There and Back Again: An Alex Knob Tale

On Monday (Jan. 26), Hannah and I had the day off. We wanted to do something EPIC that day! There are a lot of 3 or 4 hour hikes around Franz Josef, but we wanted to do something more! Our ignorant and naive selves wanted to climb a mountain! We wanted to hike "Alex Knob", which was advertised as an 8 hour hike up to a "sub-alpine terrain with superb views". Superb views it certainly was... But they failed to advertise a few other things... 

Most of the hike up was full of roots and rocks that required us to get on all fours and pull ourselves up to where the path continued. 

In between climbing, there were a lot of really cool spots to stop and take a picture... Aka: take a break, drink water, and pray to God that we were almost there. 

There were also several tunnels along the path, made from fallen trees and rocks. Some of those reminded us of a few scenes in LOTR, which then led us to pretending we were Frodo and Sam.... The things we did to keep our mind off of what we were actually doing. We played 20 questions, we sang songs, told stories, and even started taking turns about what we were grateful for (ie: for the roots, for giving us steps to climb up. For the moss, for giving me a soft cushion to land on when I fall). We became desperate towards the end... 

After 6 hours... Yes that's right, 6 HOUrS of climbing up hill, we finally made it to the top! A few people, who passed us along the way, even cheered for us as we walked up to the summit... Or for me, as I dragged myself to the top of the summit...either way, it was encouraging to have people who were rooting for us all the way up. 

We spent 20 minutes at the top in pure, yet exhausting, bliss. We were so proud of ourselves that we made it all the way to the top. We didn't care that 10+ people passed us or that we took many breaks to catch our breaths, we had made it! Now we had to make it down! That part was easy, we only had one choice. On the way up we struggled with the choice of turning around or making it to the top, but once you get to the top, the choice is made for. Unless we wanted to sleep there, we had to go down. 

5 minutes into our decend, I was in my own little world, thinking about how easy it'll be to go down, when my clumsy feet failed me...

It would have been fine, except I then had to go down the entire mountain! It took us four hours to climb down. Using my left foot as a crutch and my arms to hold me, I was able to climb down all the roots and rocks that we had just climbed up only a few hours ago. I think my adrenaline and Hannah got me through. She kept my spirits up and we were able to make it to the bottom. We may not have made it in 8 hours... But we made it, that's all that matters. Luckily for us, our dear friend Mike offered to pick us up at the end of the day. I don't know what I would have done without him. I even offered to work the night shift for him! All in all, it was an absolutely beautiful hike! Even though I hurt my ankle, the views and the fact that I can now say i climbed a mountain were totally worth it! 

For a more entertaining and detailed story, visit Hannah's blog at: 

Http://ibetterkeepmoving.blogspot.com