My hands white knuckled around my hiking poles, the right one gripped at about half way along its length, the left I firmly palmed the top of the ergonomic handle, compensating for the severe slope we traversed across. Each step was excruciatingly methodical on the exposed section as we focused on our destination, somewhere beyond a ridge in the distance. My wife, Bec, took the lead for two reasons: One, was that she had hiking boots on while mine, having become soaked duri