21st of January

Mark and I decided to climb the mountain behind our hotel to get a closer look at an ice waterfall. Due to the treacherous nature of the off path areas I couldn’t make it close to an ice waterfall without seriously risking sliding on some ice and then off a cliff which was rather sad.

The cliffs on the side of the mountain we decided to climb looked distinctly like the cliffs of Minis Tirith.

On my way down I saw three kids above me and seconds later they were below me. How they managed to do this while wearing either poor sneakers and in one case naught but sandals and socks I have no idea. Just before the bottom the most tragic thing happened, my loyal boots (which many of you are no doubt familiar with as they have crushed many toes) decided to fail. One of them developed a rather large tear in its sole. This first became apparent when I tried to wash some of the accumulated dust off them in a running creek. My left foot became very cold, on inspection the boots sole was ripped from side to side. Why do my boots get a whole paragraph? Because I miss them terribly and they have served me so loyally over so many years. I can hardly count how many small children have been crushed beneath their heel and never gave me a blister.