Today, I woke up at 4:25 am ready to embark on my first day of trekking through the woods of Government Canyon State Natural Area to assist with the Golden-cheeked Warbler survey. I had gone to bed pretty early for a Saturday night, so I wasn't overly surprised to wake up five minutes ahead of my alarm. I had also gotten my clothes ready and put them in the bathroom, so my getting dressed wouldn't be too disruptive for Rachel. I had even showered and shaved before going to bed to save time this morning.

I arrived at the natural area at 6:00 am. By 6:30, we were all packed into Ranger Theresa's truck riding across barely existing ranch roads in the dark to be dropped off at places from which we could start hiking closer to our survey points. The truck was basically bushwhacking through fields at some points. We would hit a dead end, Ranger Theresa would throw it in reverse, and we would try to find another way through the overgrown thicket. It was a rough teeth jarring ride. I was very happy when she finally stopped and pushed my partner Jessica and me out into the chilly black nothingness. We stood there shivering until the beginning sunrise brought us enough light to safely travel on.

We found our first two survey points easily. They required a little bit of bushwhacking. There was some small amount of stooping under or climbing over low branches. My partner wrote down all the required data at each point, then we stood there silently for three minutes listening for the call of the warblers. We did hear one way off in the distance at the first point, too far for us to try and walk to. At the second, we were serenaded by a lovely Carolina Wren, but no warblers.

Our third survey point, number 19, changed everything. For one thing, it took us forever to find it. This one required bushwhacking to a degree for which we were not mentally prepared. We climbed up and down several small valleys crashing through branches and vines while getting scratched and poked all the way. Once, my partner, Jessica, fell hard on her knees. She jokes that she fell gracefully, but she went down hard- narrowly missing a big rock that could have taken her out. A few minutes later, I got my feet hung up in branches, and fearing a fall on my knees, tried desperately not to fall. Somehow, I landed on my back with my head going down hill and my arms and legs up in the air above me. A small bush seemed to magically form itself into the shape of a Native American travois and cushion my fall. I knocked my hip against a sharp rock which would have impaled a kidney had I landed a few scant inches to the left. I landed with my head on a stone pillow which should have split my head open, but for reasons I can't explain, didn't hurt me at all. Jessica rushed to my aid, but I told her to leave me alone for a minute. I needed a moment to make sure I wasn't already dead, and to assess the damage. Fortunately, I didn't seem to have any breaks, gashes, or sprains. She helped me up, and we laughed both of our falls off and carried on.

Finally, we found the survey point only to stand there for three minutes of silence. You would think that, after all that trouble finding the spot, a damned warbler would have taken pity on us and sang out nice and strong. Nope. Feeling a bit defeated, we moved away trying to figure out where the road was. That was when my GPS decided to stop working. It would come on for a second or two then shut down. When I got home, I discovered that I had cracked one of the battery connections. Upon inspection, it promptly came completely off, turning my GPS device into a paperweight. We still had Jessica's GPS and knew that we needed to keep heading east, but there were places we couldn't get through. We would walk around hoping to find a better access point, heading for small clearings only to learn they dead-ended with brutal overgrowth after a few yards. I was tired of being stooped over. I was tired of branches scratching me. We were both just over it. That's when Jessica realized that she had lost her prescription sunglasses. She was devastated. Both of us realized that we would never see those sunglasses again.

We continued rambling through the woods in circles. Jessica was not as focused because of her concern for her glasses. I just felt totally lost. I would look on my iPhone to see where we were, but it didn't help me get a sense of direction. Other than trying to head east, we really didn't know what else to do. Then we saw a familiar little tree. It was about four feet tall and had been burned. It got my attention earlier as we were going through the area. I remember that I had even pointed it out to Jessica, but neither of us remembered when in our timeline that had been. For that reason, we didn't rejoice too much. Yes, we had found a place we had passed before, but we still had no idea where we were. That's when things got even more amazing than a few soft "should of killed me" falls in the woods.

When I realized that we were sort of backtracking at this point in time, I jokingly said to Jessica that maybe we would find her sunglasses. She said that would be nice, adding that they were in a black case. It was just idle chatter, with no real belief that we could ever possibly find the glasses. We moved on, and in about a minute, just as I was breaking through a particularly rough stretch of branches and vines, I saw a black case laying on the ground in front of me. It was amazing. Just the thought that we had gotten so lost, but accidentally ended up where she had lost her glasses in the woods an hour or so earlier amazes me. This time we did rejoice. She was so relieved to have her glasses. I was really happy for her.

Now, better able to focus, we made it back to the road after only a few minutes. We actually did pretty good after that. We found two more survey points fairly easily before the cutoff time. Then we hiked a few miles back to headquarters. We were extremely tired and battered, but not broken. We get to do it all again in a few days.