When I was 13, I got a beautiful book that still inspires me, even though I haven't seen it in years. It was coffee table sized and replete with gorgeous photos. The chapters alternated technical information about camping and backpacking with essays about specific hiking areas across the U.S. I could spend hours reading, planning, and dreaming.
Alas, I never brought those dreams to fruition. I have always loved the idea of backpacking, have always meant to do more...any, but never seemed to find the gumption to follow through. I have unfulfilled fantasies of hiking Crow Pass, Johnson Pass, Resurrection Trail, and many more trails across Alaska, most of which have always been in my backyard.
I nearly let myself down again this week. I had three days free between a fused glass class in Anchorage and starting work on a trip I'm co-guiding. My publicly stated plan was to backpack all three days. My hope was Crow Pass from Girdwood to Eagle River (23 miles with a crossing of Eagle River), but I deemed that too sketchy to do alone after I went to a talk about it on Sunday at the Eagle River Nature Center, the endpoint of the trail. There's still too much snow in the pass. My backup plan was the Gold Mint Trail in Hatcher Pass, perhaps my favorite place in the world. Although it was only a two-day hike, I nearly disappointed myself by downgrading my plans to a couple of day hikes rather than backpacking. In the end, I told myself to suck it up and get moving.
Rather than write a finely edited narrative of my short trek, I've decided to just transcribe my journal from those two days. It'll be a scary look at my stream-of-conciousness thinking. I hope to make it all better by sharing some photos of this beautiful area.
Wednesday, June 7
My pack has got to lose weight! By the time I left Mom's this morning, it weighed a solid 40 pounds, including water (3 L). If I switched to a smaller tend and a new pack (made wiht lighter materials than existed 25 years ago), I could drop 5+ pounds easy, but I'd like to figure out how to cut another five. However, as I sit here at the head of the valley, eight miles from the trail head and below what appears to be a non-existent Mint Glacier, I have used everything I brought except rain gear and too many granola bars. Hopefully the rain gear will continue to go unused, and I know I don't have five pounds of granola bars. I'm not sure where I can cut the weight, but I'll figure it out.
Anyway, and not surprisingly, it was exhausting to hike the miles with 40 pounds on my back since I'm not used to a pack. I was beat by the time I got to a spot where I could see the head of the valley and found a half-way decent camp spot. Between brush and undulating terrain, that was no easy feat!
The first three miles of the trail are cake - fairly flat, wide, graveled, and very well maintained. Miles 3-5 resemble a typical Alaskan trail: not too bad, but starting to get rougher. After mile 5 the trail deteriorates significantly, but at least is easy to follow through the beaver-flooded swamps and mud holes interrupted by tumbled boulders. It's terrain I don't normally mind, but fatigue and too little food was making my thinking fuzzy. I needed to stop, either for good or a long break before I hurt myself. Happily, I was able to push through to the end. At least on the way out the worst part will be in the morning when I'm fresh.
I'm camped on a little hill above the Little Susitna River. I found a great boulder to use for my kitchen, and enjoyed my Good To Go dehydrated meals. The wild mushroom risotto was great (needed salt and pepper), but the Thai Coconut Curry was passable. It tasted good, but the veggies didn't rehydrate well. A little Irish coffee made waiting for food much more pleasant.
I saw few-days-old bear and moose tracks, as well as several dead beaver lodges (grass growing on them), and heard marmots whistling, but all I've seen are white-crowned sparrows, a dipper, and an Arctic ground squirrel. I don't mind not seeing any bears.
I was disappointed to never get above the brush line into tundra. I waded through willow and alder all day. It was hot enough that I was comfy in shorts and a tank top in the breeze, but my arms and legs are all scratched up. It was interesting to see the willow regress into earlier in the spring as I climbed. Up here at the top, the pussys are barely out, but they're gone at the bottoms.
The sun keeps playing peek-a-boo with me, and I keep expecting it to rain, but so far, so good. The breeze is cool, though, (why is it blowing up the valley? that seems counter intuitive) and I'm grateful for dry clothes and my down jacket. I just hope I don't freeze tonight. I'm planning on making a hot water bottle before bed.
A ground squirrel keeps chirping at me, but I can't find it. They're so loud, though, that he could be further away than he sounds.
Last year's crowberries are abundant under my camp spot. The tundra smells sweet. New flowers are just starting to appear.
It's too early to go to bed, so I will suffer the incongruity of reading Visit Sunny Chernobyl and Other Adventures to the World's Most Polluted Places by Andrew Blackwell while sipping Pendelton Midnight whiskey.
Thursday, June 8
Why, oh why, is it called a 15-degree sleeping bag when I can't stay warm at 30+? A predictably miserable night. Cold even with my hot water bottle, my left hip/leg were in agony from the day's exertions, and I laid awake most of the night. Up at 5:30. At least I should get back to the trail head in time to tell Mom to leave a key out for me since I left mine in her house.
So much for the worst part of the trail being easier because I was fresh. Not only was I not fresh, although I did love getting up and eating my oatmeal and drinking my coffee in the wilderness, but my hips and knees hurt enough that I didn't trust them to boulder hop across streams or take big steps down the trail. Even being "all downhill" on the way out was a lie. I was much slower than I anticipated because I was still so sore and tired. To top it off, I lost the trail going around one beaver swamp. The main trail had been flooded out, but there was a fainter one around the area. I'd had no trouble following it going in, but managed to promptly lose it this morning. I bushwhacked for about 30 minutes trying to get back to the trail. I was grateful I only had to wade through waist-high willows and not devil's club!
About a mile or so from my camp I was startled by a voice calling, "Good morning!" just before a dog barked sharply. The couple was as surprised as I to see another human out there. I regained control of my heard and continued on. They weren't far behind me, but as I wandered through the willows, they got ahead. I was grateful when I saw where they crossed a pretty big creek on a house-beam bridge. I had been planning to find a place to ford it, but was much happier following it downhill to the beam. Although I was slowly failing, I was trying to keep my feet dry.
Step after step, I slowly kept on. Sometime in the past few years, I've developed this habit of continuing to keep moving until I've reached the end, regardless of how much I need to stop for a break. The habit was killing me again this morning. I did stop once to take off my rain pants (the brush was wet from overnight rain, but it was just too muggy and warm to wear them) and eat a granola bar and some jerky, but other than that I kept forging on. I knew the first mile marker I'd see was a mile 5, but I really hoped I'd missed it. When I saw the post off to my left, I thought, "I'm going to cry if that's 5 and not 4." I pulled up my big girl panties and held back the tears.
For the remainder of the hike, I lived for seeing the next mile marker. They couldn't seem to come quickly enough. I made two more brief stops to put Moleskin on my left big toe and the ball of that foot, but failed to change into dry socks. By the time I was done, the sweat-soaked socks had rubbed matching blisters on both feet. A fine accompaniment to my aching hips and knees. At least my right shoulder had stopped cramping.
In the end, it took me five hours to hike into the valley and 4.5 to hike out. Since all I'd eaten this morning was a bowl of oatmeal, a granola bar, and a handful of jerky pieces, I figured I more than deserved a western omelet with hashbrowns and toast at the Noisy Goose Cafe in Palmer. After all, Map My Run told me I'd burned 6,000 calories just this morning.
It was all worth it. The hike was gorgeous, and I am proud that I kept going even when I wanted to quit. Now I just need to figure out how to make it easier next time.
