CDT Day 98 (8/24/23)
Miles 2344.8 (Red line 2689.2)- 2375.8 (Red line 2720.2) (31 miles)
Verbatim
Today may have been the last day of really big climbing. There was something like 7,000 both elevation gain and descent over the 31 miles. It was a day of epic views and of withering sun and wind. The haze continues. So the views had great shading and layering, although were not incredibly clear. It was windy up high, which I like. I really wished for a friend (maybe a doggo!) and the experience of trail running today. It would have been fun to be moving light and quick up high.
Now I’m camped down low in the southern reaches of the Bob. There’s water all around. I can hear a Hawk. I think I may have just heard a Mountain Lion screaming. I hope no Bears accompany my camp tonight. Oh! I saw two Badgers today! Or Wolverines (They were Badgers)? I don’t know, but need to look it up tomorrow in town. It was awesome! Their burrow was in a burn zone I was descending through. There they were, right as my podcast was finishing, on the other side of the dry creekbed. The one didn’t see me until I stopped and it felt my eyes boring into it. It turned and looked at me, took a second, and beat a hasty retread up the slope. It was sort of cute how it waddled in its escape.
The face structure is so cool. Sort of like two pointed tufts of hair sticking out both sides of its cheeks. The other I saw a moment later as it emerged from the den and headed up a different creekbed. What a rare sighting. I was stoked to have seen them.
I also met a cool dog today, Scout. Scout is a one year old Belgian Malanois. What an energetic, trusting, and cute pup. Total machine too, even as a one year old. He came and cuddled with me for a minute. :) :) :) I can’t wait to get a dog! The owner said Scout had been chasing every Squirrel and Chipmunk. That he was worried Scout would go too hard and dehydrate over the long dry stretch (17 miles) over the course of the day. Especially with all that climbing!
I’m watching a Chipmunk eat nuts on the top of a log and it’s awesome. He ate one seed, then got another. Retreated to the same spot, dropped the second nut, retrieved it, and continued eating after returning to the top of the log once more. Hilarious. :)
Post Note
That Chipmunk was so cool! They had a dinner table! Animals are humans too. Scout was also awesome. I was happy to sit across the trail with his owner, who was probably the most attractive male I saw on the whole trip. This dude was chiseled in every sense of the word. I felt outclassed at so many levels and felt all the insecurities gifted to me over the winter and spring. But then I had a forty-five pound puppy writhing barrel rolls over my lap and I looked into soft eyes of love, wonder, and joy. I had to set some limits with Scout. Like no you can’t tackle me just because I sat down. Eventually he felt rebuffed and returned to his owner’s lap. That human wanted to make it all the way to Mexico. He was truly the last human I saw heading SOBO. He thought the 17 miles between the water sources was good for a day. He must have had sixty pounds in his pack. Only because of his extreme fitness would he make it any day’s distance under that load. I fully believe he didn't make it to Mexico. His hike wasn’t his own, it was Scouts. He didn’t have the experience to know he didn’t need all the things in his pack. The thing he said he was most excited for was drinks in town the next night. Yeah. He didn't make it to Mexico.
People often ask me why I don’t get a dog for these trips. I really want a dog, but won’t get one until the time in my life is right. It’s gonna be crazy when I get a dog. I’m so excited. I can’t wait, except I choose to. When you take a dog on a thruhike it becomes the dog’s thruhike. You don’t get to set your own pace. Unless you’re walking with a literal Wolf you’ll find the dog can’t do what you can do. And the dog has to do what it can do differently that the way you can do it. That’s what I’ve heard from talking with people who walk with dogs at least. They say it’s hard. It’s like any partnership; infinitely rewarding but so so hard. One day…
The human companionship I was really missing that day was with my friend Nathan. I wanted to climb every mountain and run every trail with him. Nathan’s managed to forge out a life that I can’t even seem to scratch at. He has a dog! Her name is Josie. :) And he has a wife! Imagine that… He has a full time job too. Huh. I often wish he was out on these adventures with me. Some part of him wishes he was too, though he wouldn’t give up his love for the world. I’m so happy for Nathan. Doesn’t mean I don’t wish we could share some of these experiences together.
Thruhikers go on these trips and make their thruhiking friends. And then you go home and you don’t see them anymore. So you feel lonely, maybe more lonely, than you did before. And maybe that’s one of the reasons why solo hikers go back out summer after summer. You try to chase that opportunity for a shared joy of the trail. Like, “there’s got to be someone out here I’ll meet and share this joy with”. I don’t know. That’s been one of the hardest parts of losing L. All my experiences of and many memories from thruhiking have taken on some bit of the characteristic of “lonely” again. My brother reminds me that Christopher McCandless’s last communicative words were, “happiness is only real, when shared”. I don’t think that’s true. I do think it is mostly true. But, I know it’s not totally true because I know melancholy on an intimate level.