Walk in the Rain

On Tuesday, May 9 it was raining and the temperature was around 4 degrees. Our small group was meeting at a home in a small town about 24 km north of our place. Paul was away for the week and so I decided that would be the day I would do my big walk. I have learned through experience that walking in the cold is easier than walking in the heat and I wanted to know what it was like to walk in the rain.
So I packed my large backpack with all that I thought I would need for an unassisted walk of 24km in the rain on a cold day. I even took my whisperlite and MSR fuel cannister as I was going to make a warm tea half way there. Since I was going to a meeting I also packed clean set of new clothes in a dry sack).
It rained consistantly but I felt stong and moved along well. After 2.5 hours of what I estimated to be 6 hr trip (I added an hour for resting, lunch, etc) I stopped for my hot tea. There was a deep gully with some trees on the side of the hill and enough space for me to get out of the wind and the rain.
Immediately upon stopping I began to get REALLY cold. I heard myself repeating "cotton kills" as I put on a cotton hoody under my rain coat before I left home. I had ignored the words of wisdom and so here I was now wishing I had grabbed the fleece I had considered.
While starting my whisperlite I melted the plunger on my fuel bottle. I was so disappointed with myself that I had been so careless. So the tea was out but looking back it was a good thing I didn't spend time waiting for the water to heat up as I would have been really late and would have ended up walking in the dark.
Something else that I did which disappointed me was that I hadn't been wise enough to charge my Garmin so I was without my gps. And I didn't print a map as I usually am extremely over cautious about carring a map. All I had was directions and distances, north 13.43km, east 1.69, etc. Even my cell phone wasn't charged (bad planning, or none at all!). Sometimes I think I am so smart and then ... I get what I need a shock of reality. There is always planning to do even for a half day walk.
So I sat on the emergency blanket I did bring, tore pieces off to stuff up my sleeves to keep my hands warm, and ate my peanut butter and honey sandwich. The cotton hoody did have a "hood" and so I drew it in close and pulled the hood of my rain coat up as well and rested my legs and feet. I kept getting colder so I knew that I had to keep moving.
Unsure of my route (and there are NO signs on Saskatchewan grid roads), with squishy wet shoes and socks (another thing I did wrong - didn't pack extra socks), cold, mad cuz I'd melted my plunger, without my hot tea, and muddy (the mud here is like stickytack and builds up on the bottom of your shoe until you are walking on high heels) I began walking again.
There was another 2.5 hrs walk ahead so I just kept putting on foot in front of another.
Whinning is something that I never want to be accused of so I don't allow myself that pseudo-comfort in my mind either. Singing is my occupation of choice at these moments of just doing what you have to. So it was and I did.
One hour went by rather quickly and I felt like forgiving myself for ruining my fuel bottle when there came a rumble from deep down. You know what its saying although it has no words. No it wasn't sky rumble it was bowel rumbles.
OK, so I really do love Saskatchewan but at that moment I was homesick for the unending forests of Ontario. I desperately looked for a place to hide. But nothing. The only small hope was to get into a deep ditch that was not going to hide anything of importance but it was all there was. Starting toward the dual culverts (which were not offering any cover since they were full of a fast flowing creek) I heard/felt it again. Then once more and that was all the warning I had.
Funny how we ignore the little prompting of our friends. Just before I left my friend that was helping me throw everything into my pack said, "That's not enough toilet paper! The dumps in the woods are always way messier than at home." We laughed and I assured him that I also had 3 WetOnes. Now, as I was stripping to my skin, in a ditch with no privacy I thought, "Carmen was right!" I did my best to clean up and then took it all and wrapped it in the rest of the emergency blanket. But I didn't want to put this in my back pack so I took my Tilley (which was too wet to wear anyways) and stuffed it all in there deciding that if an elephant could eat a Tilley and then the owner find it on its way out the other end and still wear it my Tilley could do this messy job no problem. Only 3 vehicles passed while I was "exposed" and one seemed to think about stopping to help. I am so glad they didn't.
So with nothing under my rain pants except me, I started off for the last 1.5 hrs of the walk. I began to worry about hypothermia, but as walking warmed me I just kept it up.
Missing my turn twice cost me about a km extra but I did figure it out and got back on the right track. When I was within 2km of my destination there was one sign, "FAIRY GLEN 2km". I had to laugh, "thanks eh!"
So, I made it. My friends were glad to let me use their shower (in fact they insisted). Remember the clean set of clothes in the dry sack? Yes, one thing I did right! We had a great time together that night. What are friends for if not to help you get over your humiliation - that doesn't seem like such a small step, but one we all have to take.

Something that I was happy about was that although I walked for probably 3 hours in soaking wet shoes and socks I didn't get a blister and my feet felt great. That really suprised me.
My recovery was great. By the next day at noon I felt completely normal.
I did learn alot. I'm glad I walked that far in the rain so that I can know what its like for the walk. Yes, in all I am encouraged.