Yikes.

Today I have a little story for you about a trip that I went on to Bass Lake.

It was the 2nd Annual Bass Lake hike that I went on with some friends. Last year I posted about it here. If you don't want to click there or find out more about where Bass Lake is, its up in the Marin Headlands about 5 or 6 miles outside of Bolinas. You hike 2.8 miles on a beautiful trail and at the end, you get to this beautiful lake out in the middle of nowhere. The morning had a slow start and it was a little foggy, but by the time we got all the way up to the lake, I was warm and ready to get into the water. Here's a picture of me and Ryan with a view of the lake behind us.

Here's part of the group looking out over the lake. We were ready to have fun on the rope swing and everyone was having a great time.

Of course I don't have any pictures from us swimming around in the lake, but here's me and Silvia after we got out of the water. It looked like it would be soooo cold, but once you got in, the water was really enjoyable.

I might add that before the following picture of me, Erica, and Sil was taken, one of the boys on the trip walked up behind me while I was changing back into my clothes...and since I wasn't really clothed(at all)..., he got a free show. Nice. At least we were friends before the trip. And it was at about this time that we started saying things like "Hey guys, where's Vince?"

If you don't like unhappy blog posts, stop reading here.

Ok well now that the rest of you are reading, I'm not really sure how to even write about this. Here's what I know.

We were all swimming around in the lake together and it was 1pm. There were about 20 of us. We didn't all go out at the same time for different reasons, so I wasn't really keeping track of who was out with us at the rope swing and who was coming/going. I got back to the shore and met up with Silvia. After getting out of the water, I talked to a few people and just walked back up to the picnic area to change into some warmer clothes. Then at about 2:30pm...we realized that Vince wasn't with us anymore. His shoes and belongings were though. Some people in our group started walking down all the trails around the lake that we could find and we yelled his name so loud that we could hear each other screaming on the other side of the lake. The last person to see Vince was my friend Dave. Unfortunately, he was seen in the lake swimming alone. We never found him. One of the guys in our group ran the 2.8 miles back to the parking lot and called 911. Helicopters circled the lake for about an hour. When I was watching scuba divers get into the water to look for a body, I lost it and I was glad when the park ranger asked that the women start back towards the parking lot. By about 8pm we were all together again back in the parking lot. Well, 19 of us were there. We had a group prayer and decided to go to dinner together before going home. We all cried.

This happened on Saturday. As of Sunday night when I'm writing this, he hasn't been found yet. Crews are going to continue searching tomorrow. The hardest part is just not knowing. Not knowing what happened; not knowing if he's dead or alive.

Keep Vince and his family in your prayers, ok?
Yikes.
update: Today is Friday June 22 and they found Vince's body this afternoon. Check the news if you'd like to know more. I don't have any details and I'd rather not post them here.