Backcountry trail

"Kel Bel, I called you like a thousand times to tell you how good-looking you are, but your phone was off! Why?"

Friend, the boyfriend and I backpacked. We slept three nights in the great outdoors with the threat of bears, rummy losses, tent breath, etc.

We completed 70%ish of the Teton Crest Trail. Thursday, we moseyed up a few thousand feet with the help of a tram. (It moseyed up the mountain so our feet didn't have to! What an angel.) Then we hiked down and slept.

Friday, we walked down a huge hill, up a huge hill, saw a nice lake, hiked up another huge hill, and then back down another hill into a sweet camping spot. Friday, I was grumpy. My blisters developed. The boyfriend was, like the tram, an angel. Unlike the tram, he did not physically carry me up the hills. I forgive him for not being a big, red, people-carrying machine.

Saturday was easier peasier. Again, we went up a hill, down a hill, and then up a hill, but this last hill was the tip-top of our hike! No more big hills after this one! Ninety-eight percent of my body felt glad as we moseyed down switchback after switchback and I saw miserable souls trying to get up the pass we had just conquered.

This morning, we woke up knowing we were the best at everything in the world. We hiked out of the canyon. A bull moose conveyed his message of, "Goodbye! We enjoyed having you!" by sitting in a field and not making eye contact.

And that, palios, is why you couldn't reach me these last few days. And why I have blisters. And why you shouldn't come over if you don't want to see them.