Day Four ~ Monday, April 29

First day of hiking! Day 4 of Europe. It was supposed to be stormy today, and it did sprinkle a little bit. But for the most of the day there was actually a lot more blue sky than we have seen the past few days. It was very windy however, and fairly chilly. We got up at our usual 8 a.m. for some breakfast.
Morning meeting was supposed to be at 9:15, but ended up being closer to 9:30. We looked over our prayer flags and talked about the day. With a late departure, we barely caught the 10:15 bus.
Hollis was telling me and someone else (I forget who) about how he was hoping we’d miss the bus, so that we could learn about leaving on time with low-consequence. But we caught it by delaying it a few minutes.
The bus ride was short, and soon enough we were at the Aira Force waterfalls stop. After about 20 minutes or so (of walking), we made it to the waterfall. We all stopped to get photos with it. It was neat overlooking the pool, getting sprayed by the fall’s mist.
Moving on, we made our way farther up the trail. In about another 40 minutes of hiking, we made it to our lunch stop, where it looked like rain might engulf us in a moment. But it did not! We got on and off sprinkling – the clouds were extremely fast and moved to the sides primarily.
Lunch was a cheese sandwich, potato chips, a water bottle, two candy bars and an orange. After lunch we had to choose how to proceed. There was a full route option taking about 4-5 additional hours. We chose to instead to go up the nearby hill (taking about 20-30 minutes) to enjoy a more challenging, uphill hike.
The view from the hill was beautiful. To the left you could see the lake tucked away in a collection of mountains. On the shore was a little town. It was really quaint and unlike anything you’d find in America. And that town is called Glenridding – and is where our Youth Hostel is.
To the right you could see the occasional cottage on the vast green hills, with stone walls crossing left and right. You could see the valley continuing up farther, and out of sight between the mountains.
Then we had to book it back down the hill, and all the way to the bus stop within an hour or else the next bus was 4 hours later and we would just end up walking back to Glenridding.
And we did it. With about 20 minutes to spare. Some people went down to the lake and ran after some sheep. Then we caught the bus back.
When back, I took a long nap, wrote in my personal journal and hung out with the others until dinner. After dinner, we had evening meeting and evening program. We played the most ridiculous game called celebrity. 3 rounds, everyone puts a celebrity’s name into a hat. The first round you can say anything except the name and can act anything out to try and get people to guess the name. 2nd round you had one word you could say, and could act any number of motions. 3rd round you could only act.
Then we read off the jobs. Tomorrow I’m the Hot Seat. I’m nervous about it, for a number of reasons.
And then after evening program, we broke off to watch a movie, which I’m listening to as I write this and will now go and watch. Talk to you later.

-Joseph Bruner