Beep. Beep. Beep.
'Damn alarm,' thought Joy as she hit the snooze button. 'Mountains are not even that far away, so why do I have to get up at such an ungodly hour?' complained Joy to herself. After dragging herself out of bed she got ready to have a shower. After having a steaming hot shower she felt a lot more awake. Right after getting dressed she heard the door bell ringing. 'Damn Carl is early. I wanted to get some breakfast first,' thought Joy. "Hey, you're early," said Joy as she saw Carl standing at the door.
"Are you going to let me in? I thought we could have breakfast together," Carl says.
"That's so sweet. I think that will make up for you not staying last night," she tells him.
Carl smiled at her as she opened the door and let him in. "You're going to love it this weekend. I have all the equipment we need in the car," Carl assured her.
"Do you have the tent?" asked Joy
"Of course I do, Joy. What makes you think I didn't?" he asked in return.
"I don't know. It's just that I've never been camping," Joy admitted.
"Seriously? You're missing out on a lot, Joy," Carl says.
"And I couldn't believe you hadn't been diving before," Joy teases.
With a sly wink Carl said "Looks like we have something to share with each other,"
"Indeed we do. I need coffee though," Joy said around a yawn.
"I'll get it for you then we can head off. When we get there we have a two hour walk to reach the campsite," Carl says.
Joy's eyes widened and she exclaimed "Two hours?!?"
Carl chuckled, nodding and says "You get used to it, don't worry. Only some of it is mountainous, since most of the trail is flat,"
"It better be, or you'll be carrying me up the mountain," Joy teases as she poked her tongue out at him.
After having their coffee and breakfast, they got into Carl's sports car and drove off towards the mountains. After an hour of driving Joy finally breaks the silence. "This place is beautiful. Rainforests are so amazing,"
"Yeah they are, Mountain forests are more beautiful when they are resting on extinct volcanoes like this one," Carl says.
"How much further until we reach the trail?" asked Joy
"Not much longer now. A few more minutes and we should be there," Carl says.
A few minutes later, they did arrive at a parking area with a few cars scattered about the parking space. "Can you carry the tent? I'll carry the bags with the climbing equipment," Carl says.
"Sure, I'll help you out there," Joy replies, nodding her head.
"Let's get moving" said Carl as he locked the car and picked up the climbing bag putting it over his shoulder before he walked to the trail entrance at the edge of the parking space. "Come on, Joy," Carl called out over his shoulder as Joy struggled with the tent.
After an hour of struggling with the tent up the hillside Joy dropped the tent bag with an audible thump and thought to her self 'I'm so going to make Carl pay for this tonight'
"You surprised me, Joy. I thought you would have dumped that ages ago. Carry the climbing gear. Its heavier but a lot less annoying," Carl told her.
Joy just stared at him and grumbled, "You could have told me this so much earlier,"
'He's so going to get it later,' thought Joy.
"I tried taking Miranda camping once but all I got was complaints. It was so not fun," Carl tells her.
"Really? Well I'm not complaining. It's just that damn tent is so awkward," Joy admits.
"I know. I have trouble with it myself," Carl admits. "You ready to continue? The largest slope is up ahead."
"Oh great. Yeah, I'm ready," Joy says. After about another hour of toil Joy's legs and arms felt like deadweight. "Damn my arms and legs are tired, I have no idea how I'll manage to climb anything today,"
"Don't worry, Joy, we're nearly there. There's an awesome campsite up ahead," Carl told her.
"Wow, this place is amazing," Joy breathed out as they approached a small clearing in the vast expanse of trees. After dumping the climbing gear near some trees, Carl dug out some plastic containers with food in it.
"Let's have some food now. I'm starving," Carl suggests.
"Good idea and I could so do with a good rest," Joy says.
After eating their meal Joy breaks the silence with "When we go back, you're taking the tent,"
"Sure. I thought at one time you were ready to pitch it off the side of the mountain," Carl says, snickering softly.
"That would have been a smart move wouldn't it? Then we'd have no where to sleep" said Joy as she kissed his cheek.
"Now I want to show you where we are climbing first. It's an easy slope so I can teach you how to use the hooks," Carl tells her.
"Can we wait a bit? My arms don't want to do anything right now," Joy asks.
"Oh really?" Carl asks he walked over to her and pulled her back into his chest. He pushed his thumbs into her arm muscles and made her groan.
"Oh, Carl, that's great. They still feel really numb though," Joy moans out.
"After I'm done with this, babe, I'll move onto your legs. Can't have you having jelly legs can we?" asked Carl as he kissed her behind the ear.
"Mm, feels so good. Keep doing that, Carl," Joy purrs out in pleasure.
After Carl finished massaging her arms he repeated this with her legs. After finally finishing Carl asked "Feel better?"
"Yeah, much better. Thanks, Carl," Joy said as she turned around and kissed him gently. "Ok, come on. Let's go and get some climbing done,"
"Right. I'll carry all the bags this time so you don't strain yourself," Carl tells her.
Joy rolled her eyes at him and picked up her bag and followed him. After a short walk through the bushes they came to a tilted rocky hill.
"I know it's not really a cliff, but it's a really good place to learn how to climb with the hooks. Put the climbing gloves on, Joy. You'll need them or you'll cut up your hands," Carl says as he pulled out some hooks attached to some thick ropes.
"Will I need this helmet?" asked Joy holding up said helmet.
"Yeah, you'll need that or you'll hurt your head worse if you fall or hit something," Carl says.
After getting the safety equipment on, Carl took Joy to the bottom of the hill-face. "Open the hooks like this" said Carl as he showed Joy how to open the hooks. "Cliffs are generally very uneven so there should always be a place where you can wedge these hooks in,"
"Ok so like this?" asked Joy as she hooked the hook into a gap in the hill.
"Yeah like that. Then you put your foot into a toehold. A toehold are rocks that stick out from the side of the cliff and this hill is very good for that," Carl continues.
After some time practicing this, Joy had scaled halfway up the hill. "Are you coming up Carl?" asked Joy.
"Yeah, you're doing really well, Joy," Carl replies.
"Thanks. This is great. I can't wait until we can actually climb a real cliff," said Joy
"You'd want to rest before doing that since the best cliff for that is quite far away," Carl says as he started climbing up the side of the cliff.
"Ahhhh, damn it," yelled Joy.
"What happened?" asked Carl.
"Owww. My foot slipped and I grazed my leg on the rocks,"
"Oooo does it sting much? I've done that plenty of times before," winced Carl
"Yes it does, but I want to finish climbing this damn hill," Joy told him.
"Alright if you're feeling up to it," Carl agrees.
After pulling herself up the hill with her shin leaking blood she collapse at the top the hill and waited for Carl to reach her.
"Let me take a look at your leg. I went back down and got the first aid kit," Carl told her after finally arriving at the top of the hill.
After he pushed her shorts leg up and straightened her leg, Carl accidentally touched her leg causing her to hiss in pain. "Sorry, Joy, but you scraped your leg pretty badly there. Can you walk on it?" asked Carl.