There is some dispute to why we didn’t start until 11 today. I blame Pam, Pam blames me–welcome to the people’s court where you are the judge. As we stated just 3 days ago, we need to make earlier starts every day so that we can finish this trail and move on to the Tour du Mont Blanc. I took it upon myself to set an alarm for 7:15 this morning, after all, we stopped hiking at 4 yesterday afternoon and got to bed well before 10 last night.
When the alarm went off, I automatically hit the snooze (Pam NEVER gets up without at least one snooze, so I was just being a good husband). When the alarm went off again, Pam said “one more snooze,” so I obliged like an obedient husband would. The next time it went off, Pam said “I’m not ready to get up yet.” Clearly, the implication was “shut that damn alarm off or I’ll stab you in the throat.” Of course, I complied. I’m not finished with my throat just yet.
At 9:53, Pam jumps out of bed claiming to be the first one up and that we need to get moving like I was the one holding us up. I was clearly ready to start moving 2 hours earlier, yet she blames me for the late start. Keep in mind, that I still had to get up and make her breakfast, neglecting all of my packing and personal hygienic needs while she took care of hers. I, the good husband, made her coffee and hot muesli and neglected all my needs. So who is to blame for the late start? Some may say this is a one-sided argument, but this is reality blogging and I have the keypad. Please make your decision now.
An astounding 98% of you sided with me and blamed Pam for the late start. Kudos to all of you for your keen understanding of the natural order of things. But I’ve got a secret–I can read. I read the guidebook last night (surprisingly, he’s wrong on most things, but he always seems to get the elevations right). It said we had almost 6000′ of gain today with 4000′ of it being right off the start. That’s why I succumbed to my wife’s desire to sleep late.
At least the trail was well marked right from the start. There weren’t as many zig zags (as dead men say) and the trail was quite steep in several places. But what made it difficult was the heat and flies. It clouded up before we made the top, but it was a high cloud cover so we still had great views at every pass we went over. The flies didn’t get better until it started to rain–much later in the day after we were done hiking.
We’ve been in France for almost 2 months and I’m starting to get a feel for things. Some things I like a lot better than the USA and some I don’t. There are a few things I would like to incorporate in our home when/if we ever quit traveling: 1) no squatter–I prefer a toilet. 2) I like toilet seats so we will definitely have one on each and every toilet (I’m sure some women were complaining about the seat being left up, so a refuge guardian said to hell with it and removed all the seats. Of course, this spread like wildfire as a way to stop women complaining about leaving the seat up, they just forgot that men occasionally need the seat as well, but too late, the point had been made). 3) I like the idea of a water closet, I just want the door far enough from the toilet so I can put my legs together without having to lift them up and rest them on the door (sometimes I enjoy the alone time and like to read) 4) While on the subject of door space in the water closet, I want to be able to clean up the Netherlands (not the country, but thanks autocorrect) without having to turn my head sideways and plaster it on the door. 5) Speaking of cleaning the Netherlands, I like the shower head on a flexible line–no fixed heads in our house. 6) I like all the shutters on the windows.
Somehow, I got off the subject of today’s hike. The trail was well marked, that is, until we got to the second Cabane that was supposed to have food stocked for sale in it and didn’t. I am talking about the Cabane we are camped below. Not as far below it as we had planned because the trail just disappeared. We spent over 1/2 hour trying to find the trail and were thrown off by a dead guy’s sketch (why we believed him now, I don’t know). After scrambling around for a while, crossing the creek several times, dealing with cows with inferiority complexes, and wading through bogs, we found the trail. Exactly where the dead guy said it wasn’t.
The skies were turning angry looking and I wanted to get the tent set up ASAP. Pam was convinced that it wasn’t going to storm so we should take our time and find the perfect spot. I was happy with a flat spot. In the end, she found a pretty decent spot, but took her time doing it. I was wanting to get the tent up before the storm started. I for got to talk in a “nice voice” and she got mad, but as soon as the tent was up, it started to rain. As soon as we got all our stuff inside, it started to storm.
Pam is making some progress with dealing with storms. We’ve discovered that if we cover her eyes, like we used to have to do with Nutiket before we killed her, she is a little calmer until the thunder arrives. Unfortunately, we don’t have a closet in the tent that she can hide in.
In between storm cells, we made dinner and rationed out M&Ms once again. Because I need the extra calories, she let me have the odd numbered one.
