Dennis  and I decided to leave the camping spot we shared with Dennis’ sister , Lorriee and her husband Stanley. 

There was a string of four small lakes we wanted to see. The distance to the lakes was maybe a mile to two.

Did I mention that we took no food or water?  No problem…except we were starving when we decided to stop at Pear Lake. Dennis somehow found a safety pin which he attached to a piece of rope. We had no bait, but Dennis was sure if he was still he would catch our dinner. In about three minutes he came back to our camp spot itching and scratching the mosquito bites and swearing up a storm. Couldn’t blame him. 

As I recall, we only took a blanket each, no sleeping bags; another mistake. 

Darkness was setting by 6-6:30pm at our position surrounded by mountains. Time for a campfire. We did have matches and we were able to gather enough would and kindling to get a little fire going.  Great , right?  We didn’t notice how close we were to a small tree. Yes, it started to burn. Dennis and I did manage to stomp out the fire. We were on granite and the little tree had grown through a crack in the rock.  By the way, I have no idea if a camping or fire permit was required back then, but we had neither. 

After a completely sleepless night, we decided to break camp early and head back. I should mention that the millions of stars we saw overnight were awesome and intimidating. 

On our trek back to Lorrie and St an’s campsite we realized that previous day’s hike was mostly sloping downhill. We hadn’t noticed. Well, what goes down has to come back up to return to camp. It was sunny, hot and we had no water. 

We passed by four guys in their late teens to early twenties. As we passed by quietly we noticed one of the guys  had a hunting knife and made sure we saw it. We could hear them saying some threatening things, so we found the motivation to get up the trail faster. The trail was all switchbacks. When we got about thee switchbacks above the not so nice guys, one of us had the idea that we couldn’t take four of them, but maybe a small to medium sized rock would let them know we were not appreciative of their behavior. It wasn’t aimed directly at them, just near enough to send a message  

Over the side with the rock, not waiting to see where it landed, we sprinted to camp. 

One of the many adventures Dennis and I shared.