June 16, 2018 Father Knows Best

Love of the mountains goes back at least three generations in our family.  Since it is Father’s Day tomorrow Granny Hat wants to thank the dads she knows who took their kids up into the high country, taught them to hike, to choose a camp, to cook in the wilderness, to survive torrential downpours and cross a river safely.  Granny especially loves these High Sierra pictures of her dad, Philip Lewis, taken around 1954.

Granny Hat would like to bet that canvas pack with thick support poles weighs twice as much as Stephan’s Osprey Exos 58.  And the dapper hat!  Just love it! My Dad took us back to Heather Lake in the Sequoia National Park several times for day hikes in the 70’s, beautiful place.

Mission’s dad started his kids young in the wilderness also.  Here is a day hike up to the top of Lassen Mountain when Mission’s older brother Christopher was just a tiny guy, this would have been the fall of 1980.

Over the years, as the kids were old enough to carry a small backpack, Dad trained them in the Ventana Wilderness, our local coastal mountains that run from Carmel down past Big Sur.

(This photo includes Christopher Miser, Melody Miser, Noah Kareus, Craig Hill and Sonia Hill- Mission wasn’t even born yet!)  But Dad always waited until late July to venture into the high country of the Sierras. He wanted to avoid snow hiking and extreme snow-melt river crossings.  He preferred to take his chances with mosquitoes, dry creeks and those late summer afternoon showers.

Mission has not been in contact with us for a week now.  Granny Hat is so glad he has a SPOT so we can at least see his progress and it has slowed down quite a bit so we can only imagine that snow is the impediment.  He crossed over Muir Pass yesterday (does Granny Hat need to talk about who Muir Pass is named after?), camped in Evolution Valley and today is headed to Muir Ranch which has some re-supply and hopefully cell service.  We wonder if Mission was able to visit his stone monster friends on this trek or if they were hibernating deep under snow drifts.

Granny Hat cannot wait to hear his stories and get some photography that is current and has some snow in it!  But for now, Mission Control is collecting the next re-supply and thanking God for all the late July training backpacks.  Father truly knows best!  Snow can be the real monster in the Sierras.

Granny Hat guesses that Mission would dearly love to see the ocean about now! Although here on the Central Coast it has been much too cold to have a beach day.

And another couple photos of Dad making a smart choice for a spring hike – The Grand Canyon! Uncle Frank and Aunt Lori are great hiking buddies.

“Climb the mountain not to plant your flag, but to embrace the challenge, enjoy the air and behold the view. Climb it so you can see the world, not so the world can see you.”
― David McCullough Jr.

And even though we can’t see Mission here at Control Center, we know our heavenly Father knows best and never sleeps or slumbers, He watches us night and day.:

 The Lord is thy keeper: the Lord is thy shade upon thy right hand. The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul. The Lord shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore. Psalm 121