Hiking

I don't want my trip to be a treatise on hiking. But I went to the Audie Murphy Monument again from the opposite side. I have a couple of comments. First, if you've ever hiked steep areas you arrive in the morning and look up and say "I'm going to be up there in a couple of hours." You stop there because if you think of the pain of getting up there you'll get back in the car and stop at the nearest Starbucks for a refill or three.

At the end of the day you look up and say, with pride, I was up there today.

Now today I did about 1500 to 1700 feet of climbing. Look at it this way. My ears popped on the way down. But looking at that ridge line and realizing that was where I was hiking was a buzz. Which is why you do it. At the end of the climb, when your legs are screaming, and the sweat in pouring down, all of a sudden you are at the peak and looking down around you. Or you are on the ridge line, walking on the top of the earth. And it is a high that makes a runner's high seem like a one beer buzz. IF you've done it and felt it, you know what I mean. If not, you have to try it. It's worth the pain.