Brrrrrrrrrrr

Finally, early this week I think I was finally able to kill off most of the viruses that were making life tiresome these past weeks. So, what do I do to celebrate my viral liberation? I abuse my immune system by inflicting upon it subzero air temperatures, smoky air, and sleeping inside a poorly ventilated hole in the snow at 5800ft. David had sparked the idea of going snow camping this weekend, and I didn't see any reason why not to go. Plus, it had been quite some time since I last built a snowcave or igloo to sleep in. I believe the last time I did one of those trips, I helped others build snowcaves, and then I set up my dry tent up on a nice ridge. Then that night, someone's shelter caved in, so I let him crash in my tent. However, due to his tossing and turning at night, my tent gradually slipped off the ridge crest, and the whole tent went crashing down into a ravine at 3am. Cold night.

I had hoped this trip wasn't going to be like that. Well, Trevor and I met up at Dave's place where we loaded up his car and headed up to Provo canyon around 5pm. We got to a camp site about an hour or so later and began to dig. There wasn't quite enough snow to dig a simple snow cave, so we had to build up the hillside a bit. After about an hour or two of digging, I had a pretty good shelter considering the snow limitations. Trevor and Dave had to rebuild theirs after a collapse, but eventually got something to work with. The approx ¾ moon gave off plenty of light during the night, and we got a nice fire going to warm us up. It dropped well below zero during the evening, and thankfully the air was dry. Clothes were not though, which is why the fire was really nice. We cooked up some hot dogs, and chili. I left a can opener at home, so we had to resort to rather primitive methods in obtaining food. Dave and Trevor retired for the night, and I curled up around the fire until it was almost out. I saw a few shooting stars, some deer, and listened to a chorus of coyotes squabble in the distance. I got into my cave, and put on some extra clothes in my sleeping bag. I woke up several times throughout the night having to curl my toes to get feeling back in them. I didn't rest all that well.

I awoke in the dark with Trevor saying that Dave was pretty sick, and he was needing to take him to the hospital. It took several moments until I was able to make any sense of what Trevor was telling me. But by then, he had already taken off with David. So, with nothing else left to do but keep warm, I went back to sleep. My toes were now completely numb, and freezing. I took off my extra pair of socks, and immediately feeling was restored. Too tight of socks were cutting off circulation. Duh. In an hour or two, Trevor returned and reassured me that David was only severely dehydrated. Trevor and I started a fire to warm up a little, and broke camp. We met up with David later at the hospital, and went out to eat some breakfast. I got home, took a ridiculously hot shower, and crashed for several hours in a dry warm bed.