Nicki and Dustin: Epic Harper's Ferry Hike

On July 5th we decided to go on a hike at Harper's Ferry and go rappelling. Let's just say that this was the most epic adventure I think we've been on yet. At least as a family. For those of you who know Dustin he has a few that just might compete :)

The group: Two pregnant ladies and their husbands, me carrying Conner in the carrier, Dustin carrying the rappelling equipment and part of a large cooler, David carrying the other half of the cooler, Dad with the other backpack of equipment and mom who was just getting over a horrible chest cold and having a harder time breathing.

The atmosphere: hot and humid. Temperatures in the 90s with % humidity in the 90s.

What we thought would just be a mile turned into 2.5 miles to the top with a steep and I mean steep incline. With the group and our heavy load it took over 90 minutes to get to the top. The hike itself was absolutely beautiful and shady and green. By the time time we reached the peak it is lunch time and the weather was stifling. And there is little shade. Not wanting to go back up the switchbacks we came back down even though we were all exhausted we decided to set up the rappel. Fastest way down right? Wrong. We had to hike down to a lower ledge but the rope wasn't long enough so we had to tie another rope on making is to the person had to unhook, move the knot and then hook back on. Here is where we should have decided it was best to all hike back down. There were three extremely inexperienced hikers, everyone was tired and Conner was done.

Dustin went down first to take care of the rope. I came down next to sit on the ledge and help everyone with the hooking and unhooking. Mom came down. Then Dad came down with Conner in the carried on his back with Conner crying the whole way down (no nap, tired, hot and so ready to be out of that carrier!). Then Mom, Conner and I went to hike the 3/4 mile walk back to the cars to try and help Conner sleep and cool down. We ended up plopping in the river by the car and playing there. Conner taken care of and super happy.

Then they started lowering the cooler and equipment not needed at the top and the cooler hit a bump and all of the food and water supply fell out exploding as they hit rocks falling down the 250 foot drop. No food. So Sarah played a game of grab food as you go down, trying to salvage what we had. Mistake number 2. All the experienced rappellers except for David are now at the bottom and the three inexperienced and David at the top.

Then the harness didn't fit our friend so he was going to hike down with the remaining equipment from the top. Then his wife tried to go down, having never rappelled before and also being 18 weeks pregnant, and being hot and dehydrated, had an anxiety attack coupled with heat exhaustion. They call us on the cell phone (the only way we could communicate) and Ben is on his way down to get water and they need help. Dustin I run back to Dustin at the bottom of the ledge, we collect empty bottles (we had no water at all down there, it all was lost when the cooler fell) and fill it with River water to dump on her. Mom and Conner and Sarah go off to buy more water and drinks and Dad gathers everything else to try and pack it all up. Dustin and I head back up the descent with the river water as fast as we could go, worried that we'll have to carry our friend down.

We meet poor Ben on his way down and he turns around to come back up with us. We end up meeting with our couple friends and David on their way up the switch backs to start heading back down so we dump water all over her which she said provided immediate relief since she had stopped sweating. They had gotten water from some other hikers and there were a few sips of Vitamin water and she had maybe half a cup of smart water and then we had a bag of peaches and cucumbers and carrots which we all sucked on our way down since by this time it was 2pm and we were all dehydrated. Hiking down we picked wild raspberries and then towards the bottom met Dad on his way back up with the water and sports drinks they bought. Then we all jumped in the river to cool down and felt much better. We headed home, getting good food on the way, showered and crashed. I think we figured that I had gone over 9 miles that day and Dustin around 8 miles.

We learned some valuable lessons and sadly a lot of this could have been avoided if we had planned better. Lesson learned. And you can never, and I mean never bring too much water.

Conner playing with mom at the top. Very excited to be out of the carrier but not for long since I banished him to it for the rest of the time because he wanted to climb near the edge.