Fun with fungi!

I knew it was time for the hike to be over when I finally identified an unusual red and yellow fungus at the side of the trail. We had seen odd fungi all day, tiny yellow ones and great big scarlet ones and middle-sized greenish ones and a few that were spotted, but this was really unusual: a long, narrow, stemlike object looking like a cigar rolled from colorful spongy stuff. Only when I stooped for a better look did I realize it wasn't a fungus at all. It was a Fruit Roll-Up.

I'm sure I wouldn't have made that mistake if I'd been wearing my glasses, but they kept fogging up, first from sweat and then from humidity and then from rain, so I gave up and put them in my pocket. Still, I saw a lot--spider webs and waterfalls and Indian pipes and mud, lots of mud, and tall trees standing, falling, and rotting, and caves and rocks and more rocks and slippery rocks and mud-covered rocks and rocks worn into smooth shapes by moving water. I saw people wearing flip-flops on muddy trails and others all decked out in hiking gear and rain ponchos and some Amish-looking people wearing hats and long skirts. I walked through woods and caves and over bridges and up steps, lots of steps, lots of wet, muddy, slippery steps. My knees won't let me forget those steps.

After four hours of hiking and slogging and slipping and climbing, we had a picnic lunch while soaking wet and tried to determine which of us smelled the worst. The problem was finding a judge; we briefly considered accosting passing strangers to ask, "Would you smell me?" But that approach just begs for some sort of lawsuit, so instead we headed home for hot showers. We left behind the fungi, the Fruit Roll-Up, and the cell phone (oops), but we brought back a pile of memories, a sense of satisfaction, some really smelly shoes.