Category Archives: Adventure

Through the Woods

Posted by dkrashb on

Stepping silently is impossible, especially in the woods.  But under the refuge of a heavy rain, each step disappears, blunted and blended into the sounds of the rain.  If ever I needed to escape or evade, I would hope for a downpour to hide my sound, my scent, my very presence, truly allowing me to leave no trace.

Perhaps it is the feeling of being encapsulated in a rain shower that causes an illusion of privacy.  As we put one foot solidly in front of the other, I forget my companions.  I look around in a panic realizing I haven’t heard Tisen’s familiar jingle for quite a few yards.  He is close at my husband’s heels, still trying to keep his head dry by hanging out under the over hang of Pat’s pack.  He hasn’t yet learned rain is its own kind of shelter.

Stepping through the rain becomes a meditation.  I cannot hear my own breath nor even my thoughts.  My mind has gone still and I focus on planting a trekking pole, placing a foot, planting the other trekking pole, placing the other foot.  I feel the muscles in my arms flex as I push off the poles.  I feel the twinge in my knee that threatens to turn into a sharp stab should I push it too hard.  My shoulders are already screaming.  I shift my focus back to my steps.  I don’t think about the distance left or the distance behind.  For those moments, I am my feet, my arms, my shoulders, my legs.  My boots and the ground move together as if the earth moves with me and all of me has melted; I am the rain.

Then, it stops raining.  My metaphysical moment evaporates even before the sun dares to break in through the clouds.

Returned to my more mundane reality, we find a spot to stop for a snack.  I slide out of my pack and dump it, rain cover down, onto a log.  It looks like an overturned turtle who has given up and stopped waving its legs.

I can’t remember ever enjoying trail mix so much as I enjoy it standing on the trail with a grumbling stomach, wondering if we will make it back without stopping for lunch.  Tisen stretches out and opts for a quick nap while we finish eating our apples before strapping our packs back on.

Now, the wet forest demands my photographer’s eye.  Every stretch of the trail reveals even more beautiful mushrooms.  I do my best to capture some of them with my 24-70mm lens, but I wish there were such a thing as a weightless macro lens and tripod so I could get up close and not worry about camera shake.

We hike faster as we get near the end.  My mind is no longer in the moment.  I’m longing for when I can set down my pack and know I don’t have to pick it up again for a very long time.

 

Overlooked

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Something I always seem to forget when I haven’t been backpacking in a while is just how badly I sleep.  At first, I thought it was about equipment.  I gave up on the ultra-light sleeping pad and invested in a Big Agnes inflatable mat.  That was a nice upgrade.  A big, thick, insulated, cushy air mattress that really didn’t weigh a whole lot more.  I still didn’t sleep well.  There are several factors involved:

  1. Noises.  These range from bears to my husband snoring (he claims it’s me), but there always seem to be noises I can’t ignore.
  2. Fluids.  I drink a lot of water when we’re hiking.  Unfortunately, particularly in cold weather, this leads to having to get up many times in the middle of the night.  The whole process of managing getting out of the tent and then wandering out into the cold and/or rain has a pretty significant impact on sleep.
  3. Discomfort.  Backpacking uses muscles that don’t get used while sitting at a desk all day.  They don’t even get used in yoga class, rowing, biking, or the gym.  These muscles start screaming as I struggle to find a good position for my head.  At home, I sleep with two pillows to keep my neck and lower back comfortable.  Perhaps I need to find light-weight pillows for backpacking.
  4. Time Shift.  When one backpacks, there is little to do at the campsite after dinner if there’s no fire.  We rarely have a fire.  In many places, it’s not allowed.  In places where it is allowed, it’s often a lot of work.  Sometimes, it’s just impossible.  For example, when it’s pouring down rain.  So, once dinner is over, the dishes are washed, teeth are brushed, the supplies are appropriately stowed, and fatigue from the many miles of hiking sets in, it’s bedtime.  When bedtime is very early, this contributes to waking up throughout the night.

Rain suddenly pounding on the metal roof above our tent caused noise issues.  No pillow and sharing a tent with both a man and a dog created discomfort issues.  Going to bed at 7:30PM contributed to time shift issues.  The only thing I did well was taper off on water consumption.  None-the-less, I felt like I’d gotten no more than 15 consecutive minutes of sleep all night.

I think Tisen felt the same way–he wouldn’t get out of the tent in the morning.

But, we made it back on the trail eventually.  On the way back, we discovered Tommy Overlook, a highlight of the trail we’d missed in the heavy rain the day before.  We were making good time on the trail–all of us walking double-time in some unspoken agreement that we wanted to get home as fast as possible.  We stopped for a good 15 minutes to enjoy the view of the 3 gulches converging.  I couldn’t help but imagine what it would look like in a few weeks when the trees are in color.

The Next 6.3 Miles

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Mentally embracing the rain, we started down the trail, determined to make it the next 6.3 miles to a place called “Hobbs Cabin.”  We couldn’t help but hope the cabin (a rustic, first-come, first-serve arrangement) was available.

After about 10 minutes of hiking in the downpour, we realized hiking in the rain on a hot day was quite pleasant.  Instead of feeling stinky and sticky with sweat, we felt cool and refreshed and there were no bugs while it was raining.

Tisen, on the other hand, was not so enamored with the feeling of cool rain. He did his best to walk underneath the overhang of our packs to try to avoid being rained on directly.  He ended up just as wet as the rest of us, but there must have been something comforting about feeling like he had a roof over his head.

When we got to the first overlook of the “gulf”  (apparently that’s what a gulch is called in Tennessee), the rain had taken a break.  The sky was overcast and it was hard to tell it was noon.  The break in the rain was nice, as was the breeze blowing up from the valley below.  But, alas, we were trying to cover 6.3 miles before it got too late in the afternoon, so we couldn’t stop long to enjoy it.

As the trail veered away from the edge of the gulch, we re-entered the woods, and perhaps a time from the past.  It was easy to imagine the first settlers finding their way through woods like these when such woods covered much of the Eastern US. Of course, they would have all be old-growth forests back then.  But, these woods, mostly free of invasive plants, made me feel like we’d been transported in time. Thankfully, our gear wasn’t transported back to historical equipment–I think we would have needed a wagon.

At long last, we arrived at Hobbs Cabin and were relieved to find it unoccupied.  A tiny, dark, uninviting shelter, it was equipped with 6 bunks and a table fastened to the wall.  The bunks were wood planks that would require sleeping pads and bags to make comfortable.  The small windows on the back wall let in so little light that even with our flashlights, we had trouble seeing inside the cabin.  I had a hard time imagining spending the night in there.

I proposed we pitch the tent on the front porch, screening out all insects, putting us where we were sure to get a breeze, and under a great big roof to keep up out of the rain.  We hung the rain fly in position just in case we started to get wet, but planned to sleep under just the screen for the night.  Tisen was more excited than a child to crawl into the tent with us, even though we decided to call it a night around 7:30PM.  It was the earliest we’ve ever gone to bed.

2 Miles

Posted by dkrashb on

There is a fine and delicate line when it comes to backpacking between having what you need to survive and having too much weight on your back to have any fun.

Once a backpack reaches a third of your body weight, or even a quarter, when you get a few miles into the hike, you start to question the wisdom of backpacking vs day hiking.  This has been a battle played out over years for me.  The first time I went backpacking, I barely made the ascent up a 4 mile trail that climbed almost 1 mile in elevation.  I didn’t even know how much weight I was carrying at the time, but I had packed things like an 11-cup percolating coffee pot, so I’m pretty sure it was a lot of weight.

When my husband and I were in official “backpacking training,” we went on a 3-day trip to Otter Creek Wilderness in Monangahela.  This was right after I’d read a book called “The Ultra-Light Backpacker.”  I took no spare clothes except socks and underwear, no tarp, no extra anything.  If I thought I could live without it for 3 days, I left it at home.  My pack was a lot lighter, but it rained the entire time, except when it snowed, and we came pretty close to hypothermia by the time we hiked out the 3rd day with no dry clothes to change into.

Ever since then, we’ve erred on the side of too much weight.  As we headed down the trail on the Sunday of Labor Day weekend, we not only were carrying too much stuff for us, but also too much stuff for our dog:  His new special diet frozen and packed so it would stay cool long enough to be fresh for his dinner and breakfast; his bedroll strapped to the outside of Pat’s pack; extra towels packed just for drying the dog; and, of course, Tisen’s special water bowl and his own water bottle.  Spoil our dog?  What are you talking about?

It’s not surprising that after about 2 miles, we were ready for our first snack break.  We stopped right on the trail as there was no where else to go.  We opened up our packs, broke out our snacks, and started munching.

As we stood there with our stuff strewn about, we heard a sound.  It wasn’t just the sound of the wind whistling through the trees.  It was the sound of an enormous sheet of rain blowing through.  Pat went for the tarp while I went for the rain cover for my pack.  I got my pack closed and covered while Pat built us a little shelter.

We felt a little foolish when three backpackers came through soaking wet and had to duck under our shelter to continue on the trail.  We started packing up our stuff and accepting that this rain wasn’t going to just blow over.  It was time to get wet.

White Plains

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Back a few years, which now seems like a lifetime ago, I used to go to White Plains, New York for work on a fairly regular basis.  There are several things I recall about White Plains, NY.  First, if you ever have to go there and someone suggests you should fly into LaGuardia or Newark, just say no.

The first time I went there, I flew into Newark on a Sunday and spent 3 hours trying to get across one bridge–there are really only 2 bridges to choose from when coming from Newark to White Plains and apparently the entire world is divided between those two bridges on a Sunday afternoon.

My second trip, I flew into LaGuardia and my transit time was cut to about an hour and a half.  On my third trip, when I arrived in Cleveland and ran for my connection, arriving at the gate all flushed and flustered just after the door closed, the gate agent asked me where I was going.  Not thinking, I replied, “White Plains.”  She looked at me and said, “The flight to White Plains is at that gate,” pointing at a gate across the aisle.  I managed to switch flights in time to go to White Plains.  When I arrived, I discovered that airport was exactly 8 minutes from the customer site I was visiting.

I asked the customer why they had recommended Newark or LaGuardia.  They’d assumed I wanted a direct flight.  They didn’t realize that I had to connect pretty much anywhere I flew to.  Still, I haven’t figured out why someone would think it was better to have a direct flight and a 3 hour drive (or even an hour and a half drive) than to have a connection and an 8 minute drive.  Even if I had an hour and a half layover, it’s more productive than an hour and a half sitting in traffic.

White Plains itself is quite beautiful.  Like most of the parts of New York I’ve been to (other than New York City), you see more trees than buildings.  Everything is cloaked behind stands of evergreens.  It’s hard to even tell when you’ve arrived at an office park.

For the less nature-centric, there is also good shopping, good food, great access to planes, trains, and any other imageable form of transportation (including horses, although I think they were all privately owned).  Just don’t try to drive there.

I had the rare pleasure of spending an evening alone with my camera on one of my trips to White Plains.  I made an exploratory pass around the neighborhood and found a lovely Spanish restaurant on the shore of the Hudson along with a park.  After filling my belly, I walked along the dock, taking pictures of the scenes on the river.

What was most surprising to me was the view of New York City.  Looking down the Hudson, Manhattan spread itself across the river like a bridge in the distance.

Dogs and Tents

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We have decided to take two days to go backpacking.  It’s been a long time since we spent the night in backcountry.  We have chosen a pretty easy place to re-introduce ourselves and expose Tisen for the first time.  At least, we think it will be easy.  What’s 7 miles with 35 pounds on your back?

We have a checklist of things to pack for our dog:

  • Medications (the only one with no insurance is the only one on medication!)
  • Vitamins
  • Special food (because he has allergies, which led to the medication in the first place)
  • Insulated and padded sleeping roll for dogs
  • Collapsible water bowl
  • Water bottle
  • Wipes to remove poison ivy from his fur (for my protection, not his)
  • Super glue (in case he cuts a paw pad)

Given the list, it seemed logical to me that Tisen would carry some of his own stuff.  At least his own food and first aid items.  So, I had him fitted for his own backpack.  Pat vetoed the backpack idea.  He thinks Tisen will be sore from walking so much and doesn’t need to carry any extra weight.  He has a point.

Of course, once we agreed no backpack for Tisen, it was like he knew he wasn’t going to be carrying anything so he started adding to the pile of gear.  First Blue Dog appeared on the pile.  When I moved Blue Dog, Lion showed up.  Most recently, it was Duck.  I haven’t broken it to him that he’s not going to be able to bring any of them on the trail with him.

We have, however, had pre-camping lessons in the living room.  We wanted to see if Tisen would fit in the tent with us.  It’s going to be a tight fit, but if he lays parallel to us, we can put his sleeping mat under our mats (which are narrow at the feet) and he can lay between our sleeping bags.  As long as no one moves, it should be super comfortable.

We also practiced entering and exiting the tent.  We wanted to make sure Tisen would get in and out quickly so we don’t end up with a swarm of mosquitos cuddling up with us.  After a couple of practices, he was coming in and out like a trooper.

Next, I practiced getting up to heed the call of nature (which happens about 8x a night when I am camping just because it’s so inconvenient, I think) and leaving Tisen in the tent.  He did pretty well lying still while I got out and back in again.

I think we’re ready.  Now we just have to figure out how to stuff it all into our backpacks.

On a photography note, what’s really amazing about the shots in the gallery is that all but the first one were shot at 25,600 ISO.  The darker images have some grain, but they look better than the Canon 40D did at 800 ISO.  That’s pretty impressive.

The Last Push

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After spending some time cooling in a stream, Tisen and I make the final push home from Edward Point.  We make it to the first place we got lost on the way out.  When we get there, it’s completely obvious that a lower trail completely avoids the downed trees that caused us so much trouble on the way out.  We make it around the whole area with only one lift for Tisen in a spurt of steep rock steps.  I cannot resist looking to see if the trail was obvious from the other side.  It was not.  I have an excuse for at least one of my wrong turns.

I’m almost afraid to stop again.  Tisen is moving well and looking energetic.  I’m moving well now that we’re going uphill, my knee only complaining when we go downhill.

We make it back to the first natural overlook and I know we’re home free.  We take a break there, just to be safe.  Tisen looks at me with an expression on his face that I swear says, “Yay, Mom!  Look at us!  We’re almost back!”  Who knew a bit bull could look like a cheerleader?

A couple pauses to take a few quick shots from the overlook while we gather our energy for the last push.  The trees start rustling, the sun disappears, rain drops start to fall.  I realize I have nothing to cover my camera with and hope that it doesn’t get too wet.

I text Pat and let him know that we have survived and are on our way home.  I had updated him earlier when we were lost–one of the advantages of hiking on Signal Mountain is that you still have a signal.  🙂

When I start packing up Tisen’s water, Tisen pops up like he’s been waiting on me all along.  I smile.  I don’t know if he remembers what the last part of the trail is like, but it involves a lot of jumping up onto high steps and rocks to get back to the manmade overlook at the parking lot.  It’s a lot to ask of a tired dog.  I prepare myself for the possibility of having to lift Tisen many times in the last quarter mile.

Tisen springs up every rock and step like a young pup.  He is clearly excited to be getting closer to home.  He charges ahead when I pause.  When he’s behind me, I have to be careful not to kick him as I step, he’s so close on my heels.

We make it to the park.  We make it up the final hill to the car.  Tisen catapults himself into the back seat and lies there panting.  I rush to change my shoes so I can get us moving.  The breeze is still blowing, cool and slightly damp, although the rain has stopped.  I smile to myself as I put the car in drive:  we finally made it to Edward Point.

Blazing Trails

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After allowing Tisen a 20 minute nap at Edward Point, I decide we’d better start working our way down.  With our side-trips on the way up, we’re an hour behind schedule and we’ll be two if it takes as long to get back.

Unfortunately, the sun is now higher, the temperature hotter, and the bugs swarming more energetically.  I’m not sure if it’s the heat or the bugs that get to Tisen, but not more than a 1/4 mile from Edward Point, he finds a shrub, runs into the shade underneath, and starts digging himself a nest in the dirt.  It takes quite a bit of coaxing to get Tisen back out into the sun.

Fortunately, we are back in the shade a little further down the trail.  And the turkey vultures who greeted us on the way up have given up on us dying, disappearing down the river valley.  I took that as a positive sign.

Because I had opted to break in my new hiking boots in anticipation of a back-packing trip the following weekend, my knees were suffering.  My left knee was the first to start screaming.  This has something to do with inflammation.  As my knee starts to swell, it no longer wants to bend.  When I bend it and step downhill, a sharp stabbing pain shoots through the joint.  It makes going downhill excruciating.  I make a mental note to make sure I figure out how I can carry my camera and still use my trekking poles before we set out backpacking next weekend–I imagine my knees won’t hold up to a backpack without trekking poles.  I wish I could wear my fivefinger shoes, but the rocky terrain and the extra weight of a backpack is a bit much for almost-bare feet.

We manage to stay on the right trail on the way back.  I am watching for blazes with the intensity of a pit bull.  Or maybe that’s Tisen?  When we get to the juncture where I went the wrong way on the way up, I look back to see how I got confused.  I realize there is no excuse for missing the main trail.  The blazes are obvious and well-placed.  I don’t know what I was thinking.

We keep on stepping, slower than I’d like, but we’re making more progress than if either my knee or Tisen gives out completely.  I have to lift Tisen over some big rocks in the part of the trail we missed on the way up.  While I’m glad I’m able to lift him, I am simultaneously worried about how much poison ivy he’s run through and how much of it each lift is getting on me.

We make it back to water.  Tisen plows in and lays down.  I watch and wait for him to look cooled and refreshed so we can continue on our way.

Edward Point

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As Tisen and I walked what we thought was the last 15 minutes to Edward Point, shadows raced across the forest floor like silent, dark ghosts.  I looked up to discover a half a dozen turkey vultures circling overhead.  Close overhead.  Too close.

Given we were hot, tired, and bleeding from numerous wounds from brambles, it was a little ominous to feel like they were so interested in us.

Fortunately, they soared further away as we approached, giving us a more breathing room.

As we looked around (well, I looked around, I don’t know what Tisen was doing exactly), I realized that the area must have had a fire in recent years.  The trees were charred in place.  The growth was thick and dense, but it was all wild flowers and sun-loving brush.  The bugs loved it.  I couldn’t seem to keep them off of me.  I saw bugs on me that I’d never seen before.  I stopped shooing and started swatting, leaving red hand-prints on my arms.  They went well with the bleeding scratches from the earlier brambles.

There is something disconcerting about hiking from relatively deep forest into bright meadows when a mountain is well below timberline.  You expect to come out into open spaces when hiking in Colorado, but here, it just seems wrong.  I found myself wondering when the forest had burned and whether that was normal here in the Eastern  US.

About 15 minutes after we’d found our way back to the Cumberland Trail, we encountered an overlook that faced the cliff on the other side of the gulch.  Directly across from us was a huge building that absolutely looked wrong.  There is nothing I resent more than when I spend hours making my way to a overlook in the “wilderness” only to discover I’m within a football field (or two) of a major development.  I found myself hoping this was not, in fact, Edward Point.

I googled Edward Point to see if I could tell.  Thankfully, I was able to determine that we were not there yet.  Now, I had a decision to face.  A 72-pound dog who is tired and hot and 45-year-old knees that are equally tired give one pause at moments like these.  Had it been me and only me, there would have been no hesitation–I was going to make it to Edward Point this time no matter what.  However, I’d lifted Tisen enough times on the way up to know I couldn’t carry him back.  I had to consider whether he could make it or not.

I decided to give it another 10 minutes.  I could see where we were along the gulf and it seemed like Edward Point, which overlooks the main river valley, had to be close.  I was so glad we’d stuck it out when we arrived at the overlook.  While Tisen took a nap in the shade, I took as many photos of the view as I could.

Lost Again

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Tisen has a very specific way of cooling off in streams. He walks in, feels around with his feet until he finds the perfect spot, then he lays down.  I suspect it has something to do with his Holstein genes.

Having cooled off for several minutes and drunk his fill of water, Tisen recovered enough to tackle the uphill climb.

As we made our way of the far side of the gulch, the climb got steeper.  We were distracted by the amazing rock formations.  Perhaps this is why, when we got to the next junction in the trail, I decided we needed to head downhill rather than up.  This turned out to be a bad mistake.

We ended up on a trail that kept getting narrower and more overgrown.  Soon, we were walking through brambles that hooked themselves into bare skin, tearing flesh as I forced my way through.  Tisen was somewhat protected by his fur, but both of us looked like we’d taken a beating by the time we got to a clearer part of the trail.

The trail now tucked up against another rock bluff, looking more like a deer trail than a parks and recreation trail.  I should have turned around about a 1/4 mile in.  Have I mentioned I have issues with going backwards?

On the plus side, since nature was calling pretty loudly at this point, it was good that we were in an isolated area with plenty of underbrush so I could heed the call without fear of someone walking up on me.  On the minus side, there were so many enormous spider webs in the rocky bluff I was almost afraid to turn my back on them.

When we got around the bluff, we started bush-whacking uphill, hearing voices above us and thinking that must be the main trail.

This was tough going.

Not only were there more brambles and spider webs, but now there were more and more rocks to climb as well.  I was worried about Tisen getting a little more exercise than he could handle.

As we walked along the face of yet another rock bluff, we caught up with a couple with a child and two dogs.  I have no idea how they all got there, but there they were.  I asked them where we were and they assured me that we were just below the Cumberland Trail.  All we had to do was go straight up the rock face.

I found an entry point that I could climb, lifted all 72 pounds of Tisen up onto the rock at shoulder height and managed to convince him to stay up there while I used a tree to assist my own ascent.

Bush-whacking through another patch of brambles rewarded us with being back on the main trail.  The couple had said Edward Point was about 15 minutes away; had it been much further, I probably would have started heading home.