My Last Single Weekend

I'd been sick and it was raining this weekend, but I desperately wanted to get out and do something with friends. It seemed as though it had been forever since I had gone anywhere, so even though I was using a mountain of tissue for my nose, I got together with my friends Summer and Olivia to venture out into nature. Earlier in the morning, Darren and I had gone to Pine Knoll to partake in one of their amazing Sabbath School discussions (hear them on the web!) and breakfasts. Then Olivia and I waited for Summer to get out of a later Sabbath school, while Darren took off to go on a solo Joshua Tree wandering through the desert.

The gals and I were going to drive up to snowshoe up near Jenks Lake, but last minute turned around and ascended instead to Deep Creek near Lake Arrowhead. The whole drive up it was pouring down rain, but we figured that it would turn into snow when we got higher in elevation. We were sadly wrong. Our hike turned from a snow jaunt to a Northwest-esque saunter which was still fun. I sort of stumbled around the path in a sickness stupor, but was grateful for the camaraderie, river running below us, and chance to exercise.

We got back to our just in time for the sun to completely sink below the mountains. We were absolutely soaked, even through all of our rain jackets. We grabbed hot drinks and pastries in Lake Arrowhead Village, then attempted to ford down the mountain.

Unfortunately California is famous for landslides, and we got stuck in the middle of one. First we had to wait for some machines to clear rocks off the road for about 30 minutes. I guess they were working from the top down, because after we were finally allowed to continue down, there were still massive boulders everywhere along the road. My sickness, the fog, the rain, and the rocks were not a good combination. I tried to dodge the huge stones as best I could, but eventually ran smack into one. Immediately I could tell my vehicle leaned to the right. I quickly pulled off onto a shoulder. Summer went outside and yelled "D**n!" I have never heard her curse in my life. She told me a had a massive gash in the tire and that it was completely flat.

We called AAA which was a bit of a process, but finally got someone to come out and help us. The poor guy they sent unfortunately was given bad directions and ended up driving up and down the wrong road while we waited about an hour in my vehicle. Happily we had Stranger Than Fiction to watch on my DVD player while we waited. The guy--probably about our age--called us and we gave him the correct directions. Meanwhile both Olivia and I had to use the bathroom. She finally could not wait anymore, and went outside. Of course, he arrived just as she was able to re-dress. He actually let us stay inside out of the rain while he worked, so we watched a bit more of the movie. We felt like we were in one of those vans that move all around while one is watching a roller coaster track. It was kind of fun.

The fellow finished and we thanked him heartily. We continued down the mountain in thick fog, and felt great relief when it finally cleared and we were on familiar ground. I was SUPER sick when we got back home, but I was still glad we went. It was a very memorable last weekend as a single gal.