Sequoia National Park

Part I
 
"Saddle up, And Move on out"
 
I finished up the last day at a previous job on Friday, June 15.  And with plenty of time now to rest and recuperate, things started right off the bat with a friend arriving from Georgia the next morning.
 
I made my way over the Pacific Coastal Range in the tiny carmel-colored car.  That drive over highway 17 was a little more than I could deal with, but I arrived at the airport safely, and Mathew was handle all the driving chores after that, so I could rest more.
 
On the way home we loaded up on some additional camping gear, and spent the next day getting food and planning the meals for the trip.  I picked up a large cooler, and froze a gallon jug of water to put in the cooler, so the bread would survive the trip through the central valley.
 
I'd spent the previous two months figuring out what sort of hiking gear to get - boots, socks, rain gear, jackets, pants, shirts, hats, water bottles, and such.  Hiking and camping clothes are all very specialized for different situations.  After not having much of a clue about hiking boots in particular, during the last week before the trip I was able to find a pair that felt really comfortable, that were rain-proof (in the event of getting caught in the rain or having to wade across shallow creeks), and that looked pretty cool too.
 
I also got an expedition-weight fleece jacket from Patagonia, which is the next best thing to whale blubber, as far as having an insulating layer.
 
 
 
"It's Not Quite Warm Enough in Here"
 
(or... Abandon Every Air-Conditioner, Ye That Enter)
 
On Monday morning, around 10 am, we set out, the tiny car filled to the gills with camping gear, clothes, and food.  We brought 4 gallons of filtered water plus several water bottles.  The water jugs would be handy containers to fill up with water at the campsite.
 
The drive started out well - a pleasant, relaxing drive - right up until encountering the "road out" sign.  The road we were on had collapsed just ahead, probably from flood damage from the previous rainy season.  While we were backpedaling, we discovered that we weren't on the right road.  So what if there was a wrong turn on the very first turn of the trip, leading a long ways to a dead-end; there was still plenty of time left to redeem ourselves, by staying mostly on the correct roads the rest of the way.

We crept along on side roads to get back to the proper road and soon were on our way again.  There was a stretch of narrow, winding mountain roads (the Pacific Coastal Range), then the flatlands of Gilroy (famous for garlic), and then the smooth, rolling, light-brown grassy mountains of the Diablo Range (with Live Oak trees dotted across the mountains).
 
At this point, as we headed down out of the Diablo range into the central valley (the San Joaquin Valley), things got a little more interesting.  Mathew noticed that the engine was close to overheating.  The engine temperature gauge was close to the red area.  So we pulled off the highway, into the sprawling parking lot of a shopping center and tried to find some shade to park the car under.
 
It's worth mentioning that in the central valley, around high noon, areas of shade outdoors are measured in square millimeters, as there are no trees to speak of, and the land is totally flat.  We parked the car underneath a parking lot light by a restaurant, and were able to cover a good 1/20 of the hood in the generous shade.
 
To say that this gave the car a chance to cool down, is a questionable claim, as the temperature outside was 108 F and climbing, and the car was parked on a large, pitch-black parking lot with nearly no shade.  The car was either going to cool down, or it was going to melt into the pavement right there.  It seemed like even money either money.
 
We found a little bit of shade to sit down in, while the car was "cooling down".  It was right by the dumpster of the restaurant, and it added its own special smell to the air, but it was still shade.  So we sat down for a bit and had some lunch - sandwiches that we'd made that morning.  We measured the temperature at 102 F in the shade.  After half an hour, we figured it was time to try the car again, and see if it could handle some more driving.
 
Getting back on the highway, the engine temperature steadily rose, slowly inching its way towards the red, overheated area.  If we kept the car below 55 mph, we could get anywhere between 10 and 45 minutes of driving before the engine would overheat.  So we kept pulling off the highway for 10 - 20 minutes at a time, and then driving on a little ways further.
 
At one gas station we stopped at, Mathew poured some water from his water bottle onto the cement ground, under the sun.  In 2 or 3 minutes you couldn't even tell where the water had been--between the high temperature and how dry the air was.  The temperature topped off at 115 F that day.
 
So it was a little warm side in that car, driving through the central valley.  Using the air conditioner was completely out of the question, since that would cause the engine to overheat even sooner.  We relied on the old 455 air conditioner (4 open windows at 55 mph).  However, when the wind outside feels like someone just opened the door of a blast furnace, it doesn't do a whole lot to cool you down.
 
It got a bit worse from there. Mathew mentioned a way to dissipate some of the heat from an engine while it's running.  It wasn't exactly an ideal solution.  It involved turning on the heater, cranking it up and opening up the vents.  So there we were, driving through "the oven" (the southern central valley), and not only were we not able to use the air conditioner, but we had to have the heater on full blast.
 
But, to be fair, there's not a much difference between swelteringly hot, and slightly-more-swelteringly hot.
 
 
 
The Streets of Fresno (all of them)
 
Things went pretty smoothly directions-wise, until we got to Fresno.  The car was due for a break, to let the engine cool down, so we pulled off on an exit at the outskirts of Fresno.  Where we stopped was just a couple blocks from the highway exit, but it took more than a couple blocks of driving to get back on the highway.
 
After 15 minutes we got back in the car and headed towards the highway.  There were a lot of one-way streets in the area, so getting back to where we started from was not a simple thing.  There was no obvious return access to the highway, so we followed a series of signs that led to some of the nearby highways.
 
There were 3 highways in the general area. They all intersect, and a couple of them may or may not be the same physical highway part of the way.  A sign ahead showed the highway number we were looking for, a mile or two ahead, though it didn't say which direction on the highway it offered access to.
 
We drove through more slow city streets that wound around this way and that, with the same highway signs always a little ways ahead.  Some of the signs said the highway access was in the opposite direction that we were hoping to go, but that seemed better than nothing.  The streets kept going on and on, and circling around more, and we'd gone much more than a couple miles.  At least once or twice, we got on a street that looked like it was the highway, but it turned out to be another city street.  The whole time the engine was heating up, from the constant stop-and-go driving.
 
We took another turn onto what appeared to be the correct highway, but once we were on it the signs indicated that it was a different highway.  We took the next exit and turned around, driving parallel to the highway.  And then we saw even more signs ahead for the correct highway.  We proceeded on another mile or so, and much to our surprise, found ourselves not just on the right highway, but headed in the right direction.
 
It was a lot of driving just to get back two-blocks to the highway we had left earlier.  It seemed like we would have done just as well if we'd made random turns the whole way until we got back on the highway.  Apparently the Fresno Tourism Department wanted to make sure we got a good look at Fresno, at all of Fresno.
 
Needless to say, we made sure to get well clear of Fresno before stopping the car again to let it cool down.
 
 
 
The Hounds of the Foothills
 
There was another 40 - 60 miles remaining on the valley, before getting to the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas.  The temperature had cooled down to a chilly 111 F, and we hardly noticed the constant supernova blasting of the heater.
 
Finally we got to the foothills, where it was bound to get cooler at the higher elevations.  We'd be feeling icy mountain air before long.
 
It was a nice change of pace, seeing the rugged, rocky mountainsides of the foothills--prime cougar and rattlesnake territory.  Unfortunately, while climbing 2 or 3 thousand feet in elevation, the temperature didn't drop more than a few degrees (105 F), and the uphill driving was causing the car to need a break every 5 minutes or so.
 
The temperate was so hot that at one place, after walking up the road a short ways to get a better view, while walking back we noticed that we were leaving footprints in the relatively fresh pavement on the side of the road.
 
At that same pull-off spot, there was an old shack of a house right alongside the road, with a ratted chain-wire fence around it.  On one side, tied to a tree, was a large, skinny, floppy-eared hound dog, that started baying in rich baritone tones as soon as we stopped the car.   BOOOOOOooooooooo......   BOOOOOOooooooooo......  It was slowly wagging its tail back and forth the whole time, like it hadn't had this much fun in quite a while.
 
There were another 4 hounds on the opposite side of the house, inside something that looked like a huge wire-fenced, roofed chicken coop.  When they heard the first dog baying away, they all joined in and started baying too.  Every one had its own unique harmony to add to the ensemble of baying hounds.  We were lucky enough to catch an inspired performance by The Foothill Hound Dog Choir.  These were hound dogs in the prime of their vocal capabilities.
 
 
 
Cool Air and Really, Really Big Trees
 
Finally, after slowly climbing another 1 or 2 thousand feet in elevation, the air outside started to feel noticeably cooler, and the engine wasn't overheating as much.  We were able to enjoy the drive more now, rather than just trying to survive it.
 
Just the same, Mathew said he was impressed by the hostility-to-life of the climate in the central valley.  He said he found it to be an enjoyable experience in its own way, like visiting Death Valley.  I could relate to that somewhat.  When you're in The Oven with no air conditioning, you can't help but experience the climate, whether you want to or not.
 
So now there was some pleasant, comfortably cool, mountain road driving.  Well, pleasant aside from the fact that at times off the edge of the road you had a drop-off of half a mile or more straight down the mountain wall.  And going in this direction, we were on the certain-doom side of the road, rather than the reassuring-mountain-wall side.  Even as a passenger, at times I was afraid to look down at some of the views, especially while the car was going around hairpin turns.
 
But the air was feeling much cooler, much fresher, as we got into the high country, more than a mile in elevation.  It was starting to feel more invigorating.
 
We had left the foothills and were now in the pine- and fir-tree-covered Sierra Nevadas--in bear and mosquito country.  The mountains have a very distinctive look, with so many 200-foot-tall trees, closely-packed, growing straight up, covering the terrain.  Higher up, you see some of the bare, granite peaks--much more jagged and jutting than the Rocky Mountains or the smooth, rounded tops of the ancient Appalachians.  By comparison the Sierra Nevadas look like mountains that just formed a few days ago.
 
Still a ways from the camp site, we arrived at the Sequoia National Park greeting station, where they collect the entrance fee and hand out information about the park.  Next to the greeting station, which was a small booth in the middle of the road, was an especially large Sequoia tree--the first clear sight of a Sequoia as you arrive at the park.  This tree was maybe 15 - 20 feet in diameter (half the width of the famous General Sherman tree) and well over 250 feet tall.
 
That huge Sequoia tree, much more so than the greeting station or the entrance sign we passed earlier, made it feel as though you'd just officially entered Sequoia National Park.  As we drove further on, every so often there were some relatively large Sequoia trees off to the side of the road.
 
We arrived at the camp site with an hour of daylight left and were able to get most of the camping gear set up before nightfall.  I quickly saw how useful a headlamp flashlight like Mathew had would have been, for working with your hands in the dark--cooking food or putting things into the bear-safe lockers.  It was awkward fumbling around with the handheld flashlight.
 
But we had made it to the camp site, heated up some dinner with Mathew's miniature propane stove and the cooking pots he'd brought, and then crashed for the night, with towering mountain peaks on all sides and the sound of a rushing river nearby.

 

Part II
 
The Epic Dishwashing Saga
 
We woke up the next morning, relatively uneaten by bears, ready to set out for the first day of hiking.
 
After heating up some breakfast, washing the dishes turned out to be a little tricky.  We couldn't wash them at the nearby faucet, because that would leave bits of food and soap which would attract bears.  The only facilities for washing dishes were at the bathroom, on the far side of the campground.
 
Outside the bathroom there was another faucet, but it was only for getting drinking water from.  Inside the bathroom there was a sink, a regular bathroom sink, the kind where the water only runs while you hold the faucet handle open; the instant you let go the water stops.
 
The sink wasn't large enough to get a large dish or plate into it, but you could get just enough of it under the water to somewhat wash it and rinse it off.  And you weren't supposed to put any food down the sink.  To dispose of the remains of food you had to flush it down one of the toilets.  The water from the sink was pretty cold, but luckily I'd brought with me one of the standard backcountry survival items--dishwashing gloves.
 
In daring, dramatic fashion, we were able to get through the dishes and tote them back to the campsite.  And now was the time, the moment I'd been waiting for, the chance to get out the nifty hiking gear I'd gotten for the trip.
 
 
 
Style Points
 
The important thing about the gear I got was that it looked cool.  Okay, sure it was comfortable and practical and useful.  Yeah, yeah, yeah.  But mainly, it looked cool.  That's crucial when you're hiking around in the mountains, away from civilization, with nothing but style and image to keep you alive.

After all, in movies set in the wilderness, the people always look cool.  And they survive.  Coincidence?  I think not.  So I put on the gear for the hiking trip, ready to face any challenge or force of nature that wasn't cooler-looking than myself.
 
It was a lot of fun putting on the special hiking socks, lacing up the boots, donning the sun hat.  It was all new stuff.  It was almost like dressing up in a costume for a play or for halloween.  Even the pants I got were unusual.  They were convertible pants, where you can remove the lower half of the pant legs for when the weather gets warmer.  And the shirt was a special kind of polyester shirt that's supposed to help wick moisture away and keep you cool on a warm day.
 
I had two 1-quart water bottles, which went into the side pockets of the backpack, and a plastic water bag that could hold up to a gallon of water, which I put a quart and a half of water in.  I'd heard that for a day of hiking in the high country, you need to bring about a gallon of water with you.  I wasn't sure if the added 7 pounds of water weight would be too much, but it turned out to be okay.
 
I stowed the lightweight, compactable rain gear into the backpack.  The sky was totally clear, bright blue, with no hint of clouds in sight, but in the Sierras it often rains in the afternoon.  I packed the heavy fleece jacket, in case it got chilly in the evening and stashed the insect repellent in one of the front pants pockets, for easy access.
 
That left food.  For this, we needed something that said "rugged individualists", that said "trailblazers braving the frontier".  That left one clear choice: peanut butter and jelly.  As an extra touch, we got a special kind of peanut butter, one that runs so much that by the time you're ready for lunch and you open up the container, all you find is a pasty mass of bread, butter, and jelly that used to be in the shape of a sandwich.

But, hey, no one said life in the outdoors was easy (or that it's not messy).  If peanut butter and jelly was good enough for the European settlers who trekked across the continent, and if it was good enough for the Native Americans when they first came across on the ice bridge 10,000 years ago, well then by gum it was good enough for me.
 
 
 
Largest Sapling in the World
 
The hike for this day was to the Giant Forest, where the General Sherman Tree is found--the largest living thing in the world.  It was a 3-mile hike to get there.
 
Early on during the hike, I looked up the side of the mountain wall and saw what appeared to be two birds resting at opposite sides of a tall, thin tree trunk.  One of the birds was moving in a curious fashion.  Then I realized that was I was seeing was a deer.  What I thought were birds were its long ears; it was twitching one of them while watching us curiously.
 
We saw a number of deer during the time at the park.  None of them seemed to be afraid of people.  They were curious and puzzled, like they weren't quite sure what to make of us, like we were very interesting to them.
 
A ways farther on, we found a fork in the trail that wasn't on the map.  We went with the best guess, and after about a mile were getting very close to turning around and trying the other way when we came across a couple people who were returning from the Giant Forest.  It turned out to be the right trail.
 
It was nice getting to see some of the large Sequoias again.  It's difficult to get a sense of how large they are, because most of the surrounding trees are very large also.  You'd almost have to bring a regular-sized tree with you and put it right next to one of the Sequoias to get an idea of how large they are.
 

 
Some info about the General Sherman tree...
 
It's 36-feet wide at the base.  It's 275-feet tall and is between 2,300 and 2,700 years old.  The largest branch is 7-feet in diameter (how many people have even seen a tree as large as that one branch?).  The first large branch is 130-feet high.  180 feet up the tree is still 14-feet wide.
 
 
A typical 2,000-year-old Sequoia has survived roughly 80 forest fires in its life.  Sequoia trees don't die of old age.  When they go, it's usually from toppling.
 
At one point, while in the Giant Forest, there was a deep sound of wood cracking from far away which lasted for a few seconds, and then there was a thunderous explosion of noise as a tree had apparently been toppled within a few miles of where we were.  We didn't know what the circumstances were.  It almost certainly didn't topple naturally since there were sounds of construction in the area.
 
It most likely wasn't a Sequoia tree that was toppled, but if a "relatively" small tree made that amount of noise and landed with that much force, it probably wouldn't be good to be nearby when a giant Sequoia happened to fall.  I imagine you might feel the ground shaking a mile or two away.
 
 
After walking around the side trails, and hiking back and forth over the length of a giant Sequoia that had toppled long ago, we headed back for the campsite, content with an easy hike for the first day.  That left a lot of time in the evening to wind down and rest for the next day.
 
 
 
Bear Sense
 
I wanted to have at least one day of serious hiking, even if it meant having to go easy the next day.  On the following morning we took a look at some of the trails on a map, and decided on a hike to Twin Lakes.  The campsite was at an elevation of 6,700 feet and the hike had an elevation gain of 2,700 feet.  It was 14 miles to get to Twin Lakes and back, but we figured we could always turn back earlier if I got too tired or if it became too late in the day.
 
We made good time at getting ready to go that morning, had breakfast, put the gear on, and were off towards the trail by 10 am.  I had just shy of 1 gallon of water with me, and Mathew was carrying a couple quarts; he tends to not need much water.
 
I kept fumbling with my sunglasses every time we'd go in and out of the shade.  I couldn't find a convenient way to store them where they wouldn't get bent or damaged.  Mathew suggested that I put the sunglasses on the sun hat, as if the hat was wearing the sunglasses, when I didn't need them.  That turned out to work really well.
 
Very early on it was obvious that this trail was much more remote than the one we were on yesterday.  It felt much more like being out in the mountains far away from familiar sights and sounds.  After the first half mile, there were no sounds of campers or construction work.  Distractions of that sort seemed to fade away.  The forest was totally silent except for the occasional slight wind rustling through the branches overhead.
 
I also had more of a sense of being out in the wild on this trail.  The chance of meeting a bear suddenly felt much more real.
 
The only bears in the area were black bears, which are smaller and less aggressive than the more famous grizzly bears.  With a black bear, as long as you don't surprise it or happen near its cubs, they generally take no interest in you.  You do have to be careful about how you store your food (and anything that smells like food) when you're camping.  But that's more to keep the bear from getting your food, and from damaging your property in the course of getting to the food, than from concern for your safety.
 
And if you do happen to meet one, as long as you remember that they're wild animals and that they're essentially equal to you on the food chain--that they're not just large, domesticated dogs to walk up to and try to pet or feed--there shouldn't be any reason for alarm.
 
Even so, I was hoping that I wouldn't meet any. I wasn't sure how I'd react if I did--if I'd keep a clear head and act calmly, or if there'd be an initial panic reaction.  And I was a bit afraid in general about meeting a bear.  Mathew, on the other hand, was very much hoping to see one; he hadn't happened across any so far on his backcountry hikes through the Appalachians.
 
 
 
The Haunted Forest

Below, there were scenic views of lush, open meadows, as we continued up along the side of the mountain.  Occasionally, bare, granite mountain tops were visible through the tall trees.

My hiking boots were getting their first real test on the rocky, muddy, uneven trail.  At first I tried to keep them from getting dirty, but then I figured, "What the heck, may as well use 'em".  So I made a point of stepping in every small creek at least once, just for good measure.
 
After a couple miles of hiking up the mountain, the trail turned to a long, wooded section of flat land.  The trees were somewhat scattered, and of a different sort than what we'd been around.  It more resembled a forest from the East.  The wooded area had a weird open feeling to it, and there was virtually no undergrowth.  There was little sight of green growth along the ground.
 
It felt like some sort of eerie, deserted, haunted forest you'd see in a movie - like there was nothing alive in the whole area.  It was fun referring to it as "The Haunted Forest".  It added a unique atmosphere to that portion of the hike.
 
Occasionally I'd try to make a little noise along the way, either by stepping on dry twigs or by drumming a little on my chest, just in case there happened to be any bears nearby - so they'd be aware that we were in the area.
 
A ways farther on, Mathew pointed out a walking stick that was lying by the side of the trail.  I figured I'd give it a try for a while; sometimes a good walking stick during a long hike is just the thing.  So I picked it up and continued on.  The walking stick would turn out to be very handy later on.
 

 
High-Country Mosquitos
 
Perhaps you've heard of the tree line - the point in elevation (somewhere around 11,000 feet) above which trees can't grow.  Well, as we went farther along up the trail, apparently we passed the mosquito line.  Not the line above which mosquitos stop, but rather the line above which they all seem to be lurking in wait, in large numbers.
 
At this point we were a good 4 miles into the hike, and it was getting close to time to look for a place to stop for lunch.  We figured we'd go on a ways further ahead, where there was a fork in the trail, and stop there for lunch.
 
The mosquitos were starting to make their presence known.  I put a generous amount of insect repellent on my arms and around my neck.  The mosquitos seemed to not really be a problem, unless you needed to stop for a break.  If you stopped for more than a few seconds they'd start seeking you out.  Between using the insect repellent and keeping moving most of the time, we weren't having too much trouble.
 
The trail was going alongside a creek for a good ways.  There were meadows scattered along the creek, which apparently offered plenty of stagnant water for the mosquitos to breed in.  We got to the fork in the trail, now feeling very much in need of some lunch.  But the fork was right by the creek, and the mosquitos were plentiful.  We tried taking a look at nearby places, 100 feet away from the creak, but the mosquitos were still just as bad.  If we stopped for lunch there we'd be lunch for the insects.
 
So we had to make a choice - either turn back down the trail, until we got far enough away from the stream to stop for lunch, and head back to the campsite after that, or else continue on ahead and hope that there'd be a good place to stop sometime soon.
 
It was starting to get on in the day.  We weren't making very good time so far on the hike, and we needed to stop soon.  But I wanted to have a good adventure that day.  I wanted to make a run for Twin Lakes.  Mathew said he was okay with however much I felt up to that day.  So I steeled my resolve and quickly set out up the trail - and in doing so started the real adventure.
 
 

Part III
 
Feral Marmots
 
I set a very brisk pace, to be a more difficult target for the mosquitos, to get away from the creek as soon as possible, and to try to salvage some chance of getting to Twin Lakes.  We had to go another half mile before we saw signs of the mosquito activity starting to lessen.  Now we simply needed to look for a large enough boulder to perch on while having lunch.  We went on a little ways further, and Mathew picked out a large, flat boulder to the side of the trail.
 
We both brought enough snack food to help keep us going the extra way, but it still felt good to be able to sit down for a while and have a decent meal.  The sandwiches were in a surprisingly familiar form - they still resembled sandwiches for the most part.  I put the rain jacket on, so I wouldn't have to fight off the occasional mosquito while eating. 
 
I noticed that on one end of the boulder, there was a large area with a lot of small animal droppings.  Most of them seemed very old but a few of them looked like they might have been fairly recent.  While having the lunch I was trying to figure out what sort of an animal it might be, and I was also pointing out to Mathew that maybe it wasn't such a good idea to be resting at one of some animal's main territorial spots.
 
The droppings were about the size of a small dog's, but I didn't want to rule out that it might be a somewhat larger animal.  It seemed way too small to be a bear, but I wasn't sure if there was a chance of it being a mountain lion (I later learned that mountain lions aren't generally found that high up).
 
After we'd finished the meal and taken a short while to let the food settle, we were about ready to continue on.  Just about then we noticed a small, orange-brown animal walking towards us.  It was about the size of a beaver or groundhog.  Later on we learned that it was a marmot, which are common in high elevations in the West.
 
It was coming towards us slowly, but very deliberately.  Realizing that we were in its territory and that there might be at least a slight chance of it acting aggressively, we scampered off the boulder and got back towards the trail.  The marmot didn't act hostile, but it seemed like it might have been annoyed that we were at its place.  We watched it amble around for several more minutes before we headed back up the trail.  After a short while, I removed the rain jacket to cool down some.
 
 
 
Patches of Snow in June
 
Another quarter mile up the trail there was a curious rocky area.  There were large sheets of rock lying at roughly 45 degree angles, resting on top of one another, staggered down the side of the mountain.  There was a small creek trickling down over the sheets of rock, creating the impression that a waterfall was reclining against the sloping wall of the mountain to take a well-deserved break.  We wondered what sort of geological events could create an area like that.
 
Continuing up the trail, we found a large, open area of granite which served as a good place to rest for a few minutes.  The site offered an impressive open view of the mountainous terrain.  At this higher elevation, you seemed to be looking down into a series of valleys rather than looking up at a range of mountains that had been towering above earlier.  Nearby a large raven gently glided past on thermals of air.
 
A short ways down the granite surface, there was another orange-brown marmot, looking up at us.  It was waiting for us to put our bags down and then conveniently walk away from them, so it could search through them for food.  It was thinking, "You have food for me, yes?  Plenty good food."  Luckily the marmots in the area didn't know any coordinated bandit-raiding tactics, and so there were no marmot ambushes to contend with, just the occasional curious animal sniffing around.
 
After putting the backpacks back on and walking along the trail another half mile, it became much more obvious just how high up we were when we noticed a few large patches of snow beside the trail.  This might not have seemed unusual, except that it was mid-June, with the start of Summer just a day away.
 
I'd already used up most of my water.  Mathew mentioned that if we needed to, we could fill one of the water bottles with snow, as a relatively safe way of getting some extra water.  I decided to pass on having a snow cone though, for the moment.
 
 
 
El Mosquitos Banditos
 
After traversing the final half mile up the trail, the end was in sight.  The Twin Lakes were just up ahead.  We reached the final elevation of 9,430 feet, a fairly high place to find large bodies of water.  The lakes were in a wide plateau at the base of a sheer granite wall, which rose up another 1,000 feet and ended in jagged peaks.  The lakes were surrounded by deep-green marshy grass.  A few loosely-packed trails led off around the area.
 
While heading towards one of the lakes, we were greeted by the local residents of the area - enough mosquitos to annoy a small city of people.  The lakes and the surrounding wetlands were prime real estate for mosquitos looking to settle down and start a family.
 
The mosquitos were able to bite through the thin shirt I was wearing, and there was exposed skin on the arms and neck.  After a few moments of putting on a brave face I quickly abandoned any pretense of outdoors toughness and scrambled to get back in the rain jacket.  I pulled the hood up over my head and tightened it down until there was only a small portion of my face that was uncovered.  I put the sun hat and the sunglasses back on, crammed my hands in the jacket pockets, pushed the neck of the jacket up over my face, and was down to a mere 12 square inches of uncovered skin.  Mathew said I looked like "The Invisible Man", all bundled up in the clothing  hehe.  Even so, the mosquitos still made it fairly unpleasant to be around there.  At one point he said I had about 30 mosquitos just on the hat alone. 
 
Mathew, on the other hand, seemed to be astonishingly resistant to the mosquitos.  He was able to casually and calmly walk around and take some pictures of the lakes.  Unlike most people, he didn't seem to be allergic to mosquito saliva; when he did get bitten, there was generally no lingering itchy bump on the skin - a handy trait.
 
We tried resting on a couple old logs at the edge of one of the lakes, but after another couple minutes of swarming mosquitos, I suggested that we head back down the trail and find a place to rest away from the lakes.
 
 
 
Well Past the Turn-Around Time
 
I started down the trail at a half-jogging pace, trying to let gravity do most of the work of getting back down the mountain, almost in a controlled fall.  Mathew was walking at a more comfortable pace but was managing to keep up.  When we got back to one of the large, open granite areas that we passed on the way up, we stopped for a 15 minute rest.
 
When we started the hike that morning, we figured sometime between 4 pm and 4:30 pm would be a reasonable time to turn around and head back to the campsite, to make sure there was enough daylight left to get back.  I was even thinking as early as 3:30 pm, to have an extra margin of safety.
 
In my eagerness to have a memorable hike though, I had disregarded the turn-around time earlier in the day - by continuing up the trail prior to lunch rather than heading back down.  We hadn't left the lakes until 5:15 pm, and by the time we got back on our feet after the current break it was already 5:45 pm.
 
Luckily, it was the day before the summer solstice, nearly the longest day of the year.  We figured there'd be enough daylight for about 3 more hours, and that even with 7 miles to go, as long as we went at a decent pace, there'd be enough time to get back.
 
After a quick drink of water, I continued back down the trail at the same half-jogging pace.  A few minutes later, however, there was a strange twinge in the left knee.  I didn't think much of it at first, but when the twinge grew stronger and started to feel a little painful, I quickly drew to a stop.  A bad knee wouldn't help things any.
 
It was a somewhat comical turn of events - like a plot-twist added to a movie so that the characters have to face an even-more unreasonable challenge.  I took it in somewhat good humor, thinking, "naturally this would happen now."  Still, I didn't much enjoy having to tell Mathew, "Oh, by the way, in addition to all the time pressure we already have, I also have a bad knee now."  He responded resonably well though, and just said to do the best I could manage.
 
I tested the knee out for a few minutes.  Taking a step down felt very uncomfortable and sometimes was painful, but walking on level ground didn't seem to bother it much.  Unfortunately the rest of the way back was almost entirely downhill, with about 2,300 feet of elevation left to go.  So there we were, a good 6 1/2 miles from the campsite, with less than 3 hours of daylight, no flashlights, no camping gear, a quart and a half of water between the two of us, and me with a bad knee.
 
Up until now, I'd been using the walking stick to help control the descent.  But with the sore knee, I started using the walking stick as a cane, to put less of a strain on the knee.  After experimenting with different ways of walking, I found a way where I could avoid most of the pain and discomfort as long as I took a short break every few minutes.  Whenever we got to an occasional stretch of level ground, I went as briskly as I could to make better time.
 
 
 
On Second Thought, Snow Cones Don't Look So Bad After All
 
After a short while we saw the patches of snow up ahead.  This snow was the only safe source of water available on the trail.  We didn't have Mathew's water filter with us, which he uses to remove harmful parasites from any source of water; so drinking from one of the creeks would carry the risk of getting tiny parasites.
 
I took two of the empty water bottles and used the mouth of the bottle to scoop snow in, filling each one up.  I figured each of the 1-quart bottles of snow would offer about a cup of drinking water.  So now we had at least a small emergency supply of water.
 
A mile farther down the trail, we ran into some old friends - the mosquitos we'd been fleeing from on the way up.  They weren't as bothersome as the mosquitos at Twin Lakes, but they did encourage you to keep moving as much as possible.  Stopping for an occasional rest or for a water break meant being an easy target for a dozen or so of them.  Obviously there were some very influential mosquitos in the National Parks committee when they decided to make the trail so close to the creek for such a long distance   hehe.
 
After another mile and a half of following the winding trail along the creek, the trail veered off to the side and ventured into some open, sparsely-wooded areas.  It was easier to relax there as the mosquitos were no longer a problem.  Farther ahead we crossed a couple large creeks, and then walked alongside an enormous green meadow.  At the far end of the meadow, a single male deer was foraging for food on the trail.
 
As we continued on the trail towards it, it didn't seem alarmed but just looked at us curiously.  I didn't want to give the deer any reason to feel threatened, to where it might panic and rush forward with its antlers down, so I walked off to the opposite side of the trail as I passed by.  Perhaps the deer didn't want to cause us to feel threatened either, as it moved away off the trail also.
 
The meadow was about 400 feet wide and 600 feet long.  From one end of it, looking over the entire length of the meadow, we could see two female deer casually grazing at the opposite end.  Every so often one of them would effortlessly spring across the edge of the meadow and cover a good 100 feet in just a couple seconds.
 
After Mathew took a couple pictures of the meadow, we continued on our way.  The trail soon emptied out into a mile-long plateau.  There was an hour of daylight left; the light was already starting to fade into twilight.  And what better place to walk through next than the haunted forest?
 
 
 
Returning to the Haunted Forest
 
It gets dark earlier in a forest since the tree cover shuts out much of the sunlight.  Inside the forest it was well into twilight.  The forest was quiet and still, with no sign of life anywhere within.  Night was slowly creeping in.
 
It wasn't frightening, going through the forest.  It was more a sort of enjoyably eerie atmosphere, which made the hike more memorable.  It might have felt more unsettling going through there alone or in less of a hurried race against time - where the mind has the chance to wander and drift among the dusk-shrouded trees, keenly sensing every rustling of a leaf in the wind as the forest falls deeper into shadows.
 
The forest path was on level ground, and it was clear of broken rocks; so I was able to move along pretty quickly.  In twenty minutes we were out of the forest, and we regained half an hour of daylight - which we'd temporarily lost while under the tree cover.  We were within a mile and a half of the campsite.
 
10 minutes later I finished the last of the remaining water.  I was feeling dehydrated and was fighting off exhaustion, trying to hold up the rest of the way back to the campsite.  The strain of using the walking stick to hold so much of the weight was taking its toll.
 
After a few more minutes, I went into the backpack to get some of the bottled snow.  It wasn't showing any signs of melting yet.  Mathew mentioned that the snow might not be 100-percent free of parasites, as it had been lying around in the open for over half a year.  He said it would be much safer than drinking from one of the creeks though.  Rather than taking the slight risk, I put the unopened bottle of snow back inside the backpack.
 
 
 
Sunset Views
 
With a mile left to go and half an hour of fading light, I stopped for a few minutes at a couple lookout areas along the mountain wall so Mathew could photograph the surrounding terrain, while it was veiled in twilight.  The setting sun cast a warm, copper hue on the granite peaks.  
 
Although we'd been rushing the entire way down the mountain, and although it was quite a challenge getting back to the campsite, I never felt like there was any real danger of not making it back to the campsite in time.  And Mathew didn't seem to be worried either.  It was refreshing taking some time along the way to enjoy the views and the scenery.
 
 
 
Closing for the Night
 
Twilight was starting to fade away and dusk was setting in.  There was still half a mile to go.  Down the mountainside we could hear the noise of other campers at the campsite.  In this case the noise pollution was a welcome sound since it meant we were close to the end of the trail.  Even the neighbors' "All oldies, all the time" radio station wouldn't have been such a bad thing to hear at the time   hehe.
 
We rounded a few more turns on the trail and edged along a couple stretches where the trail was a mere 14-inches wide and bordered by a nearly vertical drop-off of 20 or 30 feet.  Mathew thought he saw something moving a short ways up the mountain wall, but it disappeared out of sight.  It was dark enough now that everything around us was in shades of gray.
 
A short ways farther, Mathew again noticed something moving, up on the mountain wall.  We saw a deer there, silhouetted in the darkness.  Mathew suspected this wasn't the same animal he'd seen a moment ago.  And sure enough, a few seconds later, a second deer walked into view farther back, above where we just were.  They were watching us, with their ears twitching from time to time, and thinking, "Why, it's more of those strange-smelling things that go past on our trail.  They're such curious-looking animals."
 
We spent a good 3 or 4 minutes watching the deer watching us.  And then we continued forward for the last stretch of the trail, which went steeply downhill for the remaining quarter mile.  I was hoping there would still be enough traces of light to safely walk down the rocky trail.
 
Before long we reached the end of the hike.  "Plenty of time to spare," I said, at having cut it so close.  "Yeah, I can still barely see the rocks on the trail," he replied.  A minute later we were back on the paved roads that go through the campsite.  Mathew said we had maybe 15 minutes of light to spare.  I figured it was 15 minutes if you had really good night vision.
 
I continued on towards the camp while Mathew took a detour to a pay phone to call his girlfriend and let her know how the day went.  He didn't seem to mind walking along on the paved roads in what turned out to be near-total darkness by the time he got back.
 
Dinner was a quick meal of cereal under the cool, nighttime sky.  We were both pretty tired after the long hike and promptly called it a night.  The next day brought much-needed rest for me, and an even-more exhilarating hike for Mathew.

(c) 2001, Matthew K. Coughlin