15C part sunny
Enjoyed our too short visit with Jen and her Dad yesterday.
Had a day off from bowls and will again today, we need a break now and then.

He was already sweating from his exertions from the climb and remembering he had no water, he slowed his pace.

  Now that he had escaped from the river and the plain he was crossing was easy walking, he turned his thoughts again to alternatives to ‘just walking out’

  He firmly believed they had flown much further north than Fred had thought.  No use dwelling on the error, but it left him really unsure of his location.  Yes the highway was south but was it eighty miles or more than a hundred?  ‘I guess it really doesn’t matter it will be two or three days more if we ended up in the Yukon, it all depends on the terrain, I should be able to do ten miles a day considering that there will be more tough going ahead’.  He realized that food right now was the problem, without sustenance he would go slower and slower and after a couple of days would have difficulty with walking and or climbing.  He walked on at the pace he had set for himself and after almost two hours realized he was starting to gradually lose elevation.  Another half hour or so the descent was more rapid and ahead he could see a depression and the terrain sloping back up the other side.

  He allowed himself to go faster with the down grade and suddenly came to a shallow drop off, nestled down in a draw he could make out sunbeams glancing off water. He slid over the five-foot bank and found a pool of brown warm water, green slime floating here and there.

  He sat down and stared at the pool, he did have thirst, it was going to get worst but drinking this might be risky. A few willows and thimbleberry bushes were growing around the edge.  He took out his leatherman and going to the largest of the willows, cut out a stick a couple feet long. He sharpened it on one end, moved to the upper end of the pond, cleared away the surface litter then started scratching a hole down into first a layer of humus, then a very thin layer of dirt and on down to gravel, he kept going widening the hole out with his stick and his hands, when he was down almost two feet he hit clay, there was a sheen of water on it!

  He re-sharpened his stick and worried a shallow hole in the clay then carefully cleared away the upper layers until he had a narrow trench that he could fit his upper body into.  He walked back to the pond, washed the dirt and sweat off himself, then moved back a few feet to rest and wait.

  He dozed off, he didn’t know for how long, but suddenly his eyes flew open, ‘what was that?’ He lay there listening, and then he heard a soft croak followed immediately by another then another. The croaks were coming from all around the pond, ‘frogs by God!’

  He lay there trying to imprint their locations in his mind.  Inch by inch he raised himself to a sitting position, it seemed to take an eternity but one by one he finally spotted six, there were more but not where he could see them.  But now how to catch them, how to catch one?

  Making a decision, Nat slowly moved to a kneeling position then focusing on the two small bumps that were the nearest frog’s eyes he inched forward.  After a few minutes his body started to quiver, from tension or the desire for food he didn’t know and didn’t care.  Finally judging that he was close enough he leaped, grabbing at the spot where the two eyes were showing!  His hands closed, grabbing slime, grass and nothing else!  “Shit!” He cried aloud.  He sat back on his haunches, ‘that won’t work, how am I going to catch any of these little buggers?’

  He thought for a while, got to his feet, took off his boots and socks then the rest of his clothes.  He sat back and waited and waited some more. Finally on the far side of the pond a croak, again followed by another.  He rose to his feet and jumped out into the middle of the slime-ridden pool yelling and screaming. He flailed his arms and stomped on the bottom churning the water into a muddy soup.  He stomped from one side of the pool to the other still splashing and yelling, back and forth, back and forth.  He paused and looked about, yes, by god it worked! Around the pool frogs were hopping away, away from the commotion in their pool.

  He waded to the nearest side and on hands and knees caught one, two, three, six he dropped one.  Holding the rest by their legs he whacked them onto a jutting rock, dropped them then continued with his pursuit, this time killing them as he went and tossing them into a loose pile.