A hike.

This past weekend, my mother retired. And I, made a 12,775 day tear-away calendar to mark my own retirement. Not really, but I did slump into a state of semi-depression thinking about how many more Mondays (and Tuesdays through Friday afternoons at about 5:29) that I was going to have to endure. And, decided for the 97^th time this year without actually purchasing a ticket, to play the lottery. Or to dance topless. KIDDING, mom! A little bit not kidding.

Anyway, we went to my parents’ property in western North Carolina for a surprise celebration and due to the lack of internet, television, and viable companions in the county—we decided to go for a hike to Catawba Falls.  (This blog might host quasi frequent hiking expeditions/reviews, due to my significant other’s love of sweating outside). Now, before you go start thinking that I am athletic and/or outdoorsy, I’ll need to describe how a physical event like this typically goes down for me.

every time.

Justin, whose self-admitted celeb-crush is Jillian Michaels (sick. I know), literally plays her role (on the Biggest Loser, for those of you who are ill-informed in the reality television world, and I pity you) when we do anything beyond my realm of exertion (elliptical, moderate intensity, i.e. slow enough to read my kindle without barfing, once a week month).  I can usually keep up for the majority of the activity, and by keep up I mean walk/hike/ski no less than 30 yards behind him, and for the rest of the time, am bent over, clutching an unfortunate tree or stranger, claiming/feigning adult asthma, diabetes, HIV, or anything remotely believable enough to earn me a sip of water.

handsome, eh?

(note: Justin is a male friend, as my dad would introduce him, with whom I spend a very large (and enjoyable) amount of my time. He is highly private and will probably hate this blog, so from this point forward, I will refer to him as simply J, for his protection. Though, as it turns out, he uses the internet about once a year (to look for my Christmas presents(!)), so he will likely never read this).

*Rudy story!! Although it was I who brought Rudy into this world, not physically/creepily, but I like to think in every other sense of the word, he is utterly and completely, 100% in love, with J. Insert tears/denial/confusion/depression/aggression/death. But actually, it’s sort of okay, because it generally looks something like this:

I'm dead.

Back to the hike. Overall, highly bearable. The ultimate goal I would surmise to be the big waterfall at the end; I think they call it Upper Catawba Falls, but there are a number of really pretty smaller falls and sights like century old mills/dams along the way. Now, when I originally looked this bad boy up (on my phone, on the hike, to pass time/think about anything but hiking), there was a bright bolded red sentence at the top describing yet ANOTHER person’s unfortunate death by falling from the top of the falls or wandering off the trail or some crap. To which I responded by assuming instant fear-induced paralysis if I stepped more than 7 inches off the centerline of the path.  Which makes the next part of the hike pretty unbelievable. 

Upper Catawba Falls

Also on the website (which turned out to be just somebody’s personal review of the trail, NON expert), they guy told of some more obscure paths that will get you to the very top of the waterfall. I timidly inched my way closer and closer to the top, arriving ultimately at a single, threadbare rope—with which I can only assume one was supposed to scale a rock face to get to the top. WHICH I DID. For all of 7 feet, before I cried and made J come help me down. Point being, I climbed higher than him. CHAMPION. And he was really impressed (and even a little winded!!!), which I truthfully care very little about, but will certainly recall next time he tries to make me do something scary, like ski down more than a 4 degree slope.

Something you should know about me. Every summer until I was about fourteen nine, I would climb a tree in my grandmother’s front yard, and subsequently have to wait for the mailman to come around and get me (hysterically crying/barfing) down. Every. Summer. I think that this fact, coupled with the recent hiking mishap, might serve as some sort of larger metaphor for my life. Daedalus and Icarus anyone? I’ll let you know when I figure it out.

All in all, I’d call it enjoyable. There are no signs, and it literally looks like maybe 3 racoons do this hike a year, so it’s a bit of a guessing game, but kind of nice that way. Only about a mile and a half in, pretty flat for the earlier leg, and great for dogs, if they aren’t the asthmatic/fat-kid-on-the-playground sort like Rudy. What a cutie!!

*guess who’s used the word barfing three times in two posts?! THIS girl! I’ll try to cut back.