travel and rhum

Today I went on a hiking trip w 5 random people from school, it was through our outdoors club. It was intended to be a winter hike, which would have been my first of that kind, but I think the conditions of the trail were much worse than expected.

It had gotten warm the last few days and the dropped way below freezing again, so the surface had melted to water and then froze to ice. Basically the whole thing was ice but we were doing alright to deal with low inclines and ice.

We were doing fine but we got to this super tough spot, where people ahead of us had pickaxes so they could scale the quicker part, but we chose to go around the less steep but equally icy part.

I hadn’t realized at this point, but we had our backs basically facing a cliff. Maybe 150-200 ft of high incline covered in 1-3 inches all over. You would really have no way to stop yourself on the way down unless you hit something…

What happened next was absurd, me and one of the other guys both fell and slipped, but we were far apart so I didn’t see at the time. The leader of our group dove and grabbed me, and some random hiker dove and grabbed him. First I want to say how cool it is that a group of people like hikers in general are all so selfless and caring for of others. Second, thank you specifically random hiker, and lastly because of this dude I managed to not fall far and didn’t hurt anything. The other guy in my group is a different story but I will get to that later.

At this point, since I am basically clueless in terms of winter hiking, I was stuck. I was on a steep incline with no way of getting up down or across by myself. Another random dude, maybe 75feet (20+ meters?) sees this, and books it to come help me. I have no idea how he did this without slipping once, because he was running on the same incline I was stuck on. This legend helped me pick a path and punch holes in the ice for me so I could get off. He guides me down to my friend, who I will get to later, but we realized his pack fell so we went to get it back at the top. He guides me back to the top so we get the packs, then he goes up and down this super steep, dangerous, slippery cliff in like 5 minutes??? He did this to tie a rope from tree to tree so that we both knew where the path was for when first responders came for my buddy and could take the path he punched out himself, if we needed to.

This dude is an absolute animal, he was a big dude but he was so clearly in amazing shape, was super skilled at hiking, and incredibly helpful. If it weren’t for him I would have ended up sliding down the cliff to an injury, without a doubt. Thank you man. I never got your name cuz I was a little rattled from the whole thing, but your wife said you were a marine. That’s about all I know about you but you potentially saved my life and definitely both have me inspiration, and saved me from a concussion or some serious bruising at best.

Next onto my poor friend. We are rewinding back to when I fell btw:

He slipped at the same time as me, but nobody caught him and he could stop his fall. He is a big dude and I could imagine was going pretty quick considering how the ice was so smooth and solid. He hit his head on a log 75ish feet down, and stopped for a second. He managed to grab onto that log and the other guys were yelling at him to hold on (obvious, but I’m sure they could tell he was at minimum dazed). Two other guys went sliding down he cliff when he fell to try and catch him, and both of them ended up ok but they didn’t get to him in time. He could hold onto the log, which we later found out was because he has a bad head injury. He slipped and slid another 75-100ft down, smashing his entire side against another log I believe.

I didn’t know him well but he was so nice and friendly, and he made it a better hike and I hope we would have gotten to be better friends as it went on.

He ended up pretty okay honestly. I wouldn’t rule death out of the equation of that fall if someone else were to take it, to put this in perspective. He seemed to have a potentially fractured/broken collarbone, pretty bruised ribs, and a bad concussion. Unfortunately it seems like that concussion would potentially be brain damage, he got taken to a trauma center in a helicopter.

I just wanted to share this w you guys because although I’ve been hiking before, it was only when I was with my ex so this was a bit of a big step (considering who I am) to join a club trip with people I don’t know and do something new, and it was so amazing to have the support of all the hikers around us and first responders. Thank you, and if you’re reading this marine man, you saved my ass. Thank you.