So...I almost died.
Not even joking.
I can't really find a way to tell this story without it just sounding...stiff. But that's mostly because I'm still adjusting to the fact that I honestly could have died. So here's the basic story.
Some of you might have seen my post yesterday about going to my friend Leah's cabin for the weekend. Part of the plan involved walking from the general parking lot to the cabin in the snow, which from what we had figured, would take an hour. We arrived at 8, with plenty of light (even though it was snowing a little). All was going well until it got dark. Then the snow was suddenly less packed and we kept sinking in to our hips. We tried to stick it out, but after about a half hour of trying to drag our sled of food along, we decided to leave it behind and come back for it in the morning.
At about 11:00 we were so cold we couldn't go any further--we were just so cold and even though we could see the cabin, we still had another 1/4 or 1/2 mile to get through in (what we later found out was) six feet (almost 2 meters) of snow. We were fortunate enough to have cell phone signal, and we were able to call my friend Leah's parents. Her mother called search and rescue, who called us back and had us call 911 so they could get our GPS coordinates. We then backtracked to a locked-up garage we had passed a short while before and SAR gave us about an hour til they got there. At this point, I can tell Leah is having hypothermia. So we huddle together to try and stay warm.
A bit later, Leah's mom calls back and tells us she was able to reach a couple who lives in the area year round, and that they were going to come out on a snow-mobile. Miracles of miracles, a few minutes later, Mr Hancock drives up. We called SAR and they called off the rescue and the Hancock's let us spend the night at their house. After warm showers and brief chatting with our rescuers, we turned in for the night.
We just laid in the bed, staring at the celing and realized...it truly was through the grace of God that we did not DIE last night. We just looked up the temperatures and if the Hancock's hadn't found us, we would have been in seriously bad shape by the time SAR got there--we would have required serious medical attention and thawing or could have died. We came home this morning.
Leah was sick all through the night, in hindsight it was probably shock. I avoided sick, but my whole body feels like I was run through a meat tenderizer. I also think I had the beginnings of frostbite in my fingers. Now I ache all OVER.
So yes. Very thankful to be alive. So...very thankful, and blessed.
I can't really find a way to tell this story without it just sounding...stiff. But that's mostly because I'm still adjusting to the fact that I honestly could have died. So here's the basic story.
Some of you might have seen my post yesterday about going to my friend Leah's cabin for the weekend. Part of the plan involved walking from the general parking lot to the cabin in the snow, which from what we had figured, would take an hour. We arrived at 8, with plenty of light (even though it was snowing a little). All was going well until it got dark. Then the snow was suddenly less packed and we kept sinking in to our hips. We tried to stick it out, but after about a half hour of trying to drag our sled of food along, we decided to leave it behind and come back for it in the morning.
At about 11:00 we were so cold we couldn't go any further--we were just so cold and even though we could see the cabin, we still had another 1/4 or 1/2 mile to get through in (what we later found out was) six feet (almost 2 meters) of snow. We were fortunate enough to have cell phone signal, and we were able to call my friend Leah's parents. Her mother called search and rescue, who called us back and had us call 911 so they could get our GPS coordinates. We then backtracked to a locked-up garage we had passed a short while before and SAR gave us about an hour til they got there. At this point, I can tell Leah is having hypothermia. So we huddle together to try and stay warm.
A bit later, Leah's mom calls back and tells us she was able to reach a couple who lives in the area year round, and that they were going to come out on a snow-mobile. Miracles of miracles, a few minutes later, Mr Hancock drives up. We called SAR and they called off the rescue and the Hancock's let us spend the night at their house. After warm showers and brief chatting with our rescuers, we turned in for the night.
We just laid in the bed, staring at the celing and realized...it truly was through the grace of God that we did not DIE last night. We just looked up the temperatures and if the Hancock's hadn't found us, we would have been in seriously bad shape by the time SAR got there--we would have required serious medical attention and thawing or could have died. We came home this morning.
Leah was sick all through the night, in hindsight it was probably shock. I avoided sick, but my whole body feels like I was run through a meat tenderizer. I also think I had the beginnings of frostbite in my fingers. Now I ache all OVER.
So yes. Very thankful to be alive. So...very thankful, and blessed.