Walkabout

I went on a bit of a walkabout this weekend – 35 miles in a day and a half. I think my main inspiration for the trek was the previous month of “light” indulgences: ever since my birthday (August 23), I have been more than willing to eat baguettes and bagels, which keep falling into my lap. It was all worth it! To me, the texture and taste of overly-buttered toasted bread satisfies a world of cravings. Still, I noticed subtle changes in my mood, mental activity, and sleep, as well as general inflammation that collectively called for an end to the bread. I also wanted to reset my mental patterns, which tend to form ruts over time. 

So on Friday, I drink a cup of cocoa with tallow and drive ~25 minutes up Left Hand canyon to the Long Lake trailhead at Indian Peaks Wilderness (IPW). From there, I walk nine miles along the east side of the continental divide to Buchanan Pass, where I climb up to the “peak” of Sawtooth Mountain (at 12,300 feet, Sawtooth is hardly a peak). Still, the views are glorious: I love the transition between harsh, barren rock interspersed with snow fields that dominates above ~11,000 feet and the tenuous patches of thin grass and moss that have colonized these alpine rock lands and grow in number and variety and color down to the subalpine kingdom of the lodgepole pine. To experience this landscape is to witness the edge of life: here begins a process of sediment, nutrient, and water transport that irrigates and fertilizes the American West, culminating in the Imperial Valley and the Gulf of California.

The west face of Buchanan Pass is more majestic than the east side, broad alpine meadows sweeping left and right up to the jagged spine of the continental divide and down to the forested creek valley below. As I walk below tree line across Buchanan creek, I hear the siren yelps of coyotes. I continue on — body in motion mind at rest — for another six miles until I arrive at an out-an-back trail leading up to Gourd Lake. Here I decide to hide my pack in the trees and run up to the lake; the trail climbs gentle switchbacks up ~1500 feet over a horizontal distance of 2.7 miles. This is exactly the cardio that I want so I am not too disappointed when the mid-afternoon clouds limit photo opportunities at the lake. The lake itself is perfect, one of many in IPW that are situated at tree line in an alpine cirque, giving the impression of a canvas behind the lake painted with trees clinging to the black-stained granite. Undoubtedly glaciers are at play here.  

At the base of the trail, I pick up my pack and resume walking, hearing the occasional bugle of the rutting bull elk. Listen here or here. After some time, I turn a corner and stumble upon a mother moose and her calf. A bull moose standing in the trail would scare the hell out of me; they are known to charge without warning to guard their territory from advancing threats. But the lack of antlers on the cow gives me confidence to veer off the trail away from the pair and go on my merry way. The moose definitely changed my mental and emotional state: until that moment, I had been occupying a fairly standard, self-oriented “headspace” – planning, evaluating risk, considering the logistical constraints of my existence etc. – but after seeing the moose pair I entered a much softer, universal “heartspace” – recognizing my place in a larger system of being. Something about the mother moose guarding her calf broke me out of my individual consciousness and into universal, intergenerational understanding. 

Still in hippie-dippie bliss, I walk a mere 1000 paces and encounter the largest bear I have ever seen in the wild! Okay, I have not seen many, but this black bear might as well have been a polar bear with its lumbering body, massive paws, and piercing black eyes. I take a few more steps, make some noise, try to look big, but he does not budge an inch. I resist the temptation to back away, remembering something about bears wanting to chase. Instead, I hook left off the trail with my eye over my right shoulder. Thankfully the trail was at the point of switchbacking, so my hook left is actually an inadvertent shortcut. After experiencing primal joy, vulnerability, and connection with the moose pair, I abruptly experience primal fear with the bear. I am pretty excited when I cross Cascade Creek, leaving Buchanan Creek trail behind; yes, I know bears can cross streams…

An aside:
I would not say I have ever had a mystical experience aside from the occasional bliss brought about by intense cardiovascular activity at high elevations. But the way these animals brought me out of my everyday consciousness and transported me into a timeless, universal state of understanding feels pretty damn spiritual. 

When I was running the Gourd Lake trail, I knew that I would feel the extra mileage not then and there, but on the last few miles of the day’s hike. Sure enough, by the time I cross onto the Cascade Creek trail and begin climbing again, I am beat! Thankfully the route is scenic, not unlike one of the trails on the North Shore (e.g. Kettle River, Cascade River, Temperance River), chains of churning cascades carving deep gorges into the exposed bedrock, the spray irrigating adjacent vegetation into magical fairy forests. 

After about 25 miles on foot, I arrive at the night’s destination, Crater Lake. I have visited Crater Lake every fall that I have lived in Colorado; it lies in a narrow, glacially-carved valley with steep bedrock walls and is guarded to the southwest by the ever-sexy Lone Eagle Peak. Some years ago, my friend Meesa and I half-assedly tried to climb the thing; we made it through five of the eleven pitches before we ran out of time. Crater Lake is a very popular backcountry camping location, so it is no surprise that all the sites are full at 7pm on a Friday night. I find a site near the lake, set up my tent, and then stroll over to the shore, where I eat almond butter and drink water until the last of the light has left the valley, and then hobble back to my tent. 

Saturday! Today is nothing special really – mostly just getting myself ~ten miles back to the truck. The trail up toward Pawnee Pass is such that I have to keep turning around and taking a photo – what is the best elevation from which to take in the glory of this valley? The pass itself is pretty brutal (and I’ve had it bookmarked in my memory for a long time as “no joke!”) – a series of steep switchbacks up talus slopes that are difficult to follow. And the wind is just ripping! The east side of Pawnee Pass is one of the most popular trailheads in IPW aside from 4th of July trailhead, so on the way down I weave my way through baby-carriers, third-daters, and boy scouts. Back at the trailhead, I shuffle Spotify and drive home back down the canyon to Johnny Paycheck, “please release me let me go…”