Sept. 6 weigh in

With Curtis and I gone for 5 days and all the prep, all but Josh have been a bit on a standstill.

So we'll compare from the start.

In six weeks we are down:

Griff 3

Dea 3

Curtis 2.5

Josh 18

Yup. Josh is down 18 pounds in 6 weeks. That's 3 pounds a week. Vigorous exercise certainly is the cause.

I took Griff and Lee on a walk on Saturday. It was a foolhardy walk. one I've been wanting to take for a long time. curtis drove us to the top of San Bruno Mountain and dropped us off. We walked the ridge trail across to Brisbane and down the service trail that drops behind Lipman school. No big deal. I figured it would be about a 1.5 hour walk and I was accurate. However, it was completely fogged in. We could only see 50 feet ahead of us. We set out with Curtis reluctant to leave use. About 5 minutes down the trail I thought I should check the exact time so I could track our progress. My phone was dead. No phone, no clock. I was actually a bit freaked out, but Curtis wouldn't be up at the parking lot anymore, so we may as well keep going. I tried not to think about the worst case scenarios---one of us falling on the loose graveled road that was very steep in some place, up and down, and spraining an ankle; meeting one of the coyotes that has been recently spotted on the mountain or a mountain lion that is very rarely seen; or simply an assortment of crazies that may be out on a foggy day.

Our hair was drenched within 15 minutes, the fog was so thick. At about 20 minutes I heard the most beautiful sound I've ever heard in my life--my cell phone rang. It's anew phone and I'd forgotten how to unlock it. Curtis was calling to check in on us.

The rest of the trip didn't feel nearly so scary. I was just a tad nervous about finding the service road that would take us to Brisbane. Before we got started I thought there would be lots of roads going down and it would be a matter of choosing which one. But we didn't see one at all until about 40 minutes. I debated it for a while but really thought it would be closer to a one hour walk before we saw the road so we kept going. Sure enough, at 55 minutes there was a graveled service road just as I had thought. Within 10 minutes going down the clouds parted enough for us to see the town. Tho it was a short distance down it took a full half hour to come down because it was so steep. The service road was heavily graveled which made it very slippery to maneuver. Griff landed on his butt twice; I thought I was going to a couple of times. About half way down Lee discovered a path along side the road that was well packed and it made it much much much easier to go down.

I had NO idea how many muscles are in your ankles!!! Shins, ankles, feet scream sore in the last 2 days!!!

I look forward to doing this walk again with Griff and Lee on a sunny day. It will be a kick to see all this stuff with a VIEW. At one point I knew we were close because the of the evidence of the fire on the mountain 2 summers ago. I knew it did not pass to the other side of Brisbane, and I was accurate.