August 21, 2016 1370.9-1394.3 23.4 miles Hunger. A gnawing, twisting hunger that threatens to turn me inside myself until there’s nothing left. Luckily, there’s a cafe nearby. I almost can’t pack up fast enough. It’s almost like doing the potty dance, except it’s the hunger dance and I know I’m still going to have to wait for someone to take my order and cook my food once I get there. I check my phone to see exactly where this place is. Shit. Apparently it’s not nearby. I have a 4-mile hike ahead of me before breakfast. I pull out a bar just to stave off the worst of it, but I still want to keep a big appetite. Nothing tastes better than breakfast on hiker hunger. I’m out of dowloaded podcasts, so it’s just me and my thoughts this morning. I spend the time pleasantly dreaming of breakfast and disassociatively wandering from subject to subject. Luckily, the morning miles always travel fastest, and when I check my map at a junction, it says that the breakfast place is right over there. I can’t see it, and the junction doesn’t have any signs, so I’m taking a bit of a risk by not following the PCT to where the map says it meets the road ahead. If I go that way, I’ll have to double back a quarter mile. But if this side trail doesn’t go where I think it does, I’m going to have to either bushwhack or double back to the trail, then double back again at the road. Whatever. Bushwhacking isn’t that bad, I lie to myself (it’s nearly always worse, and slower, than I expect). The side trail is a dirt road, and it passes through a fire station on the way to town. I might be trespassing, I’m not really sure, but no one says anything as I pass by. I’m probably not the first thru-hiker they’ve seen. The dirt road does come out roughly where I think it should, although I do end up bushwhacking through about a hundred yards of overgrown field in order to avoid going the long way around. It seems I’ve arrived right as they’re opening. JJ’s Cafe is a small place, the sort of small-town diner that I absolutely love. I take a seat by a window where I can charge my phone and where I can watch the cafe operate. I’ve made a sort of study of small-town diner waitresses over the years. The way they interact with customers is endlessly fascinating. No two are exactly the same. They are balancing a ton of variables with hardly any notice or recognition. Often, they are the owners of the cafe, so they are both servant and master of the hall. The customers are usually a mix of regulars and tourists, all of whom have distinct needs and expectations, and all of whom want to feel special. Most of them will call you “honey” or “sweetheart”, but the way they say it can often sound like they want to scrape you from the tread of their shoe with a stick. Some of them are endlessly distracted, as you would expect from someone who is solely responsible for just about everything that happens in the place, but many of them give you the total presence and attention that you would only expect from a buddhist monk. As a vegetarian, I nearly always ask to replace sausage or bacon with hash browns. I have no issue with paying a little extra, and I don’t mind if they say no, but the way that they react to it speaks volumes about who they are. As a filthy thru-hiker, people’s true nature comes out even more distinctly. The waitress at JJs cafe is one of the best. Attentive, kind, completely the master of her domain. If she is put off by my odor or my appearance, it doesn’t register on her face. Throughout breakfast, she is quick with a smile and the coffee, doesn’t blink an eye at my menu alterations, makes easy conversation with all of the patrons, and moves around the room entirely at ease. The food itself is solid fare, nothing fancy but wholly delicious. By the time I finish, I am thoroughly stuffed and ready for a nap. I sit outside on a bench and read for a while, using the wireless to download some more podcasts. I read until 10:30, when the pressure to hike gets to be too much. I grab a bag of chips and fill up my waterbottles at the gas station next door and head back to the trail. After a good climb up to the top of Hat Creek Rim, and a break at the rest area where a few people emerge from their cars to stretch and look around, I start one of the most notorious sections of the PCT. The rim is flat, but it’s exposed, hot, and mostly waterless desert for 34 miles. Many people night hike through here, but I’m here now, I’m falling behind schedule, and the views are fantastic. I plug into a podcast and leave the cars and people behind. The heat is peaking and the sweat is rolling off me. Today I’m listening to Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History. It’s a strange episode about a failed Anabaptist revolution. It’s four hours of slightly meandering, passionate historical exposition—perfect for a thru-hike. The rim drops off to my left and I have an expansive view of the valley, filled with churned-lava and brown grass. The texture resembles torn bread. There is something mythical about walking here along the edge of things. In the afternoon I make a side trip down a chasm to Lost Creek to refill. It’s a steep, somewhat dangerous climb, and there are yellow jackets swarming near where the water comes out of the rocks. When I get back up to the rim I’m fatigued and a little woozy from the heat. I stop for a late lunch in the shade a short while later. The view is mostly the same for the rest of the day. It’s beautiful, but monotonous after a while. A stop at Cache 22 yields hot water, fruit snacks, and spray bottles. I sit in a plastic chair for a while and read my book, hoping someone will show up and I can have a conversation, but I can’t wait for long—I still have to make my miles. I push on. As the sun makes its final descent to the horizon, I am startled out of my skin by the sound of a ratchet, fortissimo. I shift momentum in a split second, before conscious thought, and I leap backwards. A thick black rattlesnake holds its head up facing toward me. The first foot of its body vertical as it slides away, rattling loudly the whole time. It is at least seven feet long. I’ve seen plenty of rattlesnakes, but never one that large.
I decide it’s time to start looking for a campsite. I find a spot near a lone oak tree. The last rays of the sun cast long shadows and give the surrounding grasses a golden glow. It’s a perfect ending to a long, hard day. I make dinner looking east, toward a solitary dusky peak that I’m pretty sure is Mt. Shasta.
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August 20, 2016 Mile 1343.8-1370.9 27.1 Miles I am the second person awake. I only know this because one person is packed up and gone this morning. I pack up and pad quietly away. I can see my breath. I watch the trees go by, study their bark for differences and similarities. I know next to nothing about trees, but I want to know more. Simple things, like what makes them grow close together or farther apart? I peel off five miles fast. There’s a side trail to terminal geyser, but I skip it. I feel like I can’t possibly take time for side trips. I pass Boiling Springs lake, steaming and thick with pale green porridge. I step over several runnels that reek of sulphur. I crouch down and put my hand in one to check the temperature—bathwater warm. There are buildings and split-wood fences here. An asphalt road, too. I haven’t been checking the maps, and I didn’t expect these things. I turn off near a campground to get water from a pretty little waterfall amongst blackberry brambles. Someday, I think while I pump water, I’d like to camp here with Lindsey. Maybe we’ll have a little family of our own, like the one I can see across the way. We can read our books while our kid—kids?—plays with the other kids in the campground. It all seems so pleasant. No time for reading and playing now, though. I gotta book it to Canada. A couple hours later, I am at Lower Twin Lake. There are dayhikers everywhere, picnicking, fishing, strolling about. I’m about ready for lunch, but this is where there have been bear problems. A cinnamon-colored black bear has stolen several lunches and terrorized some hikers. I decide to continue on. About an hour later I stop in a wide open field. There are trees spread out about every 20 yards, but many of them have been burned and provide no cover. I find one that provides a transparent covering of shade and lean against its trunk while I eat my lunch. Almost immediately after I passed the lake, the tourists disappeared and I haven’t seen a person since. I find it strange that there were so many people, and suddenly none. Everyone was fixated on the lake, it seems. We all stick to our destinations and our goals so strongly, leaving so little room for exploration and discovery. I am, of course, engaged in the same sort of destination-oriented thinking, and my spirit is poorer for it. I’m not ready to surrender my goal of finishing this trail, though. It looks unlikely that I’ll make it to Canada before winter, but I have to keep trying. I can always come back and explore some other day (but will I?). After lunch, it is oppressively hot. I work my way around to the North side of Mt. Lassen, where I get a good view of the mountain. It’s strange to think that I’ve already passed a landmark that seemed so distant just three days ago. Time passes strangely on foot. Traveling in a car, less time would have passed to cover the same distance, yet somehow it feels as if I am moving faster. Car time is measured by clock and odometer; foot time is measured by progress and absorption. I have covered less distance, but I have traveled more ground. The afternoon goes by in a blur. I finally enter the trees again, but the forest is dry and uncannily silent. Hours, and not a single soul, neither human nor animal. I can make it to Old Station if I keep going. Maybe I can pick up my resupply and get some junk food, maybe camp near other people. I’m a little embarrassed at how important camping near other people has become to me. I am not the brave, self-sufficient explorer I had hoped to become. Eventually I reach a dirt road that leads me to Old Station. Right near the end of the road I almost step on a tiny garter snake coiled into a circle smaller than a dime. What strange, unexpected delights I find on this trail. Every day is something new and surprising. I arrive at the Hat Creek campground, then find the post office on the far end. It is a tiny hut, barely large enough to hold packages. It’s already closed, but the lady who works there is a famous trail angel and she has graciously given my package to the convenience store next door so I can pick it up without stalling my hike. I buy an oversized bottle of beer and carry it and my resupply back to the campground to repack it.
It’s getting dark already, and I’m tired from 27 miles of hiking. Every campsite is filled with people, but I find a space at the end of one of the rows where I can set up my tent. It’s not officially a campsite, but there’s no vegetation and I’ll be out of here early. A few campers look at me suspiciously, but no one says anything. I make dinner, drink my beer, and repack my resupply. I fall asleep feeling safe and looking forward to breakfast in a restaurant in the morning. Much of the damage in the world comes from thinking economically when we should be thinking morally.
When people are treated as economic variables, we devalue them as human beings. As a society, we fail in our moral duty to take care of our sick and poor. We end up with slavery and sex trafficking. We incarcerate masses of people and forget about them. When the arts are treated as commodities, cheap cliches take precedence over more complex art that can challenge and inspire us. Our lives are less rich for it. When the natural world is reduced to what we can take from it, we fail to see the complexity of relationships that sustain us. Species are lost, ecosystems collapse, and quality of life is reduced for all of us. When you measure yourself by extrinsic markers of success, you lose a part of our soul. You become easy to manipulate. Spend more to help the economy; find a high-paying job instead of doing meaningful work; buy a nicer car so you have more status. We are beholden to our jobs and we do work that is immoral, hating ourselves for it but unable to see a way out and addicted to the external rewards it brings. We’re on a hamster wheel, running as fast as we can to get nowhere. How you focus your attention determines how you experience the world and the decisions you make. When you choose to focus your attention on intrinsic value, you start to cut through the delusion of economics and see the world as it really is. You treat people like human beings, whether they hold the reins of power or work in a service job, whether they fit the mold of success or live on the street with a drug addiction. You improve your relationships, not because of what they can do for you, but because you value people for their own sake. You free yourself from the hamster wheel of craving and begin to find peace. While extrinsically motivated people are consumed with status and wealth, you get to enjoy the full spectrum of life: art, literature, music, nature, friendships, and love. The Intrinsic Value Movement is about bringing your focus back to the intrinsic, intangible values that make life rich and meaningful. And as your focus changes, it will automatically nudge the people around you to value differently. Imagine an entire culture that focuses on intrinsic value:
How can you help? Start to notice and talk about intrinsic value. There's a reason gratitude journals increase happiness. It's because your focus automatically centers on things with intrinsic value: Art, Education, Nature, Relationships, Music, Experiences, Human beings, Animals. Help your tribe start to see intrinsic value, too. you can use the hashtag #intrinsicvalue to call attention to things that go beyond economic value and status. When you notice intrinsic value, you focus your attention on the things that really matter. It becomes a habit, a new way of seeing the world. As others see your new, more intentional way of looking at the world, they will take up the torch too, and your world will get a little bit kinder, a little wiser. As your friends become less concerned with signals of status and wealth, you will feel less pressure for those things. We can all get off the hamster wheel together, and go enjoy life. August 19, 2016 Mile 1328.8-1343.8 15 Miles When I wake, the room is hot and stuffy. I have a mild headache from too much beer and not enough water. I try to go back to sleep, but after twenty minutes it’s clear that it’s not going to happen, so I dress quietly and take my book with me to breakfast. When I return, Altitude is repacking his backpack. I pack up too, then head out to look for a shoe store. I really need to find something today. My shoes aren’t cutting into the tops of my feet anymore since I cut big holes out of the top, but they’re filling with gravel as I hike. Less painful, but still obnoxious and uncomfortable. I’m able to find a sporting goods store just up the street, the Sports Nut. They have all sorts of stuff, but a very small selection of shoes and no trail runners or anything else that will work. I check two other places that seem promising, with no success. It looks like I’m stuck with these shoes for a little while longer. I call Lindsey and ask her to send my next pair of shoes to Castella. I have another mail drop in Old Station, but that’s only a couple days away and they might not arrive in time. After I finish packing up and checking out (Altitude and his pack are already gone), I’m ready for lunch. I walk to Subway and order a foot long, with a fantasy that I’ll take half of it with me out onto the trail. But who am I fooling? Of course I’m going to finish it all. I take a seat in a booth and unwrap my sandwich. I’m in a strange, disassociated state. People are around, but they are not part of my world, or I am not a part of theirs. I start to think about the source of my food. I think about the tomatoes, and how much water goes into them. The farmers that work the fields, the trucks and gas that delivered them first to a warehouse, then here, the irrigation that must have gone into the fields where these were grown, the reservoirs where that water was captured and diverted. Here in California, that water probably came from a river that used to run salmon or steelhead trout, but flows are so reduced and the temperatures so different from their natural state that the few fish that are left are prone to disease. I think through all of the pieces that came together to make this sandwich. The cheese. The bread. Before today, I don’t know that I ever noticed how delicious bread is. I think through the source of the wheat, the yeast. I realize that I don’t know where yeast comes from. It’s an organism, right? Is it cultured, then? From what? I think about the factories, the workers, the energy for the ovens that cook the bread. Each ingredient, made up of so many elements, each one requiring people, energy, and natural and unnatural processes. By the time I finish the first half of the sandwich, I feel immense gratitude and sadness. I continue on, thinking about the wrappings. This is more difficult. The wax paper. The handful of bleach-white napkins that are stuffed in alongside my sandwich, far more than I need or want. The plastic bag that holds it all, that I was given without asking even though I am eating in the restaurant. It is all so wasteful. I don’t have to look around to realize there are other people in this Subway; they have each received a plastic bag and a stack of napkins, too. How many Subway sandwich shops are there in the world? How many fast food restaurants? How many people do they serve each day? I’ve never truly realized how wasteful fast food is before today. It doesn’t take much effort to extend that thought to the entire culture. I finish my sandwich, and then—there’s nothing else I can reasonably do—I place my plastic bag and napkins in the garbage and head out into the world. My very existence on this planet leads to waste. I make a vow to live with less impact, knowing that it will be difficult in a culture that wastes indiscriminately. I walk down the street thinking about this tension between culture and ethics. It’s time to get back on the trail. I send Altitude a text to tell him I’m headed out and I’ll see them at camp tonight. Our plan was to do about 10 miles today, so I figure I’ll find a good place to camp and then read until they arrive this evening. I’m upbeat, knowing that I have companions to camp with tonight. I stick out my thumb to hitchhike. One car drives by, then another. The third one is a police cruiser. I drop my thumb, but it’s too late, he’s pulling over to the side of the road. I’m certain I’m about to get a ticket, or at least a stern lecture that hitchhiking is illegal. He stops and comes around the front of the car. “You headed back to the trail?” “Yeah,” I say. “You’ll have to ride in the back. We’re not allowed to have people ride up front with us.” Wait—what? He’s offering me a ride? I climb in the back seat and try not to think about what recreational foliage I may or may not be carrying in my backpack. “I was a little worried when you pulled over that I wasn’t supposed to be hitchhiking,” I tell him. “Oh, no, as long as you’re not on an interstate, you’re fine,” he explains. “I have to make a stop real quick, and then I’ll get you out to the trail.” We pull into an abandoned lot behind some old buildings. There’s another cruiser and a pickup truck pulled up together, driver’s side window to driver’s side window. All the surreptitious meetings I’ve seen in the movies flash through my mind and once. “Just stay in the car,” the officer says as he gets out. You’re about to get murdered or kidnapped, my brain tries to warn me. Don’t be so paranoid, I argue back. Their conversation is muffled and I can’t make anything out. Am I witnessing a shady deal? Some sort of drug deal handoff? Or is my imagination just running wild? A minute later the officer climbs back in the car. “They like to rib me a little. Say I’m too soft, giving all you hikers rides to the trail. I don’t know, I think it’s kinda inspiring that y’all can stick with it so long. Might like to do it myself some day.” Oh good, it looks like I’m not getting murdered after all. He drives me out the rest of the way to the trail and wishes me luck. I thank him and tell him I hope he gets to hike the trail some day, it’s worth it. I strap up, climb the embankment, and enter a tunnel of trees. A few hours later, I take my phone off airplane mode to see if Altitude and Ed have left yet. I have a couple texts from Altitude:
-You’re already leaving? -Ed really wants to flip. He says there’s no transportation from Castella. Can you head back? I’m a little pissed and definitely let down. I thought we had a deal to flip from Castella. We cheers’d to it! That should be as sacred among hikers as a handshake among honorable businessmen. I text back: -I’m 8 miles out. I thought you guys were on your way. Altitude: -Ed says he’ll pay for your ticket if you head back. I agonize. I really do. But when I think it through, we haven’t spent any real time hiking together. Who knows if we’d be able to keep a similar pace, or do similar miles each day? What if they decide to quit? If I have to hike by myself, I’d rather finish this hike northbound, the way I started it. Even if it means I might not make it all the way. -Tell him thanks, but I have to keep going. I’m not ready to flip yet. -Bummer man, but yeah, you’ve got to hike your own hike. Hike your own hike. It’s a cliche, and it means many things, but if ever there was a time to brush it off and hold it tight, this is it. I have to hike my own hike. I’ve lost my trail family as quickly as I gained them. It’s bitter, but I know it’s the right choice to go on. I put on my solitude like a suit of armor and brace myself for more miles. Just that quickly, the woods have taken on a different character. I am not looking forward to camping alone tonight. An hour later I am resting by the trail when a couple comes by. The man carries a Jack Russell on his back between his shoulders and the backpack. They stop to chat for a bit, and he sets the Jack Russell down. They tell me they are planning on camping just before the border to Lassen National Park since they don’t have a bear canister. That’s only a couple more miles ahead, a little further than I had planned for tonight. I have people to camp with and talk with, and that makes the miles easy. When we get to the border of the park, there’s another hiker eating dinner already. I find myself a small, slanted patch of uneven ground and squeeze my tent into it. We sit in a small circle and the four of us get to know each other while we make and eat dinner. It’s dark before we know it, and we don’t have a campfire, but we stay up talking and joking anyway. It feels great, and when I finally go to sleep, it’s an easy, undisturbed sleep despite the uneven ground. I lost my trail family, but I found companions anyway. The trail will provide. Another cliche, but it comforts me. I am content. 0 Miles Chester, CA A zero day is a vacation from a vacation. Done right, it requires a level of sloth that borders on mortal sin. Thus I find myself, at noon, still in my hotel room watching videos on the spotty wifi and snacking on the remains of the continental breakfast (more like three of them) that I have smuggled back to my room. It’s not like I’ve truly done nothing—my gear has required cleaning and no amount of scrubbing in the shower can get all the dirt off my feet. I’ve just done it all very slowly, with long internet breaks in between. But I have many chores to do today, and breakfast pastries and fruit will only go so far toward assuaging my hunger. Making decisions in towns is surprisingly difficult on trail. Simple decisions become life-or-death dilemmas. Part of the problem is the desire to minimize walking. My pulverized feet hate nothing right now more than cement and asphalt. Even the thinly carpeted floors of my hotel room are painful against my soles. So my brain tries to calculate the shortest, most efficient route to get all my town chores done in the least distance possible. I can’t figure it out. There’s no reason this should be so difficult, but it is. It’s like I’m thinking through a haze, like a marijuana high (Later, I will realize that this is probably the result of dehydration. My muscles and tissues are still screaming for water as they repair themselves, but I’m not drinking anywhere close to the same amount as when I’m hiking, and I’m drinking coffee, a diarrhetic, on top of it all). Finally I decide to start with lunch. I walk a quarter mile in the wrong direction. That’s how hazy my thinking is. The whole town is arranged along one street, and I go the wrong way. Along the way I pass the laundromat, where Ed (Mr. Tea) and Altitude are sitting on a bench outside. Ed is just down the hall from me at the Best Western, and I offer Altitude the other bed in my room so he doesn’t have to camp on the church lawn tonight. We make plans to get dinner together. Have either of them seen a shoe store anywhere in town? They haven’t. I go back the other direction, another half mile of pavement walking on bruised feet, and find the Thirsty Trout. I order a veggie burger and a beer. There is one other person eating here, but he leaves soon after I arrive. It is just me, the bartender, and the owner. The TV is silently broadcasting olympic women’s volleyball. The owner is an older lady, and she also serves as the cook. She pops in and out to see what’s happening with the game. I stick around for a couple hours, sipping a couple beers and reading my book, but mostly chatting with the bartener. She’s a woman in her mid-twenties, and she tells me working her last day here before she moves away for college. She is excited to move, but she and the owner enjoy each other and each is sad she is leaving. They are having a going away party for her this evening with a live band, to which they invite me. I am surprised at the invite since I look like I’ve been sleeping in an ally somewhere, and probably smell like it too—I’ve had a shower, but I haven’t done laundry yet, so I’m still wearing a layer of dirt and sweat several days thick. I’m grateful for the warmth with which they’ve received me and I tell them I might come by later, but I don’t plan on it. I struggle to socialize in groups of people even when I know them. Add a dash of trail brain, and the night would be a series of blank stares and awkward silences.
I run into Altitude on the way back to the hotel and let him in to take a shower while I take my stuff to do laundry. The laundromat is playing Mahler’s 5th symphony, an unusual selection for any laundromat and especially unexpected in this small town. I grew up enjoying classical music, and grew to love it more as I got better at the trumpet through high school, but it was always peripheral for me. Mahler’s 5th is the piece that put classical music in the center of my listening identity. It was dramatic, violent music, the heavy metal of the symphonic world. It didn’t hurt that it started with a dark trumpet fanfare before it launched into a funeral march. I started my laundry and sat at a picnic table out front in my rain pants, listening to classical music and reading my book. An enjoyable way to spend the afternoon. A couple hours later, with everything clean, I meet up with Ed and Altitude for dinner at a pizza joint. We order a pitcher of beer and a pizza each. It’s a busy place for a Thursday night. We fall into the easy conversation of people who have been through the same experiences, met a lot of the same people, have the same goals to look forward to. Despite our different ages and backgrounds, the trail has brought us together. After a while, Ed starts to worry about finishing the trail. We go through the math together, using the calculators on our phones. We have only 45 days left until the end of September, and that with no zeros, that means 29 miles a day. A freak snowstorm near the end of September, and our hike would be over. There’s the possibility that we might not get major snow until October, but that’s a risky move. Ed explains how we could get up to Hart’s Pass (the northernmost accessible point of the PCT on this side of the Canadian border). He wants us to join him in flipping. I’m not ready. He’s right about it all, but it doesn’t feel right to me, at least not yet. I have imagined my way all the way to Canada so many times, that to head up there now would be like opening my Christmas presents early. The rest of the trip would be a bit of a letdown, and then I’d finish my trip here in Chester. It’s a great little town, don’t get me wrong, but it would be really difficult to see it as a finish line of any sort. I suggest flipping at Castella. It’s right along Interstate 5, so we could easily find transportation to Washington and back home after the trail, Castle Crags State Park would provide a scenic finish line, and we’d get to spend our last few days looking at Mt. Shasta. It’s only about a hundred miles away, so we’re only delaying by 4 to 5 days. The new plan is agreeable. We toast. To Castella! After all this isolation, I finally have a trail family. I imagine us laughing and eating meals together, sharing conversations on the trail and hiking separately, too. I feel the relief of knowing that I’ll have people to camp with, that we can face the bumps in the night together. By the time we finish our pizzas and our second pitcher of beer, we’re all in a fantastic mood with more than a little buzz. We head back to the hotel to enjoy the jacuzzi before it closes. Naturally, a swimsuit has no place in a lightweight hiker’s backpack. Skinny dipping isn’t an option here, so we each improvise our own swimsuit out of our trail clothes. It’s all quick-dry clothing, anyway. We smuggle some more beer in plastic hotel cups and continue our planning, dreaming about the trail ahead. A group of five, possibly a family, shows up for a little while, and we talk with them, but thruhiker brains work at a different speed so the long silences become a bit awkward and the conversation dies. They move off to the pool, and then to a grassy area beyond it where they have some food. Ed is agog at a pretty twenty-something asian girl in a black bikini. We rib him a bit and try to get him to go talk to her. We’re a little drunk, and it seems like he’s going to work up the courage for a minute, but the moment passes and the next thing we know a security guard is telling us that the pool is closing. We go back to our rooms and Altitude and I channel-surf the TV for a little bit before bed. In my stiflingly soft bed, in this stuffy room, I just can’t wait to get out into the open air again and camp with my friends. I have a trail family! |
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Nick is a teacher, writer, and amateur adventurer. Archives
June 2020
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