The hike that formed my addiction to the wandering lifestyle.
Mile 1021. The landscape here brings us to a halt. Northwestern Nevada seems to have some treasures hidden away. The broad vista hides dramatic volcanic canyons. As we head back to the car Pete comments, “Well, we’ll never capture that in a picture, will we?”
Mile 957. A remote Nevada rest area provides a perfect midday refreshment opportunity. With the help of the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches I brought, we’re ready to shoot for Oregon.
Mile 729. Pete has an appointment to register for his spring semester classes online at 10 am, so we stop in Elko at the Red Lion Hotel & Casino. There we find some internet terminals at the Starbucks, so Pete buys a blueberry muffin. While he’s making the token purchase an employee sits at the only open terminal. Still, 10 minutes later he’s got his advisor and classes, and we’re back on the road. We munch on the chocolate chip oat bars I baked for the trip.
Mile 679. We stop for gas in Wells. I’m tempted by Lulu’s Espresso Shop across the street. Once inside, we see by the employee T-shirts that we’ve entered Lulu’s Espresso, Cafe, and Gentlemen’s Club. A short, squat, aging blond with a crew cut makes me the worst cappucino I’ve ever tasted. It would have been better with cottage cheese instead of milk.
Mile 537. We sleep in the car at a familiar rest stop in Utah, wake up before dawn, and are well on our way to the great salt flats by sunrise. Thoughts of the first meal of the trip begin to occupy our minds.
Mile 367. Between Rock Springs and Evanston the weather gets snowy. There are a few signs warning that the road is closed at Fort Bridger. I keep driving until an endless line of motionless trucks appears. A few people bail, driving the wrong way down the shoulder until it’s possible to cross to other side. We follow. I think I remember some county roads south of the freeway, and go looking at the first exit. Sure enough, a dirt road takes us past the long string of semi lights to Fort Bridger, and then to an open onramp. With no vehicles on the road, we’re able to drive slowly and deliberately until conditions improve around Evanston. Both of us have driven this section of road many times, and have many diverse memories of it.
Mile 0. Pete arrives, having traveled by train from Chicago, in a rented Chevy Malibu. We have ambitious plans to drive to Oregon to commemorate our 1996 Pacific Crest Trail hike, and the pacts associated with it. We really have no idea if the amount of driving we plan is even possible, but we figure possibility is less important than discovery.
The account of my Pacific Crest Trail hike with my friend Pete in 1996 is now contained in the hobolog. There are a few ways to browse it. The topic links in the sidebar display posts in the default most-recent-first order, but you can also browse
I’m also keeping the old PCT site around for posterity.
Linda gets up, makes coffee, and graciously allows me to photograph her in her bathrobe as I’ve forgotten to take any pictures here. I try putting some hot coffee in my insulated water bottle, and discover the extremely pleasant sensation of riding through the cold morning while taking sips of steaming hot coffee. The whole body tingles with delight, relishing the contrast.
I take a little rural road with no traffic into Waynesboro. Farms all the way, coffee all gone, it’s hard to find a concealed place to pee. I go in the open, hoping for the half-hour it seems to last that no one comes along the road. At one point a car approaches in the distance, but politely turns away without coming near.
The main problem on my mind is how to reach my friend Lisa in Raleigh without my address book. I try a few times to call Camella, but no luck.
In Waynesboro I eat breakfast at Weasel’s Kitchen. First menu I’ve seen with grits on it.
It’s an easy pass over the Blue Ridge. I see a string of Appalachian Trail hikers headed south. Making my way south along the foothills, I pass a ski area and lots of nice views. In Colleen I pass an ice cream stand. In an unusual display, I decide I don’t want it enough to really enjoy it. Wow. In Norwood, I’m unsure about what to do at an intersection. I turn right. The road seems to go too far east, but I stick with it.
On one of many small hills, my chain catches and I have to stop. A big guy in overalls on a tractor stops to talk to me. Wayne Mundy is bushhoggin’, which he has to translate for me as cutting the grass. He owns a big piece of land in this picturesque area. It has a great mineral water spring, he says, and offers me a drink. After parking the tractor down the road a bit, I follow him on foot up a wooded path. The spring is in an old, roofless house with names and dates from the 1800′s carved in it. Mineral deposits of orange and white crystals surround the cold, tasty water. Wayne asks if I ever camp in a spot like this without permission. I say yes, and ask him what he’d do if he found me on his property. “Hell, once I foun’ out what yew was doin’ I guess I’d let ya be. Long as yew wasn’t down here smokin’ dope or nuthin. I wouldn’t tolerate anything like that. But I spose I’d let yuh stay.” He then offers to let me camp on his land if I want to. It’s a little early, but I accept. He leads me to a nice bushhogged spot where I set up and read awhile.
After sundown he and his wife Denise come down and talk awhile. They’re nice folks.
I go to sleep surrounded by noisy deer.
Scott “LETITBE” Williamson. Made it, without Psycho Ken all the way back down to Red’s Meadow by November. A persistent snow storm forced him to prudently abandon his quest there at the gateway to the serious High Sierra. In April of 1997 he set out from Campo alone. His second attempt in as many years to yo-yo the PCT. Hopefully twice he will pass our spot of abandonment in the Siskayou Mountains. A three hundred yard side trip up the south framing hill of Jackson Pass would reveal to him a mid sized cairn of rocks. Buried underneath of which in an airtight container lies a second skin, a symbol of our journey waiting to be reborn, waiting to be out of style.
