For What Are Men Compared to Rocks and Mountains?

As you have probably guessed, I have been waiting to use this title for a blog post for a while now. I waited until the Lake District to use it. That seems appropriate, doesn't it? At least that's where Elizabeth Bennet was planning on going in Pride and Prejudice with her aunt and uncle before Mr Gardner got cramped for time and they had to content themselves with Derbyshire.

Well, I am here. In England. Unfortunately, I can't figure out how to put pictures up on these computers, and so we will have to do without for a while. All of my ideas for cute posts with pictures of Loch Lomond intermixed with the folk song will have to wait. But we have gone to Edinburgh and Loch Lomond and we are now in Keswick, which is in the Lake District. Which is where Wordsworth was inspired for much of his poetry.



Why the title post about rocks and mountains then? The Lake District to my surprise is very rocky. Which explains how there are endless rock walls that seperate sheep pastures. And there are beautiful mountains surrounding the valleys.

Yesterday we decided to hike through a pass in the mountain from our hostel to Keswick.

This picture was taken before we know what we were getting into at all...look how happy we were.)

All of the tops of the mountains were not visible due to fog, which I will display for your viewing pleasure later (which is now).

My underlayers were soaked through my waterproof pants and my camera was taking a bath in my waterproof coat. How good. I thought. How great. Six miles into the hike and we were halfway. And we were on top of a mountain. And we were lost. And there was no van to save us. nothing. We had to keep going because there was really no way back. And we were freezing and shivering in the cold and I was pretty sure we were never going to get off of that mountain. And then something amazing happened. My pants started foaming. Foaming, you ask. Yes. Foaming. That is what Katie said and I didn't believe her. "You're foaming at the butt," she said, and I of course knew no such thing was happening. Until I reached my arm back to my backside and there was foam on my sleeve. I was instantly mortified and made Lori walk in back of my as close as possible. I wondered what it could possibly be. It looked like soap. I licked it. It tasted like soap. Many jokes ensued including backwards rabies, and I was able to ask people many times if they need to wash their hands. No one did. But I think people were laughing as they watched me hiking and foam coming out of my backpack and sliding down my waterproof pants. They forgot that we were lost and freezing and miserable for a while. I guess I had found a way to contribute positively to the group, in however unexpected a way. I looked in my backpack and there was no sign of soap. That is right. No bottle, or bar. No sign of soap except for the soupy soap bath that important things were swimming in. Such as my passport. Which is now drying under my watercolor box in the room in my hostel. But I am proud to have provided some comic relief when our group was in the belly of the whale.

P.S. Paying a pound for fifteen minutes of internet sucks.

pps.

this is Whitney. sucks for her. if you can't tell, she is now sunk knee deep in water, dirt, mud, and probably sheep crap.