Challenge 227: Tired but great

What a day! Packed and lovely and filled with great people.
My coach friend, Natalie, and I had planned on taking a hike together in the late morning. It was to be a no big deal, hour or so long hike with the puppy. One that I've never been on before but she had. I pick her up and we drive up the beautiful winding road into Oakland Hills. We come upon this big parking lot and it is buzzing with activity. Families with their kids, couples with their dogs, groups of people with their walking sticks, guys with their bikes. This was the place to be on a Sunday morning. So we begin walking. The puppy is having the time of his life going to the bathroom on whatever he feels like it. Smelling all the new smells, going up to all the new people. The redwoods smell very tree like and we're having a great time. Our trail forked off and we took the one with the decline, which was fine, except I knew that a decline only meant one thing...and incline later. No prob. I can handle incline. I've been working out. So we got to the incline and I could tell I was getting out of breath, but it wasn't that bad. We were in the shade and it was gorgeous. Then we walk up to another fork in the road and my girl wasn't sure which way to go. So we decided to go left. The more adventurous looking choice. I said, "what the hell...let's do it!!" This was about 30 minutes into our hike.

So we started to go. And go. And gooooooo. And go. The trail twisted and turned. It got dirty and dusty and hot and out of the forest. We both kept thinking we would loop right back around. But it just kept going. And going. We definitely on a different side of the mountain from where we started, but how far? Who knew? We knew we started on Wild Ridge (or something like that) trail, so we just kept following the signs for that. Until the point came where the only two options to follow were NOT Wild Ridge trail. OH NO!! Where are we?! We tried to intuit the right direction and starting going up a steep path. Then neither of us felt it was right and we ran into some men with a map. We found out where we were...NOWHERE NEAR WHERE WE STARTED!!! We giggled and kept good attitudes about the whole thing. At least now, we were back on track.

The rest of the hike was smooth, albeit about an hour and a half long. We found some water for us and the puppy. We shared one small bag of nuts I brought and eventually we made it back to where we started. Three and a half hours later and a ton of great conversation. We figured that we hiked about 10 miles. Maybe more. So what started out as being a leisurely hike with a girlfriend turned into a mega adventure! Needless to say, I'm sore. Oh! Did I mention that before I started, I could already barely walk from a session with my trainer on Friday? I might not be able to get out of bed tomorrow.

So the rest of the day was great too. Got lunch, hung with Lily, had a meeting, and am now waiting for another meeting. I'm so tired!! But it feels great.