Part II: Brambles

[A Rider Brother Journey: This is part of a ten-part serialization of the story of a special hike I made with my Brother in 1989. It is based on a journal entry I made on August 19, 1989. It was recently revised into this semi-haibun format.]
The full text of the story to-date.

Early this morning we set off in fog rising off the river. We choose to head straight up the steep western slope. The climb starts off easy but soon we are clambering almost vertically up a broken rock face. After several hours of steady climbing we encounter a wide clump of tangled branches hanging over the cliff edge. We can either go straight up or work our way back down. We decide it is less dangerous to go forward. We go hand-over-hand through the tangled mass, trusting the branches, some dead, to hold our weights. One slip and we will hurtle straight back down.

640.
we put our lives
in the hands of brambles...
hot morning