Word: streamings
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After an hour spent trying to find a dry crossing, both feet and both boots were soaked from having fallen into the stream. Only later did I realize that falling in had been a good thing. Not only did it force me to keep moving so my feet wouldn't freeze but I didn't waste time avoiding water anywhere else...
...took six people an hour to cross what once had been a small but forceful stream, since turned into a bank-leaping, hip-high rush of water just two miles from the station. Adrian and Johnnie, two hikers I had met by chance the day before, were leaving the ranger station as I set off. When I first caught sight of the water we ran into three other hikers who were having trouble finding a crossing--two American servicemen stationed in Germany and a German friend of theirs in the Sierras for a vacation...
Once we got above the treeline, two or three miles of gradual climb beyond the stream, the light drizzle that had accompanied us from the outset turned into moderately heavy snow. Everyone was hiking at his own pace. I was at least 15 minutes behind Adrian and the same amount of time in front of Johnnie, Mike and the other two. It seemed an interminably long way to the top. I was getting cold, dressed only in shorts, t-shirt, down vest, poncho and wool cap. I hadn't eaten anything that morning and very little the day before, which...
...caught up. Then they stood and stared. I talked to them. They had no food, no dry clothes, no tent and only wet down sleeping bags which sap heat from cold bodies. They were defenseless, and worse, they were succumbing. I didn't think I could cross the stream alone even though it looked as though Adrian had. I wondered if I shouldn't set up the tent, get in the sleeping bag and bite through the plastic bag at my belt to get crackers and chocolate and try to save the two men along with myself. But how could...
...already given up and had sat down in the snow. The last stages of hypothermia were setting in, which meant they were already as good as gone. What chance would I have to make it through the night alone? It was highly likely I would die crossing the stream, but at least I would have tried to get out; I couldn't give up the way they had. At the same time one voice was telling me I was done for, another told me I wasn't. So I tried to cross...