Day 17, August 4: Day Hike (written August 5 from notes)

Day 17, August 4: Day Hike (written August 5 from notes)

We had a six-mile hike this day without packs. I still wore mine, but unloaded most of it. I just prefer to carry my water and other things in my regular pack. This was a three mile in and back, and we were hiking to the base of “The Grand Canyon of Tuolumne.”

The hike took us down about 1200 feet in three miles, and then back up. It is a strenuous hike, but beautiful. Only part of the group took the hike. Rick’s knee was bothering him terribly, so he thought he should save it for the hike back on Sunday, and Kim didn’t feel like the hike as she was exhausted from the hike in. She said she was not used to the hard pace of hiking like we had done. I thought that was interesting as I thought the pace, with all the lengthy stops, was unpleasantly slow.

So the group was our leader, Suzanne, Henry the old guy, the six Chinese folks, and Jo, Suzanne’s sister and the “sweep.” (The sweep is the last hiker and makes sure we don’t lose anyone.)

Suzanne, who is a botanist, gave us lots of interesting info about the flora we saw.

The Chinese couples kept the pace quite sluggish. Not that they hiked slowly – they were strong hikers – but when we stopped , they’d take more than 30 minutes taking pictures and they’d scatter, so gathering them together to resume the hike became a chore every time. They were also very loud a lot of the time, chatting at high volume and sometimes singing and laughing. It made the ability to appreciate the wilderness a little difficult at times for me. I’ve spent too much time taking it in alone or with company that likes to experience the wonder in silence or near-silence. It was a great opportunity to practice “The Work.”

But it was a lovely hike, and the Tuolumne River was spectacular to hike alongside with waterfalls and cascades all along the way. We were hiking to “Waterwheel Falls,” but they weren’t very waterwheelie because it’d been such a dry year for snow. But it was still beautiful.

 

When we returned, I went to the store, which is a small tent cabin that has a few items for sale – a little fruit and a little chocolate, both of which I purchased and consumed. They also had lemonade and best of all, chairs. When you’re backpacking, it’s amazing the little things you miss, like a chair with a back and the ability to wash your hands in hot water with soap.  The young man who ran the store, John, was 28 and had been doing it for nine years. He was very good at it, and had some interesting stories to entertain us. One of the best was the story of a hiker just last week who had to be rescued because he was narcoleptic and had lost his medicine. His recounting of the five-day rescue operation, because the hiker kept falling asleep, was hilarious.

We also got rain. It sprinkled just a little as we were coming in from our hike, but then it rained a little harder in the afternoon. I got to break out my new rain jacket, and it worked swimmingly (nice pun, no?). It then cleared off, and a few of us hiked to a high place and watched the sunset. It was a fabulous evening.

Just after we bedded down, the heavens opened up again, and we had a spectacular thunder and lightning show. I did everything right – I set my backpack and boots inside the tent, put on my rainfly with the guy lines to shed the water, and had picked a good spot. What I didn’t remember to do was to close my bite valve on my water bladder, and apparently, during the night, I rolled on to it and emptied the whole thing into my tent. Fortunately, it all ran to a back corner and everything, but the tent and my sleeping pad, stayed dry.

It was a full day, and three of the biggest impressions I had were: 1) The beauty of this place is magnificent; 2) I miss my kids when I can’t talk to them; and 3) backpacking requires a person to be content with being dirty. Really dirty.