August 2023-d

This hike made us think we could pass through time, had us picking up garbage that forced us to try extra hard to not die all night, and moved Nova to push for a harder bivouac site! It is hard to even know where to begin! But I guess the best way is to tell you that I started with Jackson Dean. Yes, he is my current favorite singer and I put his song "If I don't come back, don't come looking" on repeat again in the CD player. Even Josie climbed into the back of the truck as I think she has all the words memorized and couldn't believe we were listening to this one again! But I needed those verses to get me ready and in the mood. I was shuffling off my mortal coil as Hamlet would say. My week had been extra annoying and I felt full of unforgiveness, bitterness and resentment. The enemy was trying to fan those flames and get me to ride the lightening of anger growing inside me. But I would resist. I must resist. This hike would help me as they always do.

I know it is wrong to admit this, but when I really need to gain perspective and let go of anger and bitterness before they can fully take root, I need to do something dangerous. I need something life-threatening. Nothing puts things into a new perspective like feeling close to death. Problems don't matter as much after that. It really helps me, even though I know this is perhaps not the wisest life choice. But hey, some people drink or do drugs to forget about their troubles. My go to drug is adrenaline. Today there was suppose to be a dangerous river ford of the Sandy River and I couldn't be more ready! I was virtually pounding my chest as we approached the river ready for some danger! But what I saw shriveled my boot straps. The water was running low and there were multiple logs spanning the distance from shore to shore so there was not even a reason to get wet. Really? I was so disappointed!

This was a new section of trail today on Mt. Hood where we would need to pass through a popular area to a waterfall that many people visit before getting off onto the less popular treks up the mountainside. We would be criss-crossing popular trails, the Timberline trail, the PCT and a few others on this trip. I had mentally prepared that for the first few miles of the popular trail, we would run into a lot of humans. It is hard to prepare both myself and the girls for this as we have been so use to hiking where we rarely find a person. I tried to make the best of it though when I noticed that many of the guys hiking the trail today were fairly easy on the eyes. "Maybe I could get use to this after all," I thought to myself with a smile. But what really made me appreciate these humans is when one of these guys who was easily half my age called me "Sweetheart". The fact that he had no idea I was old enough to be his mother had me all smiles for miles! At least I had that to entertain me, because I have to admit that the trail was boring me into a coma. This popular trail was so easy and so well groomed it was princess hiking on steroids. "Where is the challenge?" I wanted to yell. "I am going to be bored to death if we don't get to something harder soon," I thought.

Once we got past the waterfall loop though, and transitioned to the Timberline trail, we actually started to climb. "That is more like it," I said quietly to the girls who even seemed to grow more excited themselves. Once we turned off the Timberline trail onto our ridge approach trail for the day, we immediately found ourselves climbing over blown down trees. "Yes!" I wanted to yell out-loud as we climbed over a dozen logs in the first mile of this trail and I started to scratch my legs up. "Now we are home!" Pretty soon, this under used trail provided a party for my mouth that just kept on giving all afternoon long!

The trail climbed and climbed some more. We were suppose to gain about 4000 feet of elevation today, but of course, with me.....that number grew. The day's temps were only in the 80's and felt so wonderful to be 20 degrees less than last week's hike. It made us feel like we were hiking on steroids since we had our stamina back! What a difference 20 degrees can make! The trail switch backed up through a mixed forest draped in moss and ferns. At one point, something unusual caught my eye in the bushes. It was bright pink and purple and I knew it did not belong there. It appeared to be some sort of cardboard box. I instantly was excited because this month has been the Washington Trails Association Hike-a-thon challenge. Each week as I have filled out my trip report, it has asked a variety of questions about my hike. I have been able to check off almost all the boxes. But the box of picking up litter on the trail had so far alluded me. "Ah-ha, now I can check off that litter box!" I said excitedly as I reached to pick the weathered box up. My hand froze just as I almost touched it. "Gross!" I said next as I was torn on what to do. I always like to do my part to clean trails, but this was crossing a line. I finally decided I would pick it up, but it was not going in my backpack. Nova would have to pack this one and take one for the team!

The forest floor was overrun with Rhododendrons for a long time before switching over to Bear-grass and wildflowers as we gained in elevation. Meadows started to open up more frequently among the trees as they grew smaller, turning into Alpine forests. This is one of my favorite transitions on mountain landscapes and every time, I find it breathtaking. Even Josie stopped to admire the views on the steep trails and watch a beautiful buck in the distance.

We were just over 11 miles in when we walked around a corner and were utterly gobsmacked by the views that smashed us! How does one breathe in a moment like this I wondered? Surely the hills really were alive with the sounds of music. I expected Julie Andrews to pop out from behind a tree and start singing to us. I am not going to lie, I might have done a full body spin with my arms stretched out wide. I could feel my entire soul exhale.

As we grew closer to the mountain and the giant chasm between us and him, we could hear rushing water. I knew exactly what it was before I even saw it. This was to be the place where the Sandy River is born. But just before arriving to that birthplace, I saw something else that stopped me in my tracks. It was a rock. But not just any rock. It immediately made me think of the story of the rocks of Craigh na Dun. You know the Scottish rocks where if you touch them, you will pass through time and might find yourself living the life of a Sassenach. Maybe I was getting dehydrated I thought as I stared hard at the rock before me and forced myself to pass on by without touching it.

When we arrived at the edge of the ravine, we could see the multi-tiered waterfall rushing down from the Reid Glacier above with broken snow and ice all around. The sound of falling water exploded up the ravine straight to us as we stood on the sandy ledge above it all.

Josie laid down in the sand and tried to tell me that this would be a lovely spot to set up camp and listen to the river being born all night long. We were 12 miles in now and I think at just under 6000 feet of elevation, but I had forgotten my altimeter, so wasn't completely sure. But it didn't quite feel right to me to stop here even though the day was growing long. I asked Nova what she thought. Was she done exploring for the day? Did she want to find someplace harder and higher and more inhospitable? Her face gave me the answer! I blame the cards in her pack for her sudden boldness.

So upwards and onward we pushed. There was still a trail here slowly switch backing up the mountain through more meadows and wildflowers and alpine trees. It gained in elevation as it curled up around the side of a high spine leading toward Hood's peak. We passed several nice looking campsites along the way. The sun was dipping lower in the sky and I knew we would have to chose something pretty soon, but the thought of what was just a bit farther ahead kept calling to me.

When the trail ended by the nicest campsite we had seen all day, I asked Nova once again, "Should we stop here?" I had read about a rough scramble trail that continued on after the trail ended, climbing across cliffs of scree and slate to gain the spiny ridge. Nova, once again, was very adamant in her answer. She wanted to keep climbing up the ridge behind her left shoulder until all the greenery ended. She wanted to see what that spot was like to bivouac in.

So upwards and onward we pushed once again. But this is when the climbing became difficult. In fact it started to become rather terrifying. The angle of the slope we had to walk across felt like it was about a 75% pitch absolutely covered in slate. Walking on slate is more like walking on broken dinner plates than on ground. They shift and slide under each step making terrible breaking sounds as they plummet far beneath you. Each of us was creating mini-avalanches down the steep drop beneath us. I tried not to look down and instead focused on finding good hand-holds as we climbed. But sometimes the strongest looking rock I would grab onto with my hand would give way and slide and tumble below us. It was maddening. Once we were far enough invested in traveling like mountain goats, we couldn't have turned around if we had wanted to. There was no room and I knew if any of the three of us slipped and fell, we were all going down since we were tied together. This would have been difficult to do alone, but it felt a bit impossible all together as we were.

I could feel my mouth going dry from the fear of what we were getting ourselves into. I sucked greedily at my bladder bag spigot to ward this feeling off. Josie was spotting snow now to our left down the cliff and clearly wanted to find a way down to it. It took all my effort to keep her focused and moving across the scree embankments. It wasn't long before I could feel the death-sweats starting. This is probably more info than you need or want, but death sweats are when your body lets loose a terrible sweat that only happens in true moments of great fear. It has nothing to do with exertion or heat. All I can say is that it feels different and it smells terrible. I both love and hate death sweats. At least now I had achieved my goal for today to get some new perspective on life. My adrenaline was pumping and I was no longer feeling so angry and bitter. The trail had absolved me of that which the enemy wanted to fuel the blaze within me. "I throw my mustard seeds on your fire!" I almost yelled but for the fear of further avalanches.

Pretty soon we breached the crest of the spine and could walk across the top right toward the mountain. We grew closer and closer to the upper waterfalls birthing the Sandy River. Now that is where we need to spend the night we almost all said in unison as we came to where the greenery ended!

As we spun in circles enjoying the views all around us, we could see a far off lake shimmering in the end of day light. The sun was clearly getting ready for bed and we knew we must too. When we crested this ridge we were hit with the fiercest of winds. I was trying to ignore them in my tank top and shorts but quickly found my whole body shivering. We crouched down beside a tiny pine shrub to try to get some relief from the winds, but when I looked down I saw that my fingers and hands were turning a strange purple color. We had to hurry!! I don't think I have ever set up camp more quickly in my life! We put all our extra layers on as well. I was so thankful that I had brought two of my rechargeable warmers for the sleeping bag as well as a thermos of hot chocolate for the night!

I crawled into bed still shivering and thinking that we were going to be in trouble. It was too late to drop our elevation back down that death cliff in the dark to get out of the winds. But if this wind kept up all night and I was this cold before the sun was fully down, it did not bode well. I curled up into the fetal position and spooned tightly with Nova. Even the Arctic Wolf who never seems cold curled up pressed with us. I swore under my breath. This was not looking good. The wind was coming right across the glaciers making them extra cold. I pulled the bivvy bag over our faces and tried to warm our cocoon with our breath. It was too cold to even read as I can't turn pages with gloves on.

It was then that the most terrible thought came to me. It was almost unbearable. If we froze to death on this spine tonight fine. As a believer, I don't fear death in any way. I know where Jesus will take me. But if we froze to death and someone then found us, they would find those terrible cards I picked up and think they were ours!! Oh the horror of the idea ate away at me. There was no way for anyone to know they were litter and not mine! What would they think of me?? Here I am a Christian woman of integrity who has been married to the same man for almost 28 years. They would think I bring these along on my hikes to look at. "God, I cannot die now!" I prayed in earnest. "Wait", I thought. "Maybe they are not so bad. Perhaps they are just of bare chested men." Since I knew I couldn't sleep until I knew how bad my situation was, I slipped my arm out of my bag and reached for Nova's pack. All I can say is that the cards were not of bare chested men and that I might be scarred for life now.

Now that I knew just how bad these things were, it was all I could do to not throw the deck of cards off the cliff we were sleeping on far below onto glaciers and rocks hopefully to never be seen by human eyes again. But then a new thought consumed me. These scree fields were full of pikas and marmots. With my luck the deck of cards would peg a pika in the head and kill him dead. Imagine his memorial service. "What killed cousin Eddie" someone will ask. "Oh, Eddie was murdered by 54 male appendages." I could not have this on my conscious.

Maybe I could write a note that these were not mine I thought. But I had no pen on me. If I had a cell phone, I could type a note, but I do not own one. I have a video function on my camera, but I know from experience that you cannot hear my voice in even a slight wind and we were still experiencing hurricane force winds. Oh the trauma of it all. My good deed was punishing me dearly! I finally decided that by will power alone, I would just refuse to die. So if you ever wonder if picking up litter can keep a person alive, the answer is yes. It was a long and desperately cold night at times, but we lived through it by shear stubbornness. The first thing I saw in the morning light was Nova thanking God for surviving.

We were all tired. The night sky had been beautiful and we enjoyed staring into the milky way and watching shooting stars despite the cold. The avalanches around us all night were also pretty extreme. The utter silence of the mountain would be punctuated by huge BOOMS that sounded like thunder, but quickly gave way to rock and ice fall. Most of these occurred near the waterfall birthing the Sandy, but some occurred on the opposite side of our ridge too. At one point in the middle of the night we were engulfed in wildfire smoke so strong that I had to sit up to check that we didn't have fire creeping up the ridge toward us. When I did sleep, I dreamt of finding old wooden shelters with wood stoves and heat! By morning we were all yawning and still freezing!

The fierce winds were still with us as the sun was rising, but not enough to clear out the smokey haze that had settled upon us. We packed up quickly to hit the trail. I will admit I was dreading the hike across the scree cliffs. If coming up them was terrible, I couldn't imagine how much harder it would be going down. Josie was not happy that she was having a bad hair day already due to the wind. Wolves and their vanity!

As you may recall, Miles the WTA fundraising marmot mascot has been hiking with us this month. He has mostly been riding with Nova, so Josie begged to carry him today. I warned her to be very careful with him and she promised she would as her chest puffed out in pride for this great responsibility.

Before fear could paralyze us, we moved down off our rocky spine hotel toward lower elevations. Although I could not take any photos while my hands were gripping rocks and my heart was in my throat, I tried to get you a picture before we started the trek across the scree cliffs and around the corner. I will say it looks easier than it was in these photos! They do not do these sections justice at all. I had death sweats at 6am in the morning for goodness sake!

But once across, we dropped in elevation quickly. I figured I had gained about 5000 feet of elevation yesterday, so we had to drop the same today. We had also hiked in 14 miles yesterday, so we would be rounding out a 28 miler today. As we got back down to the lower viewpoint, it was fun to look all the way up to the ridge we had spent the night on. "Nova" I said, "You were right to keep going past this point!" Josie was feeling a bit hungry and was thinking of snacking on Miles, before I told her I would share my breakfast peach with her.

Our final challenge of the day was to walk past that rock I named Craigh na Dun. Maybe it was the rough night. Maybe it was dehydration (I already had the headache). Or perhaps it was just wishful thinking, but that darn thing was calling to me. We walked slowly towards it full of fantasy of times long past.

So did I do it you ask? Did I reach out and touch the magical rock in a magical place at sunrise? Oh, if you know me at all by now, you better believe I did! I closed my eyes and was fully invested as my dirty little hand touched that cold and hard stone.

"How do you suppose we will know if it worked ?" I asked Nova. "I guess we have to wait until we find a human and then see what time period they are dressed for." I told her reasonably. For the first time, I couldn't wait to find a human on the trail. But first we had to say goodbye to our mountain and fields of flowers. Why is this always so hard for me I wondered? It broke me to leave. I could literally hear something shattering inside me.

Once we tore ourselves away, we flew down the trails anxious to find someone. When we finally came to the popular waterfall sure to find a human there, we were surprised to have it all alone at the early morning hour. We took a moment to enjoy the beauty and for Josie to tell me how thirsty she was!

We continued to drop in elevation and when we arrived at a trail junction with the PCT, we stopped and stood for some time. I kept looking to the right, knowing that was north to Canada. How I longed to just be wild and free and head for Canada! But then I would look left and know southbound was where my truck could be found. I was in a trance and just stood staring to the right for the longest time. Suddenly my trance was broken when out of no where an older man stood standing to my left. I just looked at him and blinked. He had made no sound.

"Good Morning" he quietly and very formally stated in a deep voice. I could not respond. I looked him up and down. He was not dressed in hiking clothes at all. I did not see a pack or even any new looking gear on him. He was dressed very nicely, like you would expect a man going to church in the 1920's perhaps. I think my mouth dropped open ever so slightly. Perhaps thinking I was stupid or did not speak English, he tried another tactic. "You have beautiful dogs," he stated slowly and also strangely quite formally. All I wanted to ask him was what year it was. How the question burned on my lips. It would be so easy to ask I thought. "WHAT YEAR IS IT?" screamed in my head. But I learned my lesson on that hike a couple years back where the man thought I was a kidnapped Amish girl and was very insistent about rescuing me before I could explain that I was fine. Once I asked this gentleman what year it was, there would be no turning back on explaining that one. So I mumbled some sort of "thank you and good morning" back instead and stumbled down the trail more confused than ever. For miles I contemplated living in the 1920s and what I needed to remember from the history books. I don't even remember that section of trail to be honest as I was so engrossed in the idea of having gone back in time 100 years. What a lovely way to pass the early morning hours on the trail!

I was drug back into reality though when it was time to cross the Sandy river once again. We easily made our way across the logs spanning the river. But once on the over side, Josie had to jump in the current. She loves fast moving water and it was too much for her to resist. It startled us all however when the napping marmot in her pack popped his head out in shock from the cold water. "Sorry Miles," I laughed. "I forgot to warn you about the Wolf's obsession with water!" But to be fair, he only got his shirt wet and his head stayed above water the entire time. Clearly Nova will be carrying Miles for our last hike with him next week though. It better be something dangerous so Miles can work out the anger brewing in his heart toward the Wolf now.