Poison Oak

Joey made an accurate observation about the blog posts we've made so far.  We would probably be more successful at maintaining reader interest if the blog did not sound like an encyclopedia.  Good point. 

Let me tell you a little bit about poison oak. Poison oak is a plant that looks like this: 

Before going on this trip, I knew what poison oak looked like.  I had successfully avoided getting it before going on this trip.  Usually, I avoid poison oak at all costs.  The main ideas is that you just don't go near it. 

Sometimes, when you are on your way to doing something awesome - you have to go through some poison oak.  Other times you have to wade through a shimmering sea of poison oak.  Rarely do you have to do wade through multiple groves of this stuff to reach your destination. 

Well, on our hike up to go canyoneer Boulder Creek, we encountered some poison oak.  At first, we just saw a couple of plants by the side of the trail.  We stopped, pointed it out - made sure everyone knew what it looked like and made mental notes to avoid the stuff at all costs. 

As we continued along the approach, we began to see more and more of the stuff - usually benignly sitting along the side of the trail, or a few feet away. 

Then we encountered the first wave.  The path was blocked  by a shimmering sea of poison oak, and the trail required us to traverse a few logs and boulders that were blanketed in the stuff. Great. 

So we hopped, scooted, jumped, and flailed our way through the mess.  

Mostly, we were all wearing pants - so at least just our clothes were contaminated with the vicious oils. 

Glad we made it through, we continued on.  Then we encountered another impassible grove. I ended up putting on my gloves to try and gingerly position the towering strands of the stuff away from my face.  Yikes! 

We went through two other sections like this. 

Finally - we made it to Boulder Creek.  Scrambling down a slope of unstable rock slide to the river, we avoided a rattle snake, and hopped into the glacial ice melt. 

Oh, it was frigid.  We did our best to scrub off with the sand from the bottom of the river.  We scared away another water snake when we scooped up the piles of sand.  You could probably hear our yelps from the cold water a ways down the canyon. 

Yep, that was two snakes in less than five minutes.  

For the most part, our wetsuits were strapped to the outside of our backpacks on our hike down to the canyon.  This meant they were also covered in the vengeful oils.  Similarly, we scrubbed those down in the river.  This made putting the wetsuits on hilarious.  We squelched, squirmed, and shoved our way into them. 

The canyoneering trip was awesome.  It was worth it. 

Then, we had to go back.  The prospect of going through the poison oak loomed in my mind.  I seriously considered hiking back in my wetsuit so that I would be entirely protected by the neoprene.  I was talked out of it.  Raycroft hiked back in his wetsuit. 

There's one thing I would advise to people who may encounter poison oak.  When you pull off your clothes to jump in the river, it may be a good idea to turn them inside out so the next time you touch them you aren't touching the contaminated side. However, make sure you don't pile them on top of other clothes that have not be turned inside out.  Yep, I did that. Both sides of my clothes were contaminated. 

So, we raced back along the trail through the many oceans of poison oak to get back to our cars - and to jump into the river again.   Again we screeched as we hopped in the ice water and scrubbed down every item that we took through the canyon: wetsuits, backpacks, hats, clothes, ourselves... 

About 3 days later, I got poison oak. Thanks to Benadryl topical spray, I have not lost my mind.