De Smoky Mountains, eh

Laythen and I hiked up our skirts and saddled the horses & traveled down to north carolina to camp at the great smoky's. (i've been trying to put some pics up, but the stupid site wont let me...yet). anyway, we had a blast. camping, mountain biking, white water rafting, hiking, running over wild animals so that we could eat...it was great!

my favorite thing was probly the rafting. on saturday, we each got in a "ducky" (like an inflatable canoe) and, with our guide JJ, headed down the Natahala river. it was so beautiful, because the river mostly runs through the valley between mountains...so you're just looking up and around a lot of the time. we also hit some pretty wicked rapids...and a grade 3 rapid at the very end (that is, 3/5, 5 being like the colorado river) so we were pretty proud of ourselves for not dying!

the mountain biking was probly even more dangerous...we went on a "short" 4 mile ride through the forest friday, but then monday, we took the 11mile "loop" around the lake...this is where it got nasty...the paths were clay, but infested with roots and rocks and the like...and sometimes, the path got down to only 1ft wide, where the outter edge drops nearly straight down 50 to 100 feet into the lake with nothing to slow you down but a bunch of happy rocks. but, lo and behold, and 4 hours later, we made it.

so there's a couple highlights...ill put some funny stories up maybe, later...