This was the “big” day of the retreat. We skipped yoga in the morning as we needed to get going at 5:30am. The program of the day was a 30km return hike up mount Ena, with some 2200 meters elevation gain. The trail started off a couple of kilometers down the main road, across a bridge off to the left. A sign indicating “km 0” marked the beginning.
Similar to our first hike, muddy doesn’t even begin to describe the state of the trail. With the effort required to pull our feet out of ankle-deep mud, hoping not to leave a shoe behind, the way in and up felt like double the work out.
Fortunately, the hike offered really beautiful vistas to distract us from the hurdle. We started on single track through the forest, then across wide cow pastures and into the forest again, later followed at higher elevation, by lower thick shrubs, and eventually sparse and dry vegetation that had us feel for a brief moment that we might have been transported to the African Savannah.
After about 5 hours we reached the top and were rewarded by an incredible 360 view of the mountains around us, with even a glimpse of the ocean far in the distance. Even Hailey and Eduardo were impressed by how exceptionally clear the sky was, a rare thing as the clouds would have usually rolled in by that time of day.
It was fairly windy at the top so after enjoying our lunch and taking the appropriate photos, we headed back down. A few people at the front started running, Brice included, while I preferred to power hike/jog along with a few others.
Eventually we reached our water refueling point by a little bridge. Lindsay and I sped up our pace, and we found ourselves some distance from the other girls behind us, but not quite able to catch up with the front group. The way down took a while of course, and being separated from the rest of the group, we had to pay more attention to our surroundings, to make sure we were on the right tracks.
It’s funny how the same trail can look so different on the way out, especially when you haven’t paid attention on the way in and you now find yourself thinking “I don’t remember this big broken tree” or “I’m pretty sure we should have passed a big open clearing by now”. We had a few moments of hesitation when finding ourselves at a fork in the trail, but every time, the deep Salomon Speedcross tracks in the mud confirmed which way to go ( I would not normally recommend this method of finding your way back to a trail head, but in this instance, following the fresh footsteps of the runners just ahead of us worked like a charm) .
On the way down Lindsay and I found ourselves talking a lot about sewing and knitting. Turns out she loves that stuff too so there was much geeking out about sewing patterns and projects and how there wasn’t enough time in the day to do it all. I was definitely thankful for the distraction during the long way down.
Eventually we arrived back at the wide open cow pastures that we had crossed on the way up. It felt quite different now though. Engulfed in fog, the grey stumps felt more prominent than they were earlier in the bright sunshine and all of a sudden it was like we were in Ireland or Scotland.
A couple of km later we reached the trail head and the “0” marker. But now that the downhill was over, we still had to climb back up the road to the lodge. We were a bit further down than on the first day of hiking, probably about a kilometre and a half. But in the same fashion as on the first day, that steep mile felt like the longest one of the day. What’s more, shortly after starting on the road, we came to a junction, with one road curving out to the left and the other continuing straight. Neither of us remembered a junction, so we were a bit confused for a minute, but we figured we could hear the river from the lodge, and the straight road followed the river whereas the one branching off to the left didn’t. So straight up we went.
Eventually, we reached the lodge and were welcomed by a cheerful group, encouraging us from the main platform. I was pretty happy to be done, and somehow found the energy to run up the steep trail to the platform, thus concluding my longest hike to date in 9hours and 15 minutes. I even went back down to the river to dip my sore legs and knees into the water.
The front group had arrived about 20 minutes earlier (Brice was already all showered up), but there were still quite a few women behind us along with Eduardo and Felipe. They trickled in over the next hour and a half. We could see each girl coming up the road so each time we welcomed them with cheering and clapping and hugs as they arrived up to the platform, a big smile on their face and sighing with relief to be done.
The last woman to arrive, Kristen, was accompanied by Eduardo, and she later told us that upon arriving at the “0km” marker she had told him she wanted to climb the last mile in less then 20 minutes. So he made sure to give her the proper encouragement all the away and as they arrived near the lodge, we saw her pass her poles to him and proceed to jog the last few 100 meters. We all started shouting encouragements and clap for her until she made it to the top, and all of us could sense the emotion and the excitement she must have felt, of finishing something she had previously doubted she could accomplish.
There were lots of hugging and barely a dry eye around and although I’m not usually one to give into public displays of emotions, I started tearing up as well. It was just such an incredible feeling, to be part of this moment with all these other women that I didn’t know a few days earlier, after accomplishing something that I would not have believed myself capable of a couple of years ago and for it to feel so organic and natural. At the risk of sounding cheesy, I genuinely felt like at that exact moment, there was no other place that I was more meant to be.
That night we skipped yoga, everybody was probably pretty happy to just give their body a rest, and after dinner we gathered once again around the fire for one last evening at the lodge.