave us our water and blankets that we got for the next night. We all crashed at that point. Who knows for how long but it was great. they even had some food there for us. Blisters and everything else was taken care of. It was time to make a choice again. Ater a summit record of 26 miles walking in the first day many were struggling. They were more than willing to go get the van and come pick up who ever wanted to quit. We all made the choice to keep going. It was a very proud moment for everyone. Our next part of the this three day party was going to be us students finding our own way. They pointed us in our way and we started walking. Once we can to the down climb we had a storming period witch i played a part in. (All apart of learning.) We finally made it back with our teachers and Dave. We got a fire and ash cakes that night. WOW!! Never have I been so happy. The next morning we got up, washed in the creek and started our out climb of the canyon bottom we were once in. It was super hard to do. With every step I thought I was going to die. I had no clue how I was going to make it to the top. Well it took many brakes and wonderful people to push me on. Once out we stopped and talked for some time while Steve and Melissa ran back to camp to get food ready so we could have it once we all got back. Finally we got back to camp after about an hour looking for it. Food, fire, and a sleeping bag have never been so good.

This is the second morning at a water troff. I didnt care!! It was the best water ever!!

This is at the base of the long steep part on the first day.

Here is one of the down climbs we got to do.

Here we are with our bark that we would be sleeping on.

This is Dave. He is one of the most amazing people ever.

This is one of our rests. Man I was grateful for each rest.

This is the out climb. As you can tell I am dieing and I can't really walk all that well at this point.

Fire!!!!

Making fire.

This the down climging we did on the second day. It took a bit for us to get here without our teachers.

This is the road we slept on.

K so this is going to be the end of my first telling. I know this part was long but I love survival. A lot of the other stuff wont be. But stayed tune if you want to find out more about summit.