Here area few anecdotes from my 10 day backpacking trip through Yosemite:

GORP | GORP is the best trail snack. We would hold out the hem of our t-shirts to create a bowl to pour GORP into when we stopped for snack breaks on the trail. We weren't very good at rationing food, so the end of our ten day trip became a snacking marathon to finish all the GORP, dried mango, and gummy worms. "Leave no trace" is the principle that whatever you bring into the wilderness you take out, leaving to trace. Often during our snacking on the trail we would spill some peanuts or raisins and the natural reaction became to reach down and eat them off the ground. I did this the other day and people gave me weird looks. "Leave no trace" obviously left it's trace on me.

HAMMOCK | I slept in my hammock most nights in the wilderness. If you don't have a hammock but camp often, please do yourself a favor and get one. Waking up without awkward rocks poking into my back made the brisk mornings so much more enjoyable. Every night I would climb into my sleeping bag in my hammock and sway to sleep, looking up at the shooting stars making their way among a billion of their friends. I would awake looking up into the trees that became our home. Trees provided shade, a place to hang our water filters, and a secure base we trusted willingly to protect our suspension sleeping. What a simple and beautiful way to live, sleeping between trees, among friends, under the stars.

PIE | The last day of the trip we had lots of leftover food. Despite much doubt and mishaps, my friend and I managed to combine most of our dessert leftovers into a glorious s'mores pie. Our crust was ground up graham crackers with a little honey. We topped the crust with Nutella and marshmallow. It looked strange, but we set it near the fire to heat for an hour as we ate our delicious dinner of soup. We finished the pie with the instant pudding we made in a Ziploc. It turned out wonderful despite the "Nile River" of water I put into it, the powdered milk made it. Our stunning s'mores pie was eaten around the campfire, passed from person to person, certain people coveting it more than others. A fellow team finished it off, devouring it by scooping it our ravenously with their hands in the dark.

OATMEAL | Our favorite breakfast was instant Quaker oatmeal. We would collect water in the morning mist and leave it to boil on our fire as we awoke the rest of our team, hiked into the woods to group poop, or began repacking our backpack for the day. The water would boil, we would pick out what combination of oatmeal packets we wanted, then scooped water into the packets to save on dishes. We ate around the campfire, atop a rock over looking the lake, or at the base of our climbing rock sitting on logs. There was something so comforting about the hot meal in the cool of the morning as we were still waking ourselves up and trying to figure out which coffee was instant and which coffee wasn't instant. Breakfast is my favorite if you haven't heart, so logically I greatly cherished these moments of team oatmeal eating.

BIRTHDAY | My birthday was during this backpacking trip. I didn't want anything, I didn't expect anything, this week was about team and other people I was given the opportunity to serve in the wilderness. I awoke on my birthday and was squished in my hammock by a hug. My team sang happy birthday to me many, many, many times over the course of the day. Despite how awkward it can be to stand as people sing to you, it meant so much. My team made the whole day a joyous occasion simply by taking the time to acknowledge the significance of August 17th. I was asked by a few team members, "What can we do to make this day special for you?" That question was enough to make the day special. Just knowing they wanted my birthday to be a celebration was a celebration enough. I hiked, I climbed, I laughed, I sat around a campfire eating good food, and went to sleep in the wilderness buried in my hammock. It was a dream come true, a day of adventure and amazing people.

Thank you team Phantom Rogue. The way you served, adventured, laughed, and loved was life giving.