Reminder that Family comes first...

Last Thursday Gerry's wife Marie had an unexplained seizure while attending a function at their kids school. Marie had no history of seizures and after an MRI of her brain she was diagnosed with a Brain Arteriovenous Malformation (AVM). She spent 4 days in hospital and is now at home and doing well, as she begeins to deal with the limitations and uncertanties assosiated with this diagnosis.

I was not going to write about this at all, but now that my best bud Gerry has in his recent post, I feel more comfortable doing so. Gerry's personal account of what they are going through is a frank and honest description and I encourage all to read it. It has me looking at my life and health in a far more appreciative way and I hope it may have the same effect on some of you.

As for our trip, we have to prepare ourselves for the possibility the trip may not happen this year. There are far too many unknowns at this point and although the likelyhood of the trip being cancelled is small, it is a possibility. In the event that the trip has to be cancelled, I will wait for next year to do the trip with Gerry as we planned. For me this trip has always been less about the challenges the back country have to offer, then it is hanging out with my buddy for 5 days and I would never do it without him. We thought of this together and we will do it together, this year or next...it makes little difference to me. So we continue to plan the trip and will deal with any problems if they happen.

Now back to the trip planning! For obvious reasons we have not been able to make it down to MEC to buy the last few odds and ends for our trip. Here is a list of the items on my MEC Wish List:

1. Outback Oven
2. Source C-2 Hydration System
3. Nalgene Bottle, 1 L, wide mouth
4. Backpacker's Pantry Supreme Pizza
5. Backpacker's Pantry Wicked Good Brownies
6. Backpacker's Pantry Cinnamon Coffee Cake
7. Backpacker's Pantry Sweet and Sour Chicken

I have updated the meal plan to add more variety and to add "a touch of gourmet" to our backcountry meals. (as requested/ complained about by Gerry)

I have also include a breakdown of our trip in terms of distances over the various days.