On with the story.

Rude awakening.


"Hey! Quit shaking the bed", Linc mumbled. Then he woke up
enough to remember where he was. He scrambled up out of the lean-to
and tried to stand up. The ground was shaking violently now, so he
crawled up closer to the tree line and away form the rocks. It was
just getting daylight enough to see good. He looked across the bay
and saw the mountain blow it's top. The fire was shooting thousands
of feet high, and the smoke rolling out of it as well . Good thing
the smoke was blowing away from the bay. Finally the shaking subsided
and he was able to stand up. He stood there in awe and watched the
lava begin to flow down the mountain side. So glad that it was miles
away. He went to the rock to retrieve his belongings, thinking now
what? Should he return to the portal or stay here and take a chance
of finding out something.
Finally he decided to remain, and went up into the trees to
relieve himself, thinking it was a good thing he didn't wet his pants
or worse when the quake struck. While there he picked some more fruit
and grabbed a couple more coconuts. Might as well get something to
eat before he took off, Never know when or what his next meal would
be. He did the crab thing again then looked up at the big mound of
rocks, and on up the beach beyond them. He decided to go the rock
route. He gathered a few more fruits and stuffed them in his pockets.
Husked another coconut and put it in the hood that was zipped up in
the collar of his jacket, and took off up the slope and on up a ridge
toward the mountains. The slope was a bit rocky in places and he had
to pick his way through, but the vegetation was getting less and less,
and the hiking became easier.
Linc had hiked several miles now so he sat down to have a bite to
eat since it was around noon. He drilled and drank from the coconut
then sawed off the top inch. Ate some of the meat from it as he dug
out the middle. He wanted to save it for a cup. He ate some fruit
and drank some water before taking off again. After another mile or
so, the ridge leveled off and he could see all around for miles. Most
it looked like a sea of vegetation. He could see across the bay and
the volcano was still erupting and a huge plume of smoke and clouds
was drifting still away from the mainland. He could see the volcano
was on a spit of land jutting out from the mainland and another bay
was on the other side of it. Just as well he didn't go to his right
when he came through the portal. He would have followed the beach and
ended up right out there on that spit where the volcano was.
Linc looked around then decided to angle around to his left and
see if there was another ridge going down. It would give him a
different approach to discover. He was looking down the side of the
higher ground on his left when he saw a different ridge. He chose to
go this route for now. He started down then noticed a blue glow a bit
farther around the slope. Hey! He thought, might as well check this
out. He paused a bit, then stepped through the portal. ' Holy crap."
Linc squeaked. Where in the heck am I ? he thought. Looking around
him, all he could see was snow and ice. Mountains, valleys,
everything covered in ice. No use sticking around here, so he stepped
back through the portal and shivered hard. Blast this he thought and
went on down the ridge.
Linc walked for a couple of miles. Lots easier since there was
little vegetation and rocks on this ridge top. He looked to he left,
down the hillside and saw what looked like a valley with a river or
lake in it. Still to far away to tell for sure. But he decided to go
that way. As he descended the ridge top, he began to see trees and
shrubs, and it was warmer now as he went down in elevation. The
ridge started to drop off much steeper down hill and soon Linc was
hanging on to shrubs a few times because of the steepness. The rocks
around were all volcanic. He slipped into a small wash and descended
very quickly now into a lot of brush and ferns, with a few trees, and
came out of the vegetation onto a dirt bank , by a lake. If one could
call it that Looked to be about 400 feet wide and maybe a mile long.
Cliffs of basalt columns, on the other side were about a hundred feet
tall. And stretched about half way down the lake. Linc could hear
running water to his left, and went in that direction. There was a
small stream of water falling down from the rocks. Since linc had
drank all his water, he now refilled his bottle and placed it back in
the holder. He then used the coconut to drink his fill of the good
cold water. It was getting late and he had better start thinking about
where he would spend this night Looking around he could see an alcove
back in the basalt, not quite a cave but a good spot for a camp. He
gathered up a bunch of long conifer cones and put them in a fire pit
he made. Wondered if there might be some fish in the lake. He walked
on down the lake a ways and through some reeds when he began to see
footprints of some big birds. Turkeys? What? He looked in the water
but could only see some weird looking things. No! No! They couldn't
be trilobites', Could they? He thought. But they were. Not edible
he thought. But looking down stream a bit further he saw a couple of
the big birds wading in the shallow water gobbling them up. Hey!
Those are not birds. By darn the were dinosaurs. They looked like
small featherless ostriches. Instead of a beak they had a longer bill
with teeth. Dark grey with long red legs. Too bad he didn't have a
camera. "Holy Cow", he yelled. Then a couple more came out of the
reeds and toward him. One tried to bite at him but he whacked it a
few times with the walking stick and killed it. The rest of them ran
on down the lake and into the reeds and brush to hide. Linc picked up
the dinosaur and went back up to where he had made his fire pit. He
wondered how dinosaur would taste, and he was going to find out. He
cleaned it out and skinned it Must weigh about 5 or 6 pounds he
thought. He skewered it onto a couple of sticks and roasted it over
the fire he built. Wait until I get back and tell Uncle Vernon about
this. Yes it did taste a bit like chicken. Tougher and stringier.
He piled a bunch of cones for a bed, built up his fire, crawled into
the alcove and went to sleep.