Oregon

... or the big green easy.

Oregon’s version of the PCT has a reputation for being easy, or easier anyway. Less dramatic elevation changes, a well maintained trail, and better weather combine to give hikers the feel of a hiking vacation. It’s not quite the moving sidewalk I hoped for based on rumors but it was a little better, most notably in terms of weather. The heat broke for the most part. The mosquitos were worse than before and the scenery, at least in Southern Oregon, was not as picture-worthy but we were able to appreciate the gentler beauty.

The desert doesn’t attract many day hikers, we were very early into the Sierra, and Northern California was too hot for dabblers in the walking arts so, for the most part, we had the trail to ourselves. Oregon, however, attracts a lot of nature lovers and we were there at just about the perfect time to enjoy it so the trail began to seem like a city sidewalk congested with people. By now I was tired of meeting people. People were friendly and engaging but I felt such distance from them. They’d ask questions I didn’t have answers for.

“How’s your hike going?”

“It’s going… fine.”… fine? Really?! A thruhike is never fine, it’s great or miserable or amazing, it’s deeply life-changing and not always in a good way, it’s pointless and arbitrary, it’s everything all at once, We’re always hungry, always tired, and everything hurts all the time. It’s not a nice linear narrative despite what Cheryl Strayed says, but you know what? It’s fine, and anyway, I still don’t have a good answer for that question.

Looking back over what I have written it seems all doom and gloom. While the rough and raw of it was a fairly constant, there were countless moments of laughter and pure joy. I think the reason I haven’t included it is the jokes will seem ridiculous and the joy unfounded to any non-thruhikers. The things that mattered to us, the things that impacted our lives most  were the sorts of things that most people take for granted. Weather, water, bugs, food, these were the things that soaked up most of our attention. Offtrail, filet mignon and single malt Scotch may taste delicious but ontrail, after days of instant mashed potatoes and granola bars, a microwave burrito and an ice cold coke from a gas station were a bonafide soul restoring religious experience of the highest order. Standing under a hot shower watching black water run off my legs after walking three hundred miles in the same clothes felt better than any deep tissue massage. And it never ceased to amaze me how a car could cover in minutes what it would take us all day to cover, cars are magic!

I’m struggling with this part, there’s not as much to write. Oregon was wonderful but hiking the PCT by this point was just what we did, there wasn’t much new to it, at least not much worth talking about. And maybe that’s the noteworthy thing. Anyone still on the trail at this point was a world class walker. The rhythm of our days had become routine. If anything, the biggest struggle through here was boredom. We weren’t so much mentally worn down as we were indifferent. Mountain Goat and Klutz got offtrail in Oregon because of it and when I heard this my reaction was a shrug, I couldn’t blame them. They are strong hikers, young and fit, and had already done the Appalachian Trail, basically they were the ones you would point to at the beginning and say “Them, those two right there, they’re definitely gonna finish.” But in Oregon they realized they didn’t really care either way. They didn’t have anything to prove.

We got a ride into Bend from Hummingbird, one of Hot Mess’s many trail friends. We stayed in a motel that smelled like a thousand ashtrays, we rented a car and ran errands, we went to REI and were confused looking at all the outdoor gear (though they did have copies of “Wild” near the checkout). We had dinner with Condor and Jasmine, Hummingbird and Bearclaw, other hiker folk I can’t remember. Bend was the biggest town we’d been to thus far and the result of the visit was (for me) the realization that I was more at home in the woods. Oregon seemed to be passing by in a haze. I listened to a lot of podcasts, reminded myself of the goal, tried to remember why I was out there.

Maybe this, this chewing things over endlessly in my mind is something to cement the experience. It doesn’t feel like nostalgia or fantasy, feels like something more. I still don’t feel like I've been changed in any way good or bad or permanent. It feels indulgent and this writing about it with the purpose of sharing it feels beyond ridiculous. Before I got on trail, and this is true for many first-time thruhikers and probably most people, I think I was a puzzle piece, soft and mashed into place. I didn’t quite fit, but close enough. The trail took me out of the collective, let my edges harden and now, try as I might, I don’t fit. Not even close. I keep in touch with hiker friends, even met a new hiker friend after the trail, and that helps a lot. It reminds me that other are dealing with this same phenomenon and that what I’m feeling is a natural response to an unnatural world.

As soon as we entered Oregon, and maybe before, I’d been thinking about a section of trail from Olallie Lake Resort to Timberline Lodge in Northern Oregon.  It is ideal for a fifty mile day. The trail substrate itself is mostly soft dirt and pine needles, the elevation profile is gentle, and it’s the last day of a food carry. For weeks ahead of time Iron Chef and I had been thinking about it, hypothetically planning out exactly what we’d need for food, how to time it, etc. I talked to other hikers about it and most seemed to think it was foolhardy. Up to that point 34 miles was my longest day and it had been less than two weeks without shin splints. Some hikers around my age suggested it was the sort of thing for the younger folk and it would be a shame to push too hard and bring on a hike-ending injury. Though he was half my age, Iron Chef and I seemed to go at about the same pace and rhythm. We agreed to attempt it but in the same breath agreed to be perfectly willing to pull up short should our bodies send any oh-shit signals.

We dumped off excess food at the resort, took some benedryl at around 6, and crashed early. My alarm was set for 3am but my eyes popped open at 2:48 so I packed up, inhaled a Snickers bar and was on trail by 3:10. Iron Chef was still in the midst of his morning routine but starting the day solitary and silent seemed appropriate.

We’d all hiked into the night before, and we’d been walking in the dark just before light, but this was different, this was full dark. I felt like an intruder at first but quickly became just one more night creature, a single thread in soft black fabric, and I belonged there. The sounds at night are different, they seem more pronounced. My headlamp cast a fog of light that was just enough to allow me to walk at my normal pace, but had the effect of narrowing and focusing my world. There was no scenery, just the lit space a dozen feet in front of me and the crunch of my steps.

I had set the hourly chime on my watch and made it a rule not to check my mileage on Halfmile any more often than it beeped. I walked 19 miles before my first break at around 9:30. I sat for a few minutes, Iron Chef caught up to me, we exchanged quick ‘howsitgoings?’ and he moved on. A few miles later we repeated the exchange in reverse, apparently he agreed with letting the first part of the day pass in solitude. At around mile 28 I stopped and washed my feet in a cold stream and changed socks. I’d saved a brand new pair of Darn Toughs for this day and was disappointed to find the beginnings of holes already forming in them.

At mile 35 I made a hot lunch to reward myself for my progress and Iron Chef caught back up to me. This time we talked, both of us cautiously surprised that this wasn’t harder. We’d decided beforehand not to walk too fast, just stick to the same 3.5 mph we usually did, slow and steady. Walking separately had allowed us both to fall into a trance and the miles rolled by but now, only 15 miles from our goal, company was what we wanted.

The air was chilled and the sky overcast which was perfect walking weather. It meant no sweating and therefore less need for water. We walked and talked of the usual things but the mental exhaustion began in ernest. At some point, for no reason I can remember I declared “I’m a taco.” IC, without missing a beat replied sympathetically “I’m a fajita.” We discussed our new shared dream of bringing delicious Mexican food to Canada. We lamented our limited understanding of the world, but then again what could you expect? I was just a taco and he was only a fajita. The rest of the day’s conversation was similarly insane.

We’d both agreed to pull up short to avoid injury if needed, but when strange new pains began showing up around mile 42 I knew there was no way I was not going to continue. After over 2000 miles of walking, we could do eight miles standing on our heads. The new pains were, however, disconcerting. At first I felt ominous twinges reminiscent of shin splints, these in my left leg. Then my left hamstring began to feel sore, then the inside of my right elbow. IC was having similarly odd twinges.

We joked about the new random pains, “What the hell, before you know it our balls are going to hurt!.”

A few minutes later, “My balls hurt.”

“Mine too.”

I think one of us invoked the Buddha’s Four Noble Truths. We decided to quit talking about pain. We walked on.

This stretch is, as I mentioned, pretty easy going, except for the last two miles which climb sharply uphill in soft sand. Luckily for us it had begun misting by this point and the sand was just saturated enough to firm up under our steps. Never the less, it did seem those two miles were five miles long. I spent the last fraction of a mile staring at Halfmile, we’d begun the day at mile 2043.12, it ticked over to 2093.12 between a few stunted trees on a sandy exposed hilltop and that is exactly where we stopped.

Setting up took longer than usual in the soft sand but with the help of some logs to tie off to we prevailed and quickly retired to our tents. We were bone tired, cold, and wet, but we’d managed to walk fifty miles in one day. My journal entry that evening: 7/25  50 miles! To 2093.12 with IC. Not as bad as I’d feared. Walked from 3:10 to 7:25 and camped in sand while it rained and blew.

I took 3 ibuprofen, a muscle relaxer, and slept fitfully until 8am. We were packing when Hot Mess and GBH strolled up. They’d done 40 miles the day before but had gotten on trail early and caught us. Together we walked the last 1.3 miles just in time to feast on the legendary breakfast buffet at Timberline Lodge.

Thanksgiving. It’s 41 degrees and raining. People walk, shoulders hunched against the cold. I’m sitting at my desk, wearing a sweater and putting off walking the dog. I try to remind myself of what we walked through with nothing but what we carried to protect us from the world around us. How water bottles  would freeze while hiking, how rain jackets would saturate through. We walked when it was 16 degrees and when it was 110. We walked through 60mph wind gusts, through every possible form of precipitation all without a building or vehicle we could duck into. It happened, I’m sure of it, except sometimes I’m not.

Oregon highlights:

·      Almost two full days at Callahan’s Lodge with my wonderful girlfriend. Our room had a hot tub!

·      Pizza with Horizon and Merkel at Mazama Village

·      Watching the sunrise over Crater Lake the morning after Iron Chef’s birthday

·      The Eagle Creek Alternate just before Cascade Locks: ferns, moss, waterfalls, magical.

·      Dinner with Eskimo, Snickers, and Amir at Thunder Island Brewery

·      Berry season! Blackberries, blueberries, thimbleberries, huckleberries, and an occasional raspberry