Day 76: Mile 876.0 - 883.6

Yesterday (I'm writing this on Day 77, the day after) started off a good day. I left from VVR relatively early--had intended to close my tab at 7am when the Store opened, but the line was long (the line was also the breakfast line) so ended up closing around 8am instead. And I had intended to catch the shuttle (VVR runs a shuttle between the resort and the various trailheads) but the shuttle was already full by the time I checked. So instead I walked to the trailhead and was actually glad I did: the line streaming into the overcast of yesterday's rains, with the foreground lake disappearing up a gorge into the background mountains, it was quite a sight! And when I got to the Bear Ridge Trailhead, lo and behold there were three hikers there from VVR about to set out. So I got there about the same time as the shuttle (just with about 1-hour and 2.8-miles less energy).

And the hike up Bear Ridge went well: some steep parts, but many smooth portions, and I made very good time (for the Sierras)--about 2.5 mph--even though it was uphill. And I turned left onto the PCT, and began this portion through more staid and formal forests, until around noon I found a large fallen trunk and laid out my tent to dry--all three pieces--as I had my lunch of tortillas and peanut butter and nutella. The tent dried fast--I wasn't sure if this was a testament to the sheer heat of the sun, or the engineered materials of the tent--but it dried so fast I was kept busy, interrupting my food to move a piece to the next section, or turn it over entirely. 

And at 12:25, under blue skies with tall white puffs above, I heard the first peal of thunder.

I would continue on the trail until around 13:19, when the first raindrops started falling. They would pick up in density and I would eventually take shelter under a tree, with my rain jacket and rain pants on and my backpack covered in my unopened extra compactor bag, and actually snooze a little bit while the storm passed overhead. And it did and, ah, I thought, this is the early afternoon storm. There might be another in the late afternoon, but that one too will last an hour or so and then dissipate around sunset.

So I started hiking again. And I met some cool folks: Heaves (who I would talk to extensively as we continued hiking), and McQueen and his wife Pain Perdu (it's french for "french toast" or something?). They were intending to make it clear across Silver Pass; I was intending to make it to the last campsite before the pass, about 2 miles hence. So I kept up with Heaves and, as I said, we talked. And maybe the talking distracted me, because the rain came on again, and heavier now than before. And we came across one stream, in the woods, and it was raging by now, only there was a big log crossing it and so we walked across that. And then we started the climb up Silver Pass and the rain only got harder, and now the trail itself was becoming a stream, and still we went, until we came to another stream.

And this stream was flowing strong. McQueen and Pain Perdu waded through, the water to their knees if not halfway up their hamstrings. Heaves tried a rock hop path upstream, but missed a rock and ended up almost up to his waist in water. I went further upstream and found a better rock hop path and used that.

And the trail continued heading up.

By now the trail was a shelf trail and it crossed Silver Pass Creek. In normal circumstances, I think this would be an ankle deep rock hop. In the midst of this storm, it was a waist deep fording across churning water. And McQueen and Pain Perdu and Heaves went straight through, just wading and pushing through. And I tried another rock hop path.

I was almost there, just a few hops left, and this next hop was a bit long but I could make it. And I stepped across, and I must have slipped, because the next thing I knew I was in the water. And I remember suddenly sitting on a rock shelf, the water surging around me, and watching it tumble down the mountain below. So steep, so fast! And I turned around and Heaves was there, and McQueen, and they were stretching their poles out telling me grab on, grab on, and I grabbed and pulled myself onto a rock, the creek cascading on either side, and just crying out in a moan, because I'd had the wind knocked out of me and my side had been hit. And I kneeled there for a while, on all fours, trying to catch my breath.

I had been extraordinarily lucky. Had I not sat on that rock shelf under the water, I would have been swept down the mountain itself, and they would have been picking my corpse off the rocks far below.

I finally got up, and Heaves and McQueen immediately rallied to my aid. My right side was hurting: Heaves did some quick checks, prodded around my midsection to make sure no ribs were broken, checked range of motion with my right shoulder to make sure that was ok, even did a close-your-eyes-which-finger-am-I-touching test. Then Heaves took my bag--I don't want you to aggravate any micro-tears that might stil be there, he said--and we headed up the trail in search of a campsite, any campsite. And even with only my poles and no bag, it was slow going for me, all in the continuing rain, as the water fell atop me, and flowed in streams down the steps below me. And we got to a small grassy section with a few tents and McQueen clambered up and down the slopes until he found a good tentsite, and they set up my tent for me, because by now I was shivering uncontrollably and couldn't do it myself. Get in the tent, do you have thermals?, get out of all your wet clothes and get your thermals on and get in your sleeping bag. Is this your sleeping bag, in this eVent bag? (They were going through my backpack.) Is your sleeping pad a pad or a blowup? Where is it? And Heaves immediately went to work blowing it up. And they got the pad in the tent, then me in the tent, and I peeled all my soaking-wet clothes off and got into my thermals, and they got me in my sleeping bag. He's still shivering, so they dug in my bear canister and pulled out snacks--pop tarts, bars, anything. Eat these, they said, you need calories to generate body heat. And they went to the other campers, and came back with Brian (an oncologist) and he did a quick check: do you know who you are, do you know where you are. And then: I want you to get warm, to eat. Your body is still in the adrenaline surge, but that's going to end. I want you to stay in your bag and stay warm. If you have to pee, do you have a pee bottle? No? Well, I see you have some tortillas and some peanut butter, and your peanut butter can is almost empty. Eat the peanut butter and the tortillas--and I'll bring you my peanut butter because you're low--and then use your empty peanut butter can as a pee bottle. Because I don't want you to get out the tent tonight, I want you to stay in the tent and stay warm. I'm going to seal up the rain fly to keep the heat in but I'll be back. And I did as Brian instructed, and I ate some pop tarts and bars and some tortillas with peanut butter and the extra he would bring, and I would use the empty peanut butter bottle as a pee bottle throughout the night. There are three of us around, Brian said, me and my grandson, and Missoula, so there are people around. But I want you to rest and I'll check on you in the morning, and tomorrow we'll go over the Pass together and head into Red's Meadow and Mammoth, ok? And I agreed.

And it was a tough night. My side was still reeling, ribs not broken but possibly bruised. Laying down was especially hard--it turns out you squeeze your stomach to lay down--and that doesn't work when your ribs are hurting. And when I finally got down, my body wasn't positioned right and for a moment I couldn't breathe, just couldn't breathe, until I managed to push my butt out and arch my back and finally start breathing, even if shallowly--I couldn't take a full breath even if I wanted to. And I lay there, trying to warm up in my sleeping bag, with my thermals and puffy on and still shivering, and I thought, what the heck have I done? Rock hopping, instead of just wading through, was stupid. You almost got yourself killed! And now look at you, shivering in a wet tent, surrounded by wet clothes, with your ribs all messed up and your right shoulder--you can't put weight on it for the pain--and you just may have ended your PCT hike right now. And that last thought, especially that last one, it took all my mental strength to put that one aside and ignore it for now, to not think about, and instead try to get some sleep. And it was tough: the body, being injured, would twitch, and often that twitch would be into a position that made it hard to breathe. And getting up from a laying position into a sitting position--that was exceptionally hard because that's all stomach, and using the stomach muscles just wasn't an option. I did eventually fall asleep, probably out of sheer exhaustion, and did pass the night and eventually come through to morning.

But what had started as a good day--a day when I had hiked up Bear Ridge Trail and felt so good that I was wondering, how am I going to keep this fitness after I get off trail?--on this day I end up almost getting myself killed first by being swept down the mountain by the river, then by getting near hypothermia, then by nearly stopping my breathing whenever I moved due to my rib injuries. (And while I moaned a lot, crying out for help wouldn't work because I couldn't get enough air in my lungs to do it.) From one of the best feeling days to one of the worst. And all for a stupid mistake on my part. Either I should have waded through or, instead of following them, I should have turned around and gone back to a campsite. But Silver Creek looked scary to me--they were wading in thigh-deep water which is near the limit of what's advised--and had I trusted my instincts and own comfort level, I would have gone back. But I didn't. And almost paid--probably should have--but for the grace of God.

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Some notes:

-- Vermillion Valley Resort > Bear Ridge > Mono Creek > North Fork Mono Creek > Silver Pass Creek > Makeshift campsite

-- And you know what makes it even worse: in the morning I even had a chance moment with the Second Old Friend it was going so well. I increasingly doubt Second will make an appearance this trip: the mileage will need to augment if I'm going to make it to Canada in time, and more miles is not conducive to the quiet needed for Second. But walking in the woods on the Bear Ridge Trail, he did make an appearance and I was so happy and excitedly jotted down as much as I could of what he had to say. And I was going to get to camp early, take it easy, and casually sort through and develop it some. And then I end up near-hypothermic in a wet tent with my ribs and shoulder messed, having trouble breathing. What a day.

-- Today I met Heaves, who I hiked with in the rain, and he just loved the rain. Have you ever read Hitchhiker's Guide?, he asked. Yeah, I said. Do you remember the first chapter of So Long and Thanks for All the Fish?, he asked. Remind me, I said. That's the one with the Rain God who doesn't know he's a Rain God. Ah yes, I said, I remember now. Yeah, Heaves would like that chapter! I get the impression he's a pretty chipper dude normally, but in the rain, climbing up rock-stairs-become-waterfalls, his positivity positively shines. In the "front-country" as he calls it (makes sense: we're in the "backcountry" after all) he works in Silicon Valley as a DevRel, that is, in developer relations. (Although he mentions it's getting way too expensive there, so he's thinking of moving, possibly to France--he speaks French--or South Korea--his wife speak Korean.) But honestly, he's a bit of a self-acknowledged bard: jack of all trades and master of none. Played violin in a funk band for a while, played D&D (and yes, the bard thing was a D&D reference--and when I mentioned I had played 2nd edition he was a bit, ohh, yeah, that was a bit primitive, but tried to be nice about it), wants to get more into writing than programming, loves Hitchhiker's Guide. He even wore a wide-brimmed pink hat--distinct against his black rain gear--with glasses that condensated up across a broad friendly face with a scraggily beard. Honestly, he was a lot of fun to talk to, and I was enjoying it so thoroughly that I lost track of how badly the storm was developing. But Heaves also has that, well, sweetness of folks on the trail, that sort of fast friendship that forms so readily. When I was in the water, it was his voice I heard telling me to grab his pole, his voice asking if I was ok, asking how I was doing. His analysis that checked for broken bones, his insistence that took my pack so I could climb, hurt, up to the campsite without the weight, his authority to set up the tent and get me inside. I can't thank him enough: he had met a stranger a few hours before, and here he was doing the Good Samaritan thing!

-- And much thanks for McQueen and Pain Perdu. My bag is heavy, so McQueen took the load off Heaves for a bit of the climb. Then McQueen was the one who went through my bag, looking for the sleeping pad, for the clothes bag, for the eVent bag, and always asking, hey, I'm going to go through your bag, is that ok? And that's sweet too: I'm soaked and hurt and freezing to death, my privacy isn't that big a concern! (But they were always very assiduous about privacy: they made sure the rain fly was closed while I changed, every time they came to check on me they would announce themselves and say they were going to open the flap.) I didn't get to speak with McQueen and Pain Perdu as much--mostly I was with Heaves in the afternoon--but another pair of Good Samaritans those two!