Two Hikes And 15 Pushups Later…

Two weeks since my last post about pushups and headstands, spring in Seattle is still like that grumpy middle schooler who can’t make up their mind about going to summer camp. By that, I mean that after a short stretch of sunny days, we are firmly back to gloomy and grey.

But my heart is already singing with springtime cheeriness and dreaming of butterflies and wildflowers, so I’ve managed to squeeze in a hike every weekend since, and now I’m up to a grand total of 3 hikes. Here’s what happened.

So the first one I went to is called Rattlesnake Ledge which is in the Snoqualmie Region. It’s a 4 mile round trip hike gaining 1160 feet of elevation in 2 miles. It’s considered a relatively easy hike by Seattle standards. But since everyone in my city trains like Captain America all year round, ‘relative’ is a key word here. The ledge is an exposed rock face that you can totally fall off of if you’re not careful. I’m astounded by the fact that people don’t actually fall off more often. I had to step from a giant boulder to another with about a foots gap between them and I panicked and had to grab my friend’s hand (Yes, I am a ninny) and there were people balancing on the very edge of the cliff for the heck of it. What if you were startled by a sudden gust of wind and tipped over? Maybe you need ninja powers of focus and concentration. We sat at the top, ate our sandwiches, enjoyed the sweeping views before us and tried to ignore the sun scorching our forearms. It was a pretty normal hike and the fun part was getting to eavesdrop on little snippets of conversations from other hikers we passed on the way up and down.

We passed a family with a young girl who was convinced she had a spider on her. She kept turning around with a panicked look on her face asking’ But are you really sure, it wasn’t a spider?!’, and her older sister saying ‘yes I am, I told you, it was just a dragon-fly!’ I could relate with the kid so much.

We also passed a couple with a pug called Frank whose legs looked too tiny to climb up a mountain. The interesting part was, Frank was a she-dog. I wonder why someone would name a female dog Frank? Maybe Frank is short for something else? My friend came up with Francine and the best I could come up with was Franklina, but I’ve never heard of anyone called Franklina. I just can’t see someone shortening Francine to Frank though. It shall remain as one of those unsolved mysteries of life, I suppose.

The more interesting hike came a week later when I took a Friday off work to relax. Instead of sleeping in like normal folks, I decided to get up at crack of dawn and attempt a new hike myself. Contemplating life and pondering my future on top of a mountain alone suddenly seemed very attractive and Heathcliff-ish.

Off I went, deciding to tackle the popular but hilariously named Poo Poo Point. For more information on the strange name, go to the link I’ve included at the end. It was an 8-mile hike with an elevation gain of about 1800 feet.

The first 15 mins were great. I snapped a few pictures, heard the birds chirp and the insects buzz and I am thinking, ‘This is fantastic, I don’t have to talk to anyone, the forest is beautiful’. That’s when things started going downhill.

I walked past a bear warning sign and every horrific movie character death I’d ever seen instantly came rushing back to me. It also started getting really steep and I was regretting coming alone. The presence of another person would have kept me moving faster and taken my mind off my screaming calves.

But most of all, the silence around me, unbroken, except by the smaller inhabitants of the forest and the thought of being completely alone in a giant, decaying logging forest unnerved me badly.

I told myself to not be a nincompoop and push on. Some things I remember thinking…

‘I just checked trail conditions yesterday…no one mentioned a bear. Surely bear sightings would be all over the news?’

‘I wonder how far I’ve come?’

‘But if there WERE a bear, could I survive?’ ‘Zee said on the hike to Margaret’s way, that hitting a bear in its balls would incapacitate it, hmm.’

‘Maybe I should carry a long stick so I can get to the balls without actually getting too close’.

Mentally imagined intense violent battle between me and imaginary bear where I come out victorious and covered in scratches.

 ‘Oh, stop being stupid, there’s no bear’.

‘Is it too soon to check my phone again? Oh ew, that’s a giant slug!’

Fast forward 2 hrs and 4 miles later, I reached the top. I took in the views and ate my sandwich and before I could really contemplate my life too much, chilly winds and the threat of rain on the horizon sent me scurrying down.  

So a cold and miserable downhill climb later, I’m sitting in my car. Was it worth all this trouble for 10 mins of contemplation that I could’ve done even while sitting on my toilet? Probably not. Will I do it again? Nope, the trail was isolated and long and if I hurt myself, getting help would be a problem. But, was I glad that I did it? HELL YES.

I hiked 8 miles, all by myself, freaked myself out by imaginary bears and bugs and still didn’t turn around. I burned a lot of calories and ensured I could eat pasta the whole day.

And to end this, a quick check-in on the status of my push-up challenge. A few weeks earlier, I had written about my summer bucket list which included a thirty-day challenge to get up to 50 push ups. Filmed about a week back, here’s a video of me barely making it to 15 push-ups! A big shout-out to Pepe and Zee for positioning me in various angles to get a decent video. I had already done about 20 practice push-ups by the time we filmed this, so I’m quite proud I even did 15!

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15/50!! Getting there slowly but steadily! Woohoo! 💪🏼💪🏼 Doing 50 pushups in 30 day challenge! Read more on my blog, link in bio! #fitness #health #goals #pushupseveryday #pushupschallenge #pushup #seattleblog #seattleblogger #blogger #bloggerlife #pacificnorthwest

A post shared by Kat – Hiker | Engineer (@shescalledkat) on Apr 11, 2019 at 7:52pm PDT

Some interesting links: 

Hike to Rattlesnake ledge

People falling off rattlesnake ledge

Poo Poo Point and it’s strange name

What to do if you meet a bear on a hike (Don’t try to poke it in it’s balls!)

Pictures of more slugs

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