July 19, 2016 Mile 906.7-923.1 16.4 miles A moral quandary: when a non-tangible good or service is received and the seller never comes to collect payment, is one still obligated to find a way to pay? We stayed the night in the Red’s Meadow campground; it's a private campground, and a sign told us that someone would come by to collect payment. We took our site early in the evening and no one came by. Now it’s morning, and I wonder whether I’m morally obligated to pay. This isn't really an issue, of course: we have no intention of waiting around or searching for someone to pay. If we can get away without paying, we will, and without guilt. But as we set off toward the Devil's Postpile, my mind spins with interesting questions about ownership and social norms. For instance, is ownership only possible because of social norms? It can't be a natural law, unless it's just power, and it certainly doesn't seem to be based in personal belief. If I walk into a jewelry store and steal a bunch of diamonds, even if I believe they are mine now, almost no one would agree that they are mine. If the diamonds were given to me in someone’s will, almost everyone would agree that they are mine once the will is executed, even before I become aware of it. It seems to be the community’s beliefs that gives legs to the ownership concept. I start to follow a line of thinking about laws—are they anything more than codified social norms?—and I quickly lose the thread in a tangle as I try to follow different types of laws to their first principles. My thinking is generally clearer and more focused out in the wild, but even out here I can only follow a line for so long before my mind starts to wander. After a short confusion about which dirt road and trail to take, we find ourselves staring up at tall hexagonal basalt columns, pressed together like an MC Escher drawing. Lindsey and I go up to them, place our hands against the cool stone. At the base, a pile of fallen pillars resembles an enormous, petrified pile of grated cheese. The trail is lined with toppled giants. We follow it around several outgrowths of these enormous rock crystals, remnants of geological forces far more potent than laws and social norms, then finally away into the woods. The PCT and the JMT split here, the first time that’s happened since they joined back near Mt. Whitney. I’ve wanted to see the PCT section here for a while, but Lindsey has never been on this portion of the JMT. I’m long past worrying about whether an alternate route will ruin my thru-hike; jumping back and forth on trail has already made a continuous through impossible for this year, and this is one of the standard alternates anyway. Most PCT hikers, myself included, will also divert off the main path to visit Crater Lake in Oregon. Besides, isn’t the structure of the trail, and of a thru-hike, just another example of a socially-held belief? It’s not like the trail is a first principle, or the result of a geological force like the Devil’s Postpile. We turn up the JMT, and I have a moment of regret for the path I didn’t take. We climb up a gentle slope through woods that hint at a view to the northeast. Dappled shade covers us and we are alone with only the crunch of our trail runners. Even water, which has been so plentiful for the past three hundred miles of trail, has become still and silent. A lake speckled with lily-pads floats out of the trees, but the creek that feeds it is nowhere to be found. A bright meadow appears to our left, and then the trees begin to spread apart, gradually exposing us to increasing sunlight. On our right appear the Trinity Lakes, then Gladys lake, where I can still remember the electric hum of mosquitoes from a night spent near the shore eight years ago. We have reached the top of a pass that is too low to have a name, and now we plunge through switchbacks that never end. When we finally get to the bottom, someone has shit right along the side of the trail and left a large pile of toilet paper. Lindsey and I sneer in disgust and complain about the selfishness of some people, ruining things for everyone. I briefly revisit social norms and think of a Bob Dylan quote that I’ve always loved: “To live outside the law you must be honest.” As much as I love casting aside social norms and strictures in the wilderness, there are principles that transcend that. Maybe someone had an emergency and didn’t have time to get off the trail, but leaving toilet paper and not burying the poop is just an asshole move. We pass near Shadow Lake, and now I have two layers of memories to revisit and reprocess: my JMT trip with Brian, and another trip with my Dad—my very first backpacking trip. It’s a miracle that I decided to keep backpacking; not only did the bears steal our food, but the mosquitoes were the worst I've ever experienced and we carried so much weight that our feet ached continuously. And yet, there were moments of beauty that were so magical that none of that mattered in the end. I would face those mosquitoes and bears and achy feet again and again to touch that magic one more time. We stop at the inlet to Shadow lake for water, in the same place that my dad and I filtered water for the very first time. I remember how striking the Sierra water tasted that first time, and the memory heightens my attention as I take my first sip. The layers of association deepen my experience. I realize with a moment of insight that this is the reason why musicians enjoy classical music more than most. We have layers upon layers of association. On the purely musical level: texture and timbre comparisons, form and harmony analyses, phrasing structure, rhythmic associations, dynamic awareness, national and ethnic categories, historical eras and influences. Then there is the personal history: memories of attending concerts or hearing a piece for the first time, overcoming related technical challenges, practice time spent shaping phrases and working with the nuances of style, performances, and a million other details of personal experience that help a piece of music to come alive. Expectations and predictions come gushing forth without effort, and a well-crafted piece of music continues to surprise and delight long after the first listen (this is also why most musicians I know avoid the “ear-worm” variety of pop music found on top-40 radio. The surprises are all spent after the first listen.) My mind is spinning quickly now, and I make the connection back to trails. I've wondered in the past why some trails simply bore me to tears, and others never seem to lose my interest. Now it’s apparent that it has everything to do with complexity, experience, and the number of associations I’m able to make. Features like lakes, streams, and erosion patterns provide me with endless fascination. As I spend more time out here, I’m starting to see more differences between rocks and trees and similar types of flowers, and so new layers of association are building up. These places where I’ve been before have added memories, and so I enjoy them even more. Immersion allows us to parse subtleties that were invisible to us before. Experience gives us personal memories. Together, these lead to increasing enjoyment and mastery. We start a long climb away from Shadow Lake. The uphill struggle floods my body and mind with endorphins, and I start to free associate on the themes of mastery, immersion, and the parsing of subtleties. At the same time I am constantly comparing the landscape to my memories of it. I try to explain all of these ideas to Lindsey, but it comes out as a combination of jumbled mess and obvious banalities, and I think Lindsey begins to doubt my sanity. This is a common occurrence for us. My insights seem so potent to me, but I seem unable to adequately fit language to them. My revery is broken by the startling snort of a horse. Someone says “Detour,” but it takes me a second to pick out the drab olive clothing from the background. Two women are dressed in forest service uniforms. One is seated on a horse, the other on a rock with an open metal lunchbox beside her. “We’re doing some trailwork,” says the one on the horse, “can you guys go around here?” “Yeah, no problem,” I say. It seems like I should say more, but I don’t. We climb up and around them, and they quickly disappear from view. Out of my reverie and back in the present, Lindsey and I carry on an easy conversation. We’re back on the topic of children, sort of. This time we're talking about what we want to do before we have children. Places we want to travel, adventures we want to have, more degrees we want to earn, new careers we want to begin. It spins out of control so fast that we have to rein ourselves in. But there will always be something else to do before having kids, we say after each time we get carried away. Some of those adventures can wait for later. I have faith that later won’t become never, like it does for most people. We are both pretty intentional about our lives. The silver sound of water gradually increases to a white roar. Soon we are climbing next to cascading staircases of water. It is overwhelming, both in volume and beauty. We fall into a reverent silence; we become a single point of awareness. The trail climbs again, away from water. We stop for lunch at a rock looking east over the area. After lunch we cross over a shoulder into the basin of Ruby Lake. Dark granite streaked with weeping snowmelt plunges deep into the water. The trail crosses the opposite shore. Another climb to Emerald lake, and yet another to Garnet, which affords a picturesque view of Banner and Ritter Peaks. We take another break for water. Strange alien noises come across the expansive lake. It takes a minute before I’m able to pick out a man sitting in the shade of a twisted foxtail pine across the way. I can’t tell why he's making the noises, but he appears to be baiting a fishing hook and under no duress. We make our final climb for the day up to the postcard-perfect Thousand Island Lake. We set up our tent in a flat sandy spot nestled in the granite batholith above the northwestern shore. We have neighbors on both sides, but they are both a couple hundred yards away. I can pick out tents scattered all around the lake; this is a popular area.
We are both tired and find spots to lean against the warm rocks with our books. It’s still early afternoon, so we alternate between periods of reading and long moments staring in awe at the stunning landscape until it’s time for dinner. Every half hour or so, one of us sighs at the incredible expanse of beauty before us.
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July 18, 2016 Mile 891.8-906.7 14.9 Miles The intensity of a memory is proportional to the suffering inherent in the experience. Virginia lake, Purple Lake, Duck Lake outlet; these are vivid places, as alive today as when I first crossed their paths. Their liquid soundtracks are filled with piercing whines, percussive slaps, and choking curses. Their stunning beauty is inexorably accompanied by hypodermic pricking and rash-like itching. Though the upcoming section of trail is aesthetically perfect in my mind, I am not eager to open the tent and face the mosquitoes again. Nonetheless, the sunlight is fresh on the mountaintops when we break camp. “That was a great campsite,” Lindsey says as we start hiking. “I could hear the wind just ripping, but I barely felt it. It was nice and warm.” “Yeah. I bet our neighbors didn’t get much sleep last night.” They are still hunkered down in their tents just north of Virginia Lake. Without nearby trees or slopes, they must have felt every jab and hook the wind delivered. Now that we are out of the tent and moving, we can feel the icy chill in our hands and cheeks. Our first stop is Purple Lake, where we make breakfast on a flat, sunny rock above the north shore. I am especially nervous about mosquitoes here; my elbows and temples send me phantom itches every few seconds, pavlovian etchings deep in my nervous system left over from my last visit. I wait for the cloud to descend as we cook our oatmeal, but it remains pleasant and mosquito-free. The lake is placid, walled in on three sides by steep talus. The fourth side is open to Fish Creek canyon, and it is there that the lake makes its languorous exit. After breakfast the trail follows the eastern wall of Fish Creek’s expansive valley. Distant mountains can be glimpsed to the west and north, and an occasional small creek crisscuts the slope. We cross the Duck Lake outlet; the lake is above us to the east and invisible, but a healthy flow of water descends through a marshy garden of lupine, columbine, and tiger lilies. Up through a dry wood, Lindsey and I talk about whether Brian and Susie are going to last as a couple. During the days spent with them at VVR, there was a tension that we haven’t seen before. Not constant, but popping up at unexpected times. We're worried for them. The dry wood goes on and on, and we alternate between conversation and stretches of silence. Eventually the spartan forest shows a crack in its armor: a narrow stream traces a straight line down a steady slope. The trail parallels it, but we are headed uphill. I remember this stream and a large campsite nearby where Brian and I joined two other groups for dinner and a fireside conversation. This reminiscing has become as enjoyable as the scenery itself It seems much longer than I remember, but we eventually find the red cones, two volcanic remnants perched on the rim of a massive downslope. I've wanted to climb these for a while. They aren’t all that tall or far from the trail, and I’m told it’s an easy tenth of a mile to the top of one of them, but not today. I am already very tired, and it looks like we’re going to make the mileage to hit Red's meadow this afternoon. We cross a creek on a log, start our downhill switchbacks and find a good place for lunch. Right as our bodies enter “rest and digest” mode, the forest spits us out onto an exposed slope, the result of the 1992 Rainbow Fire. It's hard to believe that 24 years later, there are still so few trees. We are tired, and now we’re hot too. But there's nothing for it but to plod along. As we get to the bottom, I point out one of the PCT markers to Lindsey. It’s a wood square stamped with the PCT logo, cattle-brand style. “I think this is the marker where I decided I was definitely going to hike the PCT,” I tell her. “I have a picture where I'm holding up two fingers next to this marker. Two years. Obviously that didn’t happen.” That was in 2008. The timeline didn’t work out, but this is still an important place to me. Lindsey is kind, shows interest even though I have been regaling her with my memories for days now. It's hard to express what this place means to me, especially now that I'm in the middle of turning that dream into a reality. I’m starting to see my obsession with my memories and landmarks as ego-driven. Why, really, should they be as important to anyone as they are to me? Can it be enough for me to appreciate them for myself without expecting that others will care as much as me? Or do I need to feel seen? Our feet are sore as we come in to Red’s Meadow. There is a country store here, and we buy beer and ice cream and sit on the lawn to chat and laugh. Someone walks by with a dog and Lindsey falls in love. More dogs. We chat with some other hikers, and some tourists who wonder about our packs and where we’re going. They are appropriately impressed. We walk over to the showers—natural mineral water showers that I remember were uncontrollably hot and stank of sulfur, but we could both use a shower and I doubt I could smell much worse than I do—but they are closed, permanently. We resign ourselves to a few more days of stink and head over to the campground. We choose a site on the end. Next door is a young man who has just returned from the same direction as us. His friends quit the JMT the day before, and he decided to head out on his own, but quickly decided that it was no fun without them and turned back. He wants to know if we want any of his food. We take a few items, but most of it is freeze-dried meals with meat, and we are carrying too much food anyway.
Dinner is at the cafe adjacent to the store, which has the same delicious chocolate shake that I remember, and then an early bedtime. July 17, 2016 Mile 878.7-891.8 (+1.5) 14.6 miles The ferry leaves at 9, which seems like no big deal when we wake at 6:30. Lindsey and I start our packing. The most difficult part is trying to fit our food resupply into our bear canisters, but everything seems confusing and impossible. On my own in the wild, I can break camp in 15 minutes. Put me in a civilized space, and the exact same task can spread into an hour or more. My brain feels like someone has shaken me awake from a deep sleep and asked me to do theoretical physics. Really, the problem is choices. In the wild, my choices have been whittled down to a linear series of steps, all of which are laid out before me in a confined location (my tent). In a hotel room or here in this tent cabin, I have food outside in the bear box, my gear is spread around the room haphazardly, and I have to make decisions about what to do first (or whether I should even be starting before I go to use the restroom). I am flummoxed: how did I ever get anything accomplished in civilized life? At 7:15 we are still a long ways from packed up, but yesterday’s long wait at the restaurant taught us that we’ll need plenty of time for breakfast if we’re going to make the ferry, so the four of us walk down. If it’s possible, there are at least twice as many people as yesterday. We get on the list and wait nervously outside the restaurant. Nobody will tell us how long the wait is. It's starting to look hopeless. Brian and Susie continue to wait while Lindsey and I go back up to the tent cabin to finish packing. At 8 we finish packing and head back down. We’re finally seated at 8:15. We tell the person who seats us that we need to make the ferry. 45 minutes until it leaves. We sit and watch everything going on around us. It feels like we don't have time to start a conversation of our own. At 8:30 the waitress comes by. “Sorry for the wait, folks. We've been up all night serving food to the hotshot crews.” “No problem,” I say. I didn’t realize, but I think that's a pretty cool thing that they’re doing. “We’re trying to make the ferry. Do you think we’ll be able to make it?” “It'll be tight, but I can let the cook know.” We take the risk and order. Hikers, like armies, travel on their stomachs. Our food arrives at 8:40, and Lindsey and I race to finish, stuffing massive chunks of french toast and omelettes into our mouths, slurping syrup and guzzling coffee. We hug Brian and Susie goodbye, then check out with the front desk while Brian and Susie are still finishing their food. Our total bill with VVR is close to $300! I had heard it was easy to rack up a bill here. No time to think about it now, though. I pay. We run up the hill, grab our packs, and reach the ferry at 8:58. We made it. Our minds are still racing, our bodies are primed for fast action, but now there’s nothing to do but stand and wait. A few other backpackers hurry down. They’re officially late now, but the ferry isn’t even docked yet. Eventually we all file onto the boat, leaning our backpacks one against the other in a line along the side. The ferry ride takes about an hour. The air is clear; perhaps they’ve made progress on that fire. The helicopters are still dunking their buckets in the lake, though, so it’s not out yet. It’s a nice way to look at the landscape, from the water like this. At the end of the lake, we all step off and mill around aimlessly for a bit, adjusting our packs, like we're not sure what we're supposed to do now. Finally a few hikers peel off and head up the trail. Lindsey and I follow. We climb toward Silver Pass with an aggressive stride. Lindsey has her trail legs under her now and we are cruising. It makes me proud We hit the top of the pass before lunch, then stop at Squaw lake to eat (they really need to rename that). We dip down to Fish Creek, cross over a bridge, then climb up to Tully Hole, a little meadow surrounded on all sides by steep walls. Some switchbacks and a small climb bring us up further to a small boulder field near Lake Virginia. “We stopped for a thunder storm here,” I tell Lindsey. She already knows what I'm talking about, because I’ve been talking about it all week. I mean when I did the JMT. “Oh,” she says. “I think we set up our tents right there, and Brian G set up over there.” I gesture to two spots about 10 meters from one another. Brian G is a different Brian than the one I hiked the JMT with. We met him on the JMT and kept in touch afterward. Lindsey and I have gone hiking with him a few times, so she’s not particularly surprised at what I say next. In fact, she’s probably heard this story before. “We lay in our tents listening to the thunder echo around us, feeling like the world was gonna end, and played classical name-that-tune.” If you hadn't figured it out by now, I am a huge nerd. “Oh,” Lindsey says. “Cool.” I can tell she is very impressed by my amazingly interesting story. At the head of Virginia lake is a group of five hikers. I’m not sure if they're all part of the same group or just camping together, but Lindsey and I are tired and planning to camp here too. We ask them if they’ve seen any other sites nearby. They direct us toward a copse of trees to the east where one of them saw a site. It turns out to be one of the best sites around. There is a rock wall windbreak (which comes in handy later when the wind picks up a lot), and the trees are on all sides except toward the lake, giving us both privacy and a view.
We get water at the lake and join the group for dinner. They’re friendly and not all part of the same group as it turns out. All of them are southbound JMT hikers. When we return to the tent, we discover that the zipper is breaking. We are able to get it together enough to keep out the mosquitoes, though, and sink off to sleep. July 16, 2016 0 Miles Lindsey, Suzy, and Brian are all still sleeping. I have been awake for an hour, staring at the canvas ceiling and thinking about an ever-shifting nothing. I can stay still no longer. I grab my book and my sweater and try to exit with as little noise as possible. It’s useless. The zippered door slices the quiet morning like a scalpel. I can hear all three shifting in their beds as I slash through their dreams a second time to seal out the light, the mosquitoes, and myself. Lindsey follows about twenty minutes later. We have a good read, an hour or longer, and try to ignore our growing hunger while we wait for Brian and Suzy to wake. Finally they’re up and we trudge down to the restaurant to break our fast. The restaurant bustles. Roadside diners don't have this much traffic. Most of it is hotshot crews, but there are also a couple families. We are seated and warned that breakfast will take a while. We are hungry and a little testy, mostly toward each other, but we’re grateful for all of these volunteer firefighters. Our food arrives, and our spirits pick up. Once again, I polish off two breakfasts with ease. Brian tells me I’m a pig, but I’m proud of my appetite. I’ve earned it. We head back up to the tent patio and play our favorite card game Spades. Brian and I have been playing since high school. We’ve perfected our team strategies over the years, which mostly include cheating by showing each other cards while the other team isn't looking. Getting caught is part of the fun. Lindsey and Suzy are wise to our trickery, so they force us to play on separate teams. The fresh air, the camaraderie, my full belly, and a good coffee buzz put me in a great mood. Lindsey and I win the game because we are naturally better at everything than Brian is. Brian wants to go explore for a while, and we head into the forest just south of us. We wander and play like boys, challenging each other to feats of balance and speed, throwing rocks, and climbing on high things. It's great fun, even though the girls are rolling their eyes at us the entire time. After lunch we drive down to Mono Hot Springs again. It is even busier than yesterday. The four of us try out all the different springs. We start with a grassy amoeba-shaped pond that we hadn’t seen before called Little Eden. It’s lukewarm, but it's a hot day anyway. Next we go to Old Pedro, the cement tubs on the other end of the springs. We get through them all, but we have to skip around a lot because many are stocked full of people. Unlike most hot springs, everyone here is clothed. Eventually we end up in a little pool next to the river where hot water falls over a muddy overhang. It’s a great combination of hot mineral water and cold river water.
We stay for a couple hours, talking and laughing, then ride back to the resort for a nap. The evening ends with dinner over the campfire (where Brian repeatedly drops the corn and potatoes into the fire and we all laugh), another day crammed full of fun and peace. I love hiking, but I sure love zero days too. I'm concerned about the collection of my data on the internet and other places, and you probably are too. My concern isn’t that companies or the government are going to find out something illegal or immoral that I’m doing. No, I am worried that companies have too much power to predict and influence my behavior. In one of the previous issues of this newsletter, I included an article that talked about the way internet news has become more divisive and negative due to the way the algorithms favor outrage and sensational content over more substantive, nuanced thinking. That’s only one example of how the collection of data is making our world worse. Another one is that customer service departments are using data to figure out how long they can put you on hold before they lose you as a customer (check out the article below for more on that). A third one is the way that google is walling up the internet (see the other article below for more on that).
Of course, the problem isn't with the data itself—I actually think it’s a useful thing to know that people are drawn to inflammatory content. The problem is that the companies that write the algorithms aren’t concerned about whether sharing inflammatory content is good for society—they’re incentivized to make the most money possible. So like most things in our society, if they don’t make money, they perish to competition. That’s also true for the engineer who creates the algorithm (because she will be replaced if she writes an algorithm that promotes substantive articles instead of inflammatory ones, and therefore gets fewer shares). Incentives are powerful and most companies will follow the path of least resistance. Like most problems in our world, the solution requires either a plurality of people to flip the cultural norms, or laws and regulations that have the best interest of society in mind instead of the best interest of the economy. Switching cultural norms is easier said than done, but I don’t see that we have any other option, since laws are written by the people that the culture elects (and right now, our culture is run by economic incentives, not social incentives) When enough people opt out of inflammatory content, and/or the harvesting of their data, and/or gross consumerism, some small part of the incentives begin to move towards better, pro-social solutions. Some companies have already built a niche out of the support of the thoughtful minority that is fighting the path of least resistance. One example is Duck Duck Go, which is a free internet browser and search engine that promises not to harvest your data like google does (great, this sounds like a commercial now—I get nothing from them except possibly a world where fewer people let their data get harvested willy-nilly). If you know of others, please share with me. I’d especially like to know if anyone has a good solution to email. I also keep my browser set to private so that the websites I visit can’t harvest my data. That has occasionally been frustrating, when I go to open an article and the news company refuses to allow me to read it unless I agree to give them my data. When that happens, I sigh and go read something else. My hope is that if enough people start to do that, the companies will be incentivized to change. Probably not, but at least I can feel a tiny bit better that I’m not contributing to the problem. Google is destroying the internet Everyone hates customer service this is why July 15, 2016 No PCT miles ~5 miles We only sleep like the dead for a couple hours before I am awake again. People are talking and laughing, loudly. I sit up and look through the mesh of my tent and see a large bonfire close to the restaurant. People are clustered around in a couple groups, but I’m bleary and it’s hard to make out individuals. I check my watch: 12:30am. Try to go back to sleep. Someone moans uncomfortably in a nearby tent. Night terrors or illness, I can’t tell. Another neighbor suffers from an uncomfortable insomnia, expressed by the noisy slide of artificial fabrics every few minutes as he rolls back and forth. All these people, all these noises. I slip back down and manage to string together enough broken sleep that I feel moderately rested when we emerge from the tent in the morning. A smoky haze has replaced the mountain air and makes everything look twice as far away. I order two breakfasts at the restaurant, Lindsey orders one. I finish both of mine and help her finish hers. A hotshot crew sits in the booth next to us and with a little eavesdropping I learn that the fire is only a couple miles away. It’s not large, relatively speaking, but it picked up a bit overnight because the helicopters that have been dumping water on it aren’t allowed to operate at night. It sounds like there isn’t much danger to the resort unless the wind changes, and the volunteer firefighters think that’s unlikely in this weather. Lindsey and I have most of the day before Brian and Suzy arrive, so we decide to hike a four-mile trail down to Mono Hot Springs. We bring a bag of snacks and a water bottle apiece. The trail slopes gently downhill through peaceful meadows and shady forest. After weeks of hauling my pack, I feel buoyant without it. Lindsey and I talk about all of the books we have read while we’ve been apart for the past month. We cross a creek and consider going for a dip—it’s a hot day—but we decide to wait until our return trip. The trail spits us out on a dirt road with a few dispersed campsites. There doesn’t appear to be anyone around, just cars and tents. We continue a short way to an asphalt road in disrepair. Which way? I guess right. We find ourselves at another little store, restaurant, and single-story hotel. It’s only slightly more built up than Vermilion Valley Resort. We don’t see the springs anywhere, though there are a lot more people here. We cross the street to a campground. It’s bustling; every campsite has a group of seven or eight people, it seems, and children are playing everywhere. We guess the direction again and find ourselves lost in a dead end. Doubling back, we stop a friendly-looking guy.
“Excuse me, do you know which way the hot springs are?” “I’m heading there, follow me.” He takes us down to a river, where we remove our shoes and socks to cross. The hot springs are right there on the other side. We start in a small cement pool, just big enough for three or four people. Our guide starts telling us about different drug trips he’s been on. Interesting as far as it goes, but after we’ve tried to change the conversation a couple of times without success, we decide to explore the other springs. Most of the others are full of people, but it’s too hot anyway, so we decide to dip in the river instead. We watch families go by in innertubes and floaties. Others play on the beach and swim in the deep water. It’s a busy swimming hole, but there is plenty of room for everyone. When the chill of the water gets us to shivering, we go for lunch at the restaurant. Like VVR, it’s expensive, but I don’t get many town days and I’m already losing weight, so a veggie burger and french fries are oh so worth it. We decide to take the road back to VVR in the hope that we can hitch a ride from someone. Unlike the gently graded, direct trail, the road winds every direction, including steeply up and down. We are alone on the road for twenty minutes, and the first car passes without stopping. Another fifteen minutes before the next car does the same. We resign ourselves to walking the whole way. Alongside the road are a series of tin roofs on cinder block walls. The walls are square and low to the ground with no door or hatch for entrance. We try to figure out what they could be while we climb and descend hill after hill. A little later we hear gunfire in a gully off the road. It sounds close. Probably just someone having some fun with target practice, but we have no idea what direction its aimed, so it makes us nervous. We try to hurry past the area, but it still sounds close no matter how far we hike. A third vehicle approaches and we stick out our thumbs. It stops! An old cowboy looks out at us over a handlebar mustache. “Where ya headed?” “Vermilion Valley Resort.” “I gotta take somethin’ to th’other side of the lake first, but if ya don’t mind the side trip, I can take ya.” We climb into the bed of a 1950s-era pickup. A large piece of plywood covers most of the rusted-out bottom; we can see the road through the uncovered areas. Near the cab there are a few tools and a leather saddle with stirrups. He knows the road like an old friend and drives us quickly and smoothly, easily avoiding the worst potholes. When we arrive at a junction, he stops the truck and calls back “I gotta go up that way for a bit, but Vermilion is only a half mile down that road.” We thank him and hop out of the truck. Back at the camp, we decide to take a nap. An hour later, I sit up and look out of the tent. Right on time, I see Brian’s forest green jeep drive up. We pack up our stuff to move into the tent cabin that he and Suzy have rented for the next two nights. Hugs all around. I’ve asked Brian to bring me a book: The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro. “The bookstore didn’t have it,” he says, “so I got this instead.” I stare at the slim volume—The Hardy Boys—that will probably take me an hour to read. Oh shit, I’m going to be so bored. “Thank you…” I say, but I can tell it’s not very convincing. I look up to see a grin on his face. He pulls “The Buried Giant” from behind his back. Evening falls, and we walk down to the shore to watch a colorful sunset (painted by the smoke from the nearby fire) and a colony of bats that swoops and dips to catch mosquitoes and other insects. We walk back to our tent cabin in the dark, make dinner around a campfire, and then retreat into the tent, where I read us all to sleep in a very dramatic voice: passages from The Hardy Boys. July 14, 2016 Mile 873.6-878.7 (+4.5) 9.6 Miles Bastille Day. Brian’s Birthday. We’ll see him tomorrow. Today we’re headed into Vermilion Valley Resort, one day earlier than we had planned. It’s a warm, lethargic morning, and an odor of woodsmoke fills the air. It’s not sharp like a nearby campfire would be, but it’s consistent, like a well-steeped tea. A wildfire, then. Hope it’s not too close. We take our time waking and packing up. It’s less than ten miles to the resort, and we’re taking a double-zero, or two days without hiking, so we’ll have plenty of time for chores. We hike up and over Bear Ridge. My memories seem stronger here. Most of the way along the John Muir Trail, the scenes have been distorted and stretched out of proportion—those rocks are bigger, there are bushes where I don’t remember them, that lake is a different shape. Here, though, everything is as I left it 8 years ago. The “ridge” at the top is actually a long flat forest that moves so gradually from uphill to downhill that it’s impossible to determine a top. The gradual downhill begins to steepen slowly, then swiftly, and the straight path splinters into switchbacks. Down, down, down. The dry, sandy soil darkens and compacts. Loosely arranged pine forest thickens with firs. A glimpse to the west is almost visible before the trail turns back to the east; the trail yearns toward a faintly audible stream in the east, then returns west again. Over and again, over and again. We tramp onward in meditative quiet. Footslaps and pack jangles and a lonely bird serve as meditation bells that bring us back into the enveloping silence. The soil thickens and dampens again at an imperceptible rate. Ferns, then clover, then flowers. Each one makes an appearance in turn, and we know we are near the end of our descent. The pine soldiers have been replaced by grandfatherly ponderosas, and the silver and white bark of cottonwoods and aspens shines against the greenery that now floods the forest floor. Fools’ names and initials adorn the bright wood. They are monuments to the pernicious indefatigability of human ego. We reach a junction on the valley floor and turn West, away from the Pacific Crest Trail and the John Muir Trail, toward Lake Edison and the Vermilion Valley Resort. The character of the new trail is different. Where the PCT/JMT was smooth, civilized, and curvilinear, this spur is a jumble of mud and chaos. The mud: some hidden in deep grass and some exposed in long, unavoidable tracks of black. The chaos: a tangle of raised boardwalks and overgrown vegetation, the former haphazardly constructed into roller-coaster-like dips and swoops which end at mudholes at least as often as they pass above them, the latter a collection of fallen saplings, branches, and vines, mostly at ankle- and knee-level but occasionally—and especially when you’re looking down—at forehead level. We thoroughly saturate our shoes and abrade our legs as we pass through the belly of the beast, until we find ourselves spat out at another junction with a view of the lake. A sign points left: VVR ferry. We continue straight. We’ll take the ferry back in a couple days, but the lake is only a few miles long and we want to save some of our money. Continuing along the North shore of the lake, we stop for lunch on a granite bench overlooking the water. A stately bristlecone shades a small patch of sand and gravel. We sit and watch as the ferry slices a surgical line through the skin of the lake. Its engine traces the same line—an echoless droning incision across the silent vellum. A wide plume of smoke sits to the Northwest, beyond the rim of the lake basin. We are headed that direction, but not that far. After lunch, it’s only another hour to VVR. We arrive at a small campground and country store. First beer on the house (hikers only). The lady at the register greets us and gives us the rundown on shower, campsite, laundry. The showers are quick, the laundry is slow. We drip dry and wait for our laundry at a round metal table with a couple other hikers. The slow laundry helps the store make back their money from the free beer earlier: I drink a few more while we wait.
We have dinner at a small restaurant attached to the store. Prices are high, but the hot meal is worth it. We stumble back to our tent and sleep like the dead. July 13, 2016 Mile 862.6-873.6 11 Miles We start the morning with a leisurely breakfast in camp. I’ve realized that there’s no reason to hustle through these miles. We’re going to meet a couple of friends, Brian and Suzy, at Vermilion Valley Resort in a couple days, and we’re close enough to reach there tomorrow. The first short climb brings us up to the Sallie Keys lakes. They are sepia mirrors. Walls of gravel frame us in and the path cuts right down the middle. A corner of one lake has a logjam, and the trail crosses on that. The shade here has rendered the lake’s surface invisible and trout float effortlessly, as if suspended on strings above the silty zen garden below. As the first time I passed through here eight years ago, I am note the absence of tension within me. We linger to gather water. There are mosquitoes, but they cannot touch the peace inside me. We climb to Heart lake, shaped appropriately and small enough it seems I could hold it in my hands. A small fountain gently fills the pool at one end, burbling with music and sunlight as it falls over the rocks. I am feeling especially grateful and loving today, and I think I know why. Today is our third wedding anniversary We climb up Selden Pass, which greets us with one of the most spectacular views in the Sierra: Marie Lake. It is a beauty, speckled with granitic islands that are each in turn similarly dotted with bonsai-like pine trees. It crackles and sputters with late morning light. The land falls away on one side of the lake to reveal distant mountains layered on top of one another. A mother and daughter are resting here, and they kindly take our picture. We quickly descend to the lake, where we stop to wash our faces and collect more water. The peaceful stillness and gentle splashing of water is quickly pierced by whining mosquitoes that swarm in to feast on our flesh. We make quick business of refilling our bottles and hop back on the trail. It’s lunchtime, so we stop at a granite bench just out of mosquito range from the lake. The formerly sparse trail has become a parade of hikers as we sit on the sidelines and snack on dried mango. All of the late risers have finally packed up their tents and and started their miles for the day. After lunch, we make our way down to Bear Creek Ford. The guidebook tells me that it can be a dangerous crossing, with crushing waist-high water that will try to sweep us off of the slick granite and crush us against the boulders downstream. Instead we find a modest creek, calf-high at best, and no boulders in sight. A mixed group of six hikers in their fifties and sixties is in process of crossing with no difficulty. The lattermost woman in the group strikes up a conversation with Lindsey. I am passively listening, but mostly I’m observing the group as a whole. I’m not sure why, but my brain recently seems fascinated with groups of people interacting with the land. I think I’m watching for different levels of mastery and comfort. By their body language, I can usually pick out a group leader and the person who is most comfortable outdoors within a minute or two. They are often the same person, but not always, and I find that to be an interesting fact. I’m in the process of trying to suss out the differences, when I hear Lindsey’s new friend speak a name that I recognize. “Oh my gosh! Yes! He played at our wedding!” Lindsey says, and it’s true. I rewind the tape in my head to try to catch up to the conversation. I can only remember snatches of Lindsey’s side “…Bay Area…musician…specialize in early music…IU…” Then “Do you know…?” It’s surprising, that this random stranger is a family friend of Lindsey’s friend, but perhaps not that improbable. Early music is a small community within a small world. Still, it’s an enjoyable and well-timed coincidence: it gives us another opportunity to reminisce about our wedding day. We leave the group behind and follow Bear Creek downstream for a bit. Our pace and conversation flow easily along with the creek, swift but relaxed. The flow of water and ice has sculpted the rock over eons into a slick slide. Trees have grown up alongside the granite, and the trail dips back and forth between the shade and the sunny rock. I am looking for a riverside beach sculpted out of a single slab of granite where Brian and I relaxed once after a dip in the river. Memory is imperfect and several of them almost fit the bill. We are starting to push the limit on miles without a break, and Lindsey is tiring. Finally I think I’ve found my beach. Lindsey settles in the shade for a nap, and I go for a dip. The water is, of course, ridiculously cold. I can only force myself in to the waist, and only for a short time. I retreat from the water and read my book instead: Boy’s Life by Robert McCammon. It’s one that Brian recommended to me years ago, but I never got around to it until now. It’s part mystery, part boyhood wonder, and it’s the perfect book for these longer stretches of reading that I’m getting.
After Lindsey wakes, we finish the day with a big climb up Bear Ridge. Wildflowers fill the south-facing slope: red paintbrush, columbine, tiger lilies, monkeyflower, lupine. A southbound hiker recognizes Lindsey from high school. The world feels ever smaller. The campsite we stop at is a large flat area right between switchbacks. It’s big enough for more tents, but no one else stops, though plenty of hikers come by. I build a fire out of pine cones and downed wood, the first fire since Lindsey joined me. We share a packet of freeze-dried gourmet indian food we’ve saved to celebrate our anniversary and we spend the rest of the evening recalling our favorite memories from our wedding and our marriage, and sharing the dreams we have for our future. I write in part to get better at clarifying my thoughts. That said, this is a very rough rant-like draft to get a bunch of things out of my head, and I haven't done a lot of clarifying yet. I'd love feedback on this: what's effective and what's not in making my argument? Where do you disagree with me, and why? What needs to be argued more thoroughly? Where did I over-explain and what seems tangential to the main argument? Whether you agree or disagree, please keep it civil. Thanks in advance.
I’ve had a lot of discussions about Climate Cancer recently (I’ll explain that phrase in a minute), and among believers I’ve noticed two attitudes: Alarmism and Sadness. We’ll call them Alarmists and Saddists. The vast majority of the world, and even of the US, believes that climate cancer is happening, so I’m not as concerned about non-believers. Climate denial is a fundamentalist religion and a small minority, so they have a small effect on the world and it’s very unlikely that any of us would ever reach them anyway. I’m concerned about the Saddists, which are the vast majority of climate change believers. A Saddist believes that climate change is happening, and that something should really be done about it. They know that a lot of species are going extinct, they may even recognize that we are in the midst of a 6th great extinction. They know that sea levels are going to rise, that the polar ice caps are melting, and that they should expect a lot more heat waves and extreme weather events. All these things make them really sad, like the loss of a family member. The media has done a really good job at communicating all these changes, so chances are good that this describes you. An alarmist, on the other hand, believes that the world has cancer, and that we all have cancer as a result. They believe that human-caused warming is not just about the whales, or the rainforests, or people in low-lying areas in Florida. They believe that life as we know it is coming to an end. I think the Alarmists are right. I want to convince you to be an Alarmist. The reason why most people are Saddists instead of Alarmists is that humans are very bad at thinking about second-order effects. Take a look at this list of “Global Warming Impacts”, taken from the Union of Concerned Scientists’ website (ucsusa.org): -More frequent and extreme heat -Rising seas and increased coastal flooding -Longer and more damaging wildfire seasons -More destructive hurricanes -Military bases at risk (from rising seas) -National landmarks at risk -Costly and growing health impacts -increased air pollution -longer and more intense allergy season -insect-borne diseases -Increase in extreme weather events -Destruction of marine ecosystems -More severe droughts -Widespread forest death -spread of tree-killing insects, wildfires, and stress from heat and drought -Pressure on groundwater supplies -Risks to electricity supply from storms, heat, wildfires, and flooding. -Melting ice These are mostly first-order effects with only a few second-order effects. Saddists think about these and think, “Wow, that’s sucky,” and “Yeah, these are true. We’ve seen a lot of this already.” Meanwhile an alarmist is thinking about the second-order effects: “Military bases at risk. Hmm. I can’t imagine the US would just close those bases. Either they’ll have to shore up the bases or move a lot of personnel and equipment to different, potentially less strategic places. Either way, that’s going to cost a LOT of money, not to mention tie up a lot of man hours. That’s going to be a huge drag on the economy and possibly weaken our military power. There’s no telling what could happen to the geopolitical order if that happens. Or what would happen to the economy with that sort of drag.” These are complex systems, and I’m not saying that the US would lose its geopolitical standing. What I am saying is that second order results, like the economic costs of holding on to geopolitical power, are predictable and not often reported in the media. Let’s look at some others. First-order effect: Destruction of Marine Ecosystems. Second-order effects: “Corals, shellfish, and phytoplankton, which are the base of the food chain, are particularly at risk.” (Union of Concerned Scientists) Think about what it means to destroy the base of the food chain. Not only that, but Phytoplankton are responsible for 70% of the oxygen we breathe (We’ll get to trees too). The ocean is also the primary source of protein for 3 Billion people. That’s a pretty big number of people to resign to malnutrition and starvation. First-order effect: Rising seas and increased coastal flooding. Second-order effects: -The displacement of 20% of the world’s population. That means an increase in refugees, rioting, and destabilization of governments. Some assume that countries would build levies to hold back the sea in low-lying areas, but just to protect all the places with high populations, that would cost more than twice the amount of the entire world economy. -The disruption and destruction of shipping ports. We depend on shipping ports for our food supply, among other things. This wouldn’t happen all at once, so foods and goods would become more expensive, squeezing the lower and middle classes and leading to greater political instability. First-order effect: Widespread forest death (due to bark beetle infestations, among other climate-induced stressors). Second-order effects: Hotter, faster wildfires. Erosion and mudslides. Road damage that disrupts market supply routes and incurs repair costs. Release of more carbon into the atmosphere. Trees help slow the flow of water, so many reservoirs are now filling faster than we can use the water in the spring when snowmelt happens. It also reduces our hydroelectric power, putting additional stress on our aging electric grid. First-order effect: Pressure on groundwater supply (this is an egregious example of the wishy-washy, almost apologetic communication style that climate believers use when talking about climate cancer. Pressure? A community in India just lost their groundwater supply! As in, completely dried up. That supply provided 200,000 people with water. I’ll bet those people are feeling a catastrophic loss, not pressure.) Second-order effects: Sharp reduction in agriculture yields, leading to mass starvation. Displacement of populations, refugees, mass deaths. I could go on and on like this, but you probably get the point. You may even notice some repeating themes. I believe the most important and overlooked impacts of climate cancer are: Displacement of large populations, geopolitical instability, and world war. Disruption of shipping and supply lines, as well as our aging power grid, leading to large economic shocks and possibly a global economic collapse. Global famine. The common response to all of this is that humans are resilient and creative and will come up with solutions before we feel the worst effects of climate cancer. That seems like whistling in the dark to me, and here’s why. As we’ve added renewable energy, our consumption of energy has outpaced it. We are burning fossil fuels at an ever-increasing rate despite our increased renewable energy. There have been no signs of slowing this rate. The climate is a Complex Adaptive System, which means that quick climate cooling ideas will have unpredictable and irreversible effects. Spraying dark particulates into the air to block the sun, as some have suggested, might very well trigger an ice age, disrupt the jet stream and create a polar vortex over the entire earth, or even make the earth inhospitable to all life. It’s another example of humans thinking about first order effects without considering the second order effects. If you look at the list of impacts again, you’ll notice that many of the second order effects create a spiral effect. Tree death leads to wildfires, leads to carbon released into the atmosphere. Melting ice leads to release of methane, which is a particularly potent atmosphere warmer. Heat waves lead to increased use of air conditioners, which release more carbon into the atmosphere. The point is, we can’t afford to keep waiting for a technological advance to save us. It takes a while for changes to get through the system. It’s impossible to know for sure (because it’s a complex adaptive system), but most scientists estimate that we are currently experiencing the results of the greenhouse gases of 10-30 years ago. That means that we won’t feel the effects of today’s (greatly increased!) emissions until 10-30 years from now. It’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better, and that’s even if we take drastic action. And by the way, that doesn’t include the spiraling effects that I mentioned above. Think how much worse it will be if we continue to wait another 10-30 years to change. So hopefully I’ve convinced you to become an alarmist (if not, please let me know where I lost you so I can improve my arguments or consider another viewpoint. It’s not much fun being an alarmist, so I’d welcome some hope). So the question becomes, what can we do about it? I’ll have to go more into depth some other day, but here are a few ideas: -Support gas taxes, always. It doesn’t even matter where the money from the tax is going. It will suck to pay more for gas (and everything else, because your food and goods depend on transportation), but that’s the point. We need to make it uncomfortable to use gas. Enterprising companies will cut their costs by growing and creating things closer to the places they need to ship to. People will use their cars less by moving closer to their jobs and/or working remotely. Hopefully some of the taxes will go toward better public transportation systems, but the main point is to stop the cancer from growing. -Talk about climate cancer. Use that terminology. “Change” is neutral. Cancer is imminent and distinctly negative. We need to spread the truth that this is really bad and requires immediate action. -Prioritize campaign finance reform and climate cancer in your voting, especially in local and state elections. Campaign finance is the master key to all other change, and states run elections. These changes are going to be difficult, behaviorally and economically. But we’re going to be faced with difficulty whether we change or not. I hope I’ve convinced you that this is an existential threat, not just an inconvenience. What we’re faced with is a decision between a massive, painful overhaul of our economic and social structures on the one hand, and a complete breakdown on the other hand. One theory to explain the Fermi Paradox (simplified, it says that sheer randomness should have populated the universe with lots of intelligent life, some of which should be much more advanced than us, and which should have made contact with us by now), is that a Great Filter wipes out intelligent life before it is able to travel and communicate across star systems. I believe we are at a Great Filter moment. It’s easy to envision a scenario where increasing global instability leads to a nuclear world war, or a geoengineering “solution” to climate cancer wipes out all life on the planet. Let’s hope we figure this out. July 12, 2016 853.3-862.6 (+.7) 10 miles I wake around 4:30am. I have always had trouble sleeping through the night. It’s usually better when I’m hiking, but shorter miles and yesterday’s nap have left me with a surplus of rest, and I can feel that there’s no chance I’m getting back to sleep this morning. I spend the time thinking about what I want to do for a career when I get back from the trail. I feel a little stuck, because a career change to one of the areas I know I’m interested will require more school and more debt, and I’m not sure I’m willing to go through that. I still enjoy music, but the high school gig was killing me: Marching Band rehearsals after school, football games on Friday nights, competitions and parades on the weekends. It got to be too much, and I was burnt out, short on patience with kids that deserved better. They deserved a teacher whose heart was in it. I cycle through my options and interests: Psychology, to study learning and mastery. Requires a lot more school, much of which would be outside of my interests. The jobs would mostly be in universities, which are difficult to get and could require moving away from California. Philosophy, to explore some of the big questions in aesthetics and theories of mind. More school, very competitive, not a lot of jobs. Not sure I’m disciplined enough, at least not in the way that philosophy schools would expect me to be. Writing? I love writing, people tell me I’m a good writer, and I love telling stories. I wouldn’t need to get another degree. On the other hand, it’s competitive, and I have barely scratched the surface of the craft. It doesn’t make for a lot of money. Maybe I could develop my craft on the side while I work another job. But what? I’m still as confused as ever about what I’m going to do for work, but I’m a little excited about writing. It seems like it can scratch a lot of different itches. Lindsey begins stirring just after 7. She tells me she’s been awake for a while, but she thought I was sleeping. We get moving without breakfast and follow along the San Joaquin River. We stop for water at a big bridge on the border of King’s Canyon—I have to climb down a slope and perch on a boulder that’s partially submerged to fill up my dirty bag. The water is strong and swift, definitely a larger artery than the creeks we’ve been following up to this point. We stop for breakfast a half mile later at a flat, sandy spot with some shade. There are hills that don’t fit with the erosion patterns in this valley, but they don’t look like moraines, either. The pattern-recognition software in my brain is registering an error, and it makes me uncomfortable. Throughout the John Muir Trail overlap, I’ve been surprised by how different some of these places are from my memory, but this is an area that I don’t remember at all. I try to drink it in as we eat our oatmeal, because it certainly has its beauty, dry as it is, and I love sharing it with Lindsey. In the late morning we turn off the trail to visit the hot springs near Muir Trail Ranch. This section is just as hot as I remember, and it is a relief to ford the icy San Joaquin. On the far side, either the trails have changed or my memory has failed me again, because I can’t seem to find the hot springs. We end up bushwhacking from one use trail to another, until we find ourselves next to a lake. I remember this lake! Now I am oriented, and I quickly lead Lindsey to the hot springs. The main pool is about the size of a hot tub, near the edge of a grassy meadow. The grass is trampled around the edges, but other than that, there’s no trace of human design or construction, just a water pit in the grass. We climb into the sulfurous bath and squish our toes into the mud basin. It feels a little icky, but I can feel the heat working its fingers into muscles that have been tight for over a month. The minerals and heat start to make me feel woozy and spaced-out after a bit. Another hiker greets us and joins us. He pulls pieces of plastic and metal out of his backpack and starts to construct a bong. He pulls a thick cloud of smoke through the plastic tube, expels a fit of wet coughs, then pulls again. He offers us some, but we feel relaxed enough as it is. He shrugs and smokes again. I feel some concern over the state of his lungs.
Lindsey and I head over to the lake to clean off. The water is cool, but some of the thermal water has seeped in with the snowmelt, so it’s not frigid. We cross back over the San Joaquin, which is frigid, and start our climb out of the valley. I am loose and limber after the hot and cold soaks. I check in with Lindsey—she’s okay with me hiking ahead up the switchbacks, so I charge uphill and get the endorphins pumping. I haven’t felt this good in weeks! In fact, I realize, for the first time in ages I don’t hurt anywhere. I wait for Lindsey at a junction near the top, and it turns out she’s not far behind. I feel a surge of pride: she’s getting faster. A JMT hiker asks us how far it is to Muir Trail Ranch. She has a popped air mattress and she’s hoping to get a patch kit. I imagine sleeping on the unpadded ground. On the junction sign, a cell phone sits orphaned. So many people, so many stories sharing this ribbon of earth. Each person’s adventure just as important to them as mine is to me. We continue climbing until we find a campsite near a small stream and a meadow. The mosquitoes are bad, so we take up residence inside our tent and read our books until dark. A short day, but a fun one. |
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Nick is a teacher, writer, and amateur adventurer. Archives
June 2020
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