June 14, 2017

Hiking in Kings Canyon National Park

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So I was browsing through old blog posts and some drafts that I hadn’t published, and just found this post with all these images from hiking in Kings Canyon National Park last September. I thought I had lost all these pictures because my external hard drive failed at the end of last year, but alas here some of them are!

Even though I’ve been going on little trips here and there (mostly to the desert), I’m missing my days of adventuring. There’s so many places/national parks that I want to visit, but I feel like money just gets in the way of me actually putting those dreams/potential plans into action. There’s so many other things that I need to spend money on (like paying off my credit cards and saving money to move out this summer), but all I really want to do is travel! I think I’m going to start setting aside a certain amount of money each month to put towards traveling so that I can go on some bigger trips, rather than just driving somewhere around here.

Now, back to this hike in Kings Canyon. I really like hiking. I love the views you get at the end as a reward. In this case, it was the mountain ranges on either side of the mountain we were on top of. You could even see Mt. Whitney!

But I also kinda hate hiking. I’ve had exercise induced asthma ever since I was a little kid, so cardio has always been a struggle for me. I’m always the one lagging behind everyone else and need to make frequent stops to catch my breath.

I was getting so frustrated on this hike because I wanted to keep going to the end of the trail, but we wouldn’t have had enough time at the pace we were going. I got so overwhelmed that I started crying, which made it even more difficult to catch my breath. But my two friends that were with me, Chelsea and Kim, encouraged me to keep going and just pray to God for strength.

Throughout the rest of the hike, I kept on repeating the verse, “I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me.” (Philippians 4:13). That has been my life verse since fifth grade, and it has gotten me through so much. I was also praying and thinking about how much I long to be healed of my asthma, and cried out to God for healing. I have hope that He will heal me one day, but it’s just a matter of waiting.