2006/09/09 JDF Take #2

The field was smaller this time than last week,Danimal, FT and I started this wet drippy morning from China Beach this time to try and avoid the tide on Bear Beach.

The plan was that FT would run with us to Bear Beach and double back leaving Dan and I to continue, right on through to Botanical.

There were a few factors that made this run harder than last weeks.

1.) The rain the night before. We were wet from the getgo from the salal and the bushes, we were cold on the slower sections,(the beaches)

2.) The recent full Moon.(making the tides higher than usual.)

3.) The footing was more trecherous, what last week were small mud hollows became shoe sucking quagmires.(Dan sunk up to his knee in one spot!)

4.) The rain had turned some of the trail into clay, making the decents faster but somewhat out of control. Both Dan and I ended up on our asses so many times we were getting very "stained".

A combination of these factore, plus miss-judging the tide on Sombrio, led Dan to pull of the course.

I had puchased a couple of walkie talkies so we were able to make limited contact with FT who waited to see who came out of the bush at Parkinson Creek.

I saw FT first and refueled at his fun-mobile, told him to not move from there and to wait for Dan.

I was feeling pretty good as I knew that the worst was behind me, so I pushed on in the warm afternoon sunshine to the end at Port Renfrew.

10:21 for me. 40 minute slower than last week, but I had to bushwhack off the beach and find a washed out over grown bear infested bypass trail to get by the head land and back onto the JDF, North of Sombrio.

All in all we survived another epic trip to the Wild Wet Coast of VI!