HST Video Slideshow

I finally got around to doing a video slideshow of my HST trip. This was something I have wanted to do for a long time, but only got around to it almost in time for the one-year anniversary of the trip.

(If you want the high-resolution version leave a comment with your e-mail address or if you have my e-mail, then just ask me for it.)

Enjoy!

The High Sierra Trail from Mark VPol on Vimeo.

One Year Ago - Why the HST?

It has been one year since I did the High Sierra Trail (HST), which is a 75 mile trail going across the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California. I have always loved backpacking but in the past 15 years or so my backpacking trips were limited to only one night trips, except for a four day trip with my wife in the Great Smokey Mountains National Park in 2001. Doing all these little trips just made me want to do a larger, longer trip. So why the HST?

Back in probably 1992 or 1993 I heard about the John Muir Trail (JMT) which is a 222 mile trip that goes north and south along the Sierra Nevada mountains. Ever since then it has been my dream to do that trail. I have all the maps, I have a guidebook, and have looked at hundreds of photos! Back in 2003 for some reason I decided to make a goal of completing the trail within 5 years, so 2008. Things changed dramatically in our lives when I decided to come to seminary in 2005, but then again I was now a day's drive from the JMT. Sometime in 2007 it hit me that there was no way that I could take off three weeks to do the JMT.

One other thing that I really wanted to do was to hike up Mt. Whitney (the highest point in the lower 48 states). That trip can be done in one really long and very tough day. There is actually a lottery for doing that trip from the East side of the Sierras to and from Whitney Portal. For the first couple years of being in Southern California I always heard rumors of people wanting to do this hike, but nobody ever started early enough to get a permit. So I decided to look into it myself. I was wondering if there were any other routes one could take to get to Whitney instead of the one main trail. This is where I found out about the High Sierra Trail.

The HST starts in Crescent Meadow on the Western side of the Sierras and crosses Sequoia National Park essentially from west to east ending officially on top of Mt. Whitney (although you still have to hike out!). Approaching Whitney from the west... this was perfect! So I convinced my wife to let me go on this one week, 75 mile trip if I could get some friends to go with. Initially I found a lot of interest in doing the hike, and the group was going to be around 9 or 10 people. That number dwindled down to 6 or 7 in the months prior to the trip and then within a couple of days we were down to 4. Two friends from Chicago flew out (Dan and Steve) and also Dan's brother-in-law from San Francisco was going to meet up with us. So the group was set and we took off!

If you are interested in seeing photos of the trip and in reading a report, check out this link.

Now that it has been a year since I completed the trip, I thought I would reflect for a moment on it. There is hardly a couple of days that go by where I haven't thought about the trip in some way. Maybe it is seeing photos that I have scattered around my computer, it could be one of many e-mails I have received from people asking about the trail, going on a hike and thinking about that hike, or one of a plethora of memories that come to my mind. It really was a special hike, and it is safe to say that I saw some of the most beautiful scenery in the world and did something that not very many people have any desire to do (relatively speaking). Backpacking is a very unique activity and by doing so you subject yourself to many pains, trials, and hardships, but yet the rewards are so worth it! Here are just a few things that are my favorite memories of the trip:

• Needing to filter water only a couple hundred yards down the trail while all the day hikers pass by. (There was no water source at the trailhead parking lot!)
• Seeing the "Great Western Divide" up close before Hamilton Lakes
• Relaxing at Hamilton Lakes, the most beautiful campsite I have ever stayed at
• Hiking alongside a stream in a meadow above Precipice Lake (my favorite part of the trail)
• Looking down the Big Arroyo Valley after crossing over Kaweah Gap
• Only seeing two other people in a span of almost 48 hours (we had two consecutive campsites all to ourselves)
• The Kern River Hot Spring (need I say more?)
• Although it was a low-point of the trip I will never forget cleaning and bandaging a pretty nasty head wound after asking "did you hurt yourself" and then seeing blood drip down Steve Busse's face from underneath his hat
• Walking through a stand of Aspen trees when coming out of the Kern River Valley early in the morning
• Relaxing at Crabtree Meadow and talking to the Ranger
• Staying at Guitar Lake (this was surreal for me since I had seen pictures of this lake and dreamed of one day staying there since this is also part of the JMT)
• All four of us summitting Mt. Whitney
• Getting cell-phone coverage and talking to my wife for the first time in a week from the summit
• Our campsite at Trail Camp and a very relaxing evening at 12,000 feet
• Waking up at 2:00am that last night and seeing more stars than I have ever seen
• The hamburger at the Whitney Portal store

There is so much more I could write, but I better stop!! Check out that link above to see photos and even some video of the trip.

Back again...

Can anybody else believe that it is already July? This year has gone by so fast!! Just the fact that it has been over five months since I have last blogged is testimony to that fact. However, I hope that my blogging can once again be picked up on a somewhat more regular basis. Back in January when I last posted something I mentioned how busy my end of the year 2008 was. One thing that I neglected to include in that last post was that I was at the end of a very, very busy winter term. Essentially I was taking a one 13-week semester course and cramming it into three weeks. Our professor for the Christian Life and Ethics class was going on sabbatical over the spring and this class was really his speciality so my classmates and I got to take this wonderful class in a very short amount of time, which included all the normal reading, paper, and exam that would have been done over the course of three months.

So I was really busy in the winter, but I was naively thinking that my spring was going to be easy and relaxed. My class schedule throughout seminary was kind of out of the ordinary and I ended up taking a lot of the classes that most guys usually take in their last semester earlier, so I only had three required classes remaining one of which was a preaching class, and one was a seminar. It just so happened that there were a couple of electives that I really wanted to take. Well, let's just say my class load was a lot more than I had anticipated. All my classes were great, but more work than I thought they would be.

The reason that this was a "problem" was that I knew that I had my candidacy examination coming up at the end of June and I wanted to be able to devote some time during the semester to begin preparing for that. With my class schedule, exhorting at different churches, and working at WHI, the last couple of months have been crazy. I loved pretty much every minute of it, but there was never a time when I could really truly sit back and relax with out the nagging sense that I should be studying or preparing for something!

On May 30, I graduated from Westminster Seminary California with my Masters of Divinity degree (photos here). Throughout that day and afterwards people kept asking me, "So, does it feel so good to be done with Seminary and now you can just relax?" To which I always responded with, "NO! I still have the biggest exam of my life facing me in a month. After that I can relax!"

In order to be made a candidate for the ministry in the URCNA (United Reformed Churches in North America) one needs to sustain an oral examination before classis. This exam is really the culmination of all one's seminary training, and is a necessary step for getting called to a church. So for the whole month of June I was engrossed in studying and preparing for this exam. Almost every free moment was filled with at least thinking about all that I needed to know. I only worked in the mornings, and in the afternoon I would hole myself up in a classroom and studied. I didn't neglect my wife too much (I hope!), and was able to have a couple other things going on where I could step away briefly to let my mind rest.

But then the day came: Tuesday, June 30. The day I had emblazened on my mind for the past six months. My brother and classmate, Brad Lenzer, sustained his exam before me, and then I was up in the afternoon. (I should note that the classis needed to hear four examinations which is A LOT). My exam went very well I thought. I was relaxed and fairly confident in almost all my responses. There were a few things that I got tripped up on mainly because I didn't understand exactly what the question was getting at, but thankfully I believe I was able to faithfully present my position to the satisfaction of the delegates present. Of course I flat out missed things and forgot other things, but that was fine. So at the end of the day I sustained my exam and I have my classical diploma to prove it! God is good!!

So now what? Right now I am open for a call anywhere that the Lord leads me. It is up to the local church to seek me and my brothers out, so it is a waiting game! Some of you might know that I am helping out as much as I can in the early stages of a church plant in Gig Harbor, WA. So we will see where the Lord leads with that. The work that I have done I would be more than willing to hand over to somebody else if the Lord so wills and if another man is called to that work. There are other open pulpits in the URC that I am open to candidating for, and I hope in the next couple of months that the Lord will make his will known where I can serve his kingdom best. In the meantime I will help with the church plant and exhort at various churches. I pretty much have all my Sunday's booked through the end of the summer, so that will be good.

The Bible Study/Church Plant project in Gig Harbor has a website so check that out. If you know anybody in the Gig Harbor/Tacoma area that might be interested in our work there, please let them know!!

Finally, I hope to keep this blog updated more regularly with what is happenind with Michelle and I, and then also any theological things that pop into my head that I want to discuss. So stay tuned! This blog does have and RSS feed so subscribe to that!

Take care,
Mark