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In September of 2003, a friend came to visit. On a previous occasion, we had dayhiked Cannon Mountain, which taught me a ton about getting downhill over boulders. We'd also done a little hiking in some of the parks in the Southeast.
The plan this time was to backpack thirty miles through the Olympics, from the Hoh Rainforest to Olympus Guard Station, then up to Hoh Lake, over the saddle into the Seven Lakes Basin, and then out via the Sol Duc trailhead. Since I've done very little camping over the years, and only one short, close-in overnight backpack, I selected sites with installed bear wires and pit toilets. I try to ease into new activities slowly. I always fail abysmally, which will shortly become obvious.
Roland arrived at SeaTac at around 3 p.m, and we hustled up to catch the Seattle-Bainbridge ferry, and from there to Sol Duc, where we were due to leave the car and meet our shuttle at 7 p.m. Roland did some rearranging, deciding what to take on the trail and what to leave behind. The weather was dark and drizzly. The shuttle showed up promptly, even though I had misunderstood where to meet it, she found us anyway, and drove us around to the Hoh. By this time, it was full dark and turning into rain. Nevertheless, we got the tent up, ate the last of the turkey sandwiches, stashed the food after finding the not-so-well-disguised bear lockers, and crawled into our sleeping bags.
My tent is a modified tarp from GoLite, designed by Ray Jardine whose book I regard as my primary source of information on how to backpack. I'm kind of a wimp, and view ultralite gear as a way to actually get out somewhere I can't otherwise reach dayhiking. Roland had camped in a tarp as a boy scout and was much more proficient at getting the tent up and solid than I am, a good thing since we were doing this with brand-new Petzl headlamps. Unfortunately, while I had previously trimmed a groundcloth for myself, I'd brought an untrimmed one planning to trim it for two, which we didn't have the light for, so we folded it under. And we missed a spot, leading to a midnight puddle under my sleeping bag. Roland's pack got soaked poking out of the tarp as well, proving once again that waterproof gear isn't. I caught the puddle during the night, hauled out the pack towel, and got most of it out. I refolded the groundcloth and then went back to sleep. Later Roland discovered a non-insect, invertebrate hazard of the lightweight technique. He was startled awake and ever-so-glad that the slug kiss was on the cheek.
Fortunately, in the morning, we got an hour or so of sun, enabling us to get my bag fully dry. We also trimmed the groundcloth correctly. In the course of getting our gear organized, Roland was looking for my pack, and missed it at least twice before realizing no, that wasn't a stuff sack, that was my backpack. Later in the day, he would realize that backpack had no straps other than shoulder straps and once again be surprised. We got a late start, around 11 a.m. We headed up the Hoh, as it started drizzling again, and I discovered once again just how much I love hiking with an umbrella (covers the pack pretty good, too). We had way too much food, as I had brought fruit and Roland had brought tomatos, so we kept stopping to eat the heavy stuff along the way. Tomato and pita sandwiches make great hiking food, particularly when supplemented by blue huckleberries and blonde brownies. At the Happy Four shelter, we put our packs down to eat, and the rain really opened up. About the time we were ready to continue, it was back to drizzle and we were on our way.
We got to Olympus Guard Station around 6 or so, and were happy to learn we were allowed to cook in the shelter, so after we got the tarp up (much better this time since we could see what we were doing and didn't need to deal with subsoil that had spent part of its geologic past as a stony beach) and the bags under it, we had dinner, hung the food and went to bed.
The next morning, we were still slow packing up, but got going around 10 a.m. Today would be my biggest hiking day ever, not just backpacking. 4500' of elevation gain is at least 1600' more than I had ever done in a single outing before, and the mileage (8.5) would be high as well (although well within my previous dayhike max of 11.5). Things went well, although relentlessly uphill. The trail is wonderfully well maintained, and duff almost the entire way, very easy on the feet. The views down to the river are amazing and Hoh Lake is fabulously beautiful, even in drizzly, foggy, cloudy weather. We saw a bear in the basin on the opposite side of the lake. Hikers camped at the lake were curious about how the shoes were working for me. I noted that I had to be careful to keep them dry in this kind of weather, and that hiking on rocks could be a bit tiring on the feet.
Roland noticed that I wasn't breathing heavily, and tried to get me to speed up. I developed a relentless, non-pack-related pain in my back, and my mood and ability to continue was sapped. I sat down and cried. Over the next few miles, we slowly pieced together what had happened.
I've had serious respiratory problems my entire life, and more of my immediate family has asthma than does not. While I've never been diagnosed and don't have an inhaler, over the last few years it's become obvious even to a true denier like myself that I have asthma. Because I'm slow to recover full capacity after an attack, I do a lot to avoid attacks. One of the methods I'd adopted some months earlier while dayhiking was breath control. Essentially, I never let myself breath very hard, naturally limited my exercise capacity, particularly at altitude. We initially thought I was hiking near my aerobic limit, as my heart rate would pop up to 180 or so, but I never feel any burn in my legs any more. Roland suggested that I'd developed great circulation and was processing the lactic acid elsewhere and that was why the back pain which went away so fast when I slowed back down.
As it happens, once I let myself breathe faster, I could go substantially faster, and my heart rate when a lot higher. And my back hurt a lot less. Over the next few days, we established that my max is somewhere above 200. And me 34 years old.
Coming over the saddle and heading along the ridge to Seven Lakes Basin, a black bear going downhill at a good clip crossed our path about 30' ahead of me. That also helped speed up my breathing some. Roland, hiking behind me, wanted to know why I'd stopped. I gasped out "bear" and pointed. He noted it was 100 yards or so downhill headed away and then asked if I was laughing or hysterical. I said, hysterical. He said, far away from us and uninterested. I said, it wasn't far away when I first saw it. Roland said, "Oh." Roland thought, "Oh, my!"
I made a point of continually scanning after that, particularly when rounding corners or topping small hills, but we didn't see further bears that day.
Arriving at Lunch Lake, we met the ranger on site, with a friend, another ranger, who was there to assist with the helicopter swap of vaults for the pit toilet, scheduled for the next day. My pack is largely invisible if you see me from in front, and I hike with an umbrella, in Nike trailrunners which are essentially renamed sneakers. I must have looked like a dayhiker who hiked well past her turnaround point. Roland, as usual, was behind me. The ranger asked about our tent, in response to which Roland pointed to a side pocket of his pack. The ranger offered a dome tent, thermarests, spare sleeping bags, to which I resonded, "Wow, luxury, you guys are friendly. Usually it's a your-poor-planning-isn't-my-emergency thing." I didn't realize that he didn't realize we were more or less prepared to be here. He also asked if we had a permit (quota area), then interrupted himself to say we could stay there no matter what, probably because a lot of people had been cancelling due to weather. He suggested a couple of possible sites, which we then proceeded to check out, with packs on. After looking at a couple, I said enough is enough, we go to the one he recommended, pack down and then explore further if that's desirable. It was sheltered by trees, a bit back from a ridge so we decided to stay.
Since we had strong wind coming at us from two directions (opposite), Roland pitched the tarp edges to the ground, figuring we'd get more than enough ventilation. While setting up the tent, the rangers stopped to visit. They probably do this with all of the campers. Until it was tight they seemed a little dubious. But with the last pegs in the ground and the edges on the ground tight across the likely wind they seemed a whole lot less skeptical. Again, we were cooking after dark. I didn't screw the stove on fully, and got very worried at the slow fuel delivery, but Roland fixed it, we had dinner, hung the food and went to sleep, waking intermittently as we heard something thumping around the campsite. We eventually identified the noises as bunnies. Very large, raccoon sized bunnies. During the last trip to the bear wire and privy, we saw what I was convinced were snow flakes, and Roland eventually agreed.
Having survived the night, we spent the next morning lazily eating, drinking coffee and watching the helicopter run loads out. We also met a couple of uberhikers and chatted with them for a while. We had thought about dayhiking to one of the other lakes in the basin, but I felt very lazy and the tent was warm so we lay inside our sleeping bags most of the day reading out loud to each other out of a particularly dippy historical novel about a Peloponnesian. The uniformed ranger stopped by and we were gear geeks for a while. He liked Rebecca's stove. We thought the Brunton Sherpa device which measured, recorded and displayed current and recent temperature and air pressure readings was cool. He also had a good pair of binoculars he was using to spot wildlife. He told us that his fellow ranger, after seeing the tent set up, said that we were, "Hard core." We were pretty amused. It was the five year anniversary of my retirement, so we had whisky and chocolate in the evening with our new friends and chatted till the stars came out. Again with the snowflakes and, this time, wind in three different directions.
The battle of the fronts was exciting, in Roland's words, positively Wagnerian. I started to think seriously about leaving. We were due to hike to another camp at Sol Duc Park, but the prospect of a long ridge walk as the clouds socked in and the temperature dropped frightened me. It was all too reminiscent of a sleeting hike along the Boundary Trail in Mt St Helens National Monument in July. And me with the medium weight shell, not the Marmot hard shell.
After packing up and filling our water bottles, we decided to downhike a slightly shorter route via Deer Lake and meet our new friends at Sol Duc Hot Springs. The down hike was easy. We dropped out of the clouds relatively quickly and we were at the Hot Springs before 2 p.m, despite leaving at 9 a.m. Showers and hot water to soak in are great things. Cured Roland's dishpan hands.
Returning to Seattle and degearing a day early was not the most pleasant experience, as the condo looked like a bomb had hit it, and I'm rarely at my best while cleaning up in a chaotic environment while exhausted. While we were tired the next day, we didn't want to stop cold, yet it was raining fairly hard. We got going late, eating breakfast out, making Ape Cave a poor choice for indoor hiking. We instead went to Snoqualmie Tunnel. On the reverse hike, we decided to try it without the headlamps, to see if we could. After a bit, we further decided to jog and try to catch up with the kids and scare them. We didn't make it to them before they got to the light at the end of the tunnel, but the run was nice, if a little weird in the dark.
The following day, we tried again for Ape Cave, but noticed the sun coming out as we neared Tacoma. We abandoned the cave in favor of a drive around the peninsula on 101. We stopped in at Lake Quinault to see the big tree, at Beach 1 for pictures, at Rialto for the rocks, and of course at Hurricane Ridge, which is where I discovered that by breathing appropriately, I could jog uphill at altitude, and that my max heart rate must be above 200. We stayed for a really pretty sunset, then rolled back into Seattle.
While we had driven a lot (over 450 miles), we hadn't done a lot, so we felt good enough the next day to climb Mt Si (not the haystack) and picnic on top of some boulders. 3 up, hour and a half at the top, 2 down. The view included Rainier, the Cascades, the Olympics, Seattle and Bellevue. The forest was monoculture and with very monotonous understory. We saw the inevitable evil hikers shortcutting switchbacks, and on the way out, were asked by a couple of different people for assistance. One had a dehydration headache and was looking for aspirin. He even had water on him. The other was worried because his heart was twinging and wanted company for the last mile in case it was another heart attack.
Sunday, the next day, I was due to take a friend hiking out to Twin Falls. I scheduled that for the afternoon, to leave the morning free for errands and a run around Green Lake. I'd been occasionally running quarters or up to a mile and a half, excruciatingly slowly because of the breath control (12 minute miles). Since I was able to breathe harder, I thought we could try for one of my year's resolutions: all the way around without stopping. In the event, I stopped once to tie a shoelace that had come undone, then immediately continued because I thought my head would explode otherwise. We made it all the way around (2.8 miles), in 32 minutes. So that's a little better than 12 minute miles, as well as doubling my previous max distance.
We stopped at REI to pick up some additional supplies for the overnighter we planned for the following two days. The waterproof matches I'd brought on the Olympics trip had been miserable to use, mostly because the starter strip on the box was nearly useless. In addition to renting a Garcia, we bought windproof lighters and I got a pair of binoculars. I wanted to buy a slightly warmer sleeping bag, but they were only selling much warmer (and much heavier) sleeping bags. Roland compels me to mention that we also bought titanium stuff, since the Lexan we'd had got greasy and never stopped being greasy thereafter. He got a fork and spoon. I bought a spork, and no one is letting me live it down yet. I used to wear a Spyderco, which I hadn't been able to find in time for the Olympics trip. Since I still couldn't find it, we also bought Gerber knives (lighter anyway), which the same single-handed open, locking characteristics. And, because the laminated map had proved so useful in modifying our previous itinerary, I also got a map of the loop we were planning.
Next we met Jina and went out to Twin Falls, where Roland gaped at the pretty falls and we hiked up to the junction with Iron Horse before turning around.
The next morning, Monday, we drove east to Cle Elum and checked in at the ranger station to find out about permits for the Deception Pass loop, and where we learned that it was first day of hunting season. Of course I had nothing bright on me. Despite the ranger's attempt to discourage us, we hiked the loop clockwise, starting at the Cathedral Rock trailhead at noon (we seem to get started late a lot). We had clear weather, great for pictures, not a lot of wind but cool. We met a hunter who had already bagged a 6 point buck, head in hand by the antlers, meat packed up and resting every two hundred yards as he headed downhill. We also met a fair number of hikers heading down and out.
We got to Deception Pass (10 miles), but not to the lakes. A good thing. We met a bunch of people who'd started late at Deception Pass and were hiking through to Snoqualmie. They were scouting for campsites further along the trail (packs down at the last good flat spot) and returned with us. They were moving fast, which caught us by surprise, until we realized that we'd hiked twice as far as they had that day, and done it at a higher average pace, and we were still carrying our packs. Our campsite was lower elevation than a lot of the trail we'd been on, or our planned (and cancelled) side trip to Tuck and Robin. It got cooooold that night, around 30 until close to dawn, then dropping to mid 20's, and we saw snowflakes. It didn't start in earnest until 7 a.m. the next morning, Tuesday, when we got 2 inches by 9 a.m. and decided to pack it in and hike out rather than wait for the sun to warm things up.
We downhiked fast, eating choclate bars, until I spotted a campsite with facilities by Hyas, where we stopped for coffee, water and lunch. We were out at the Deception Pass Trailhead parking lot at 2 p.m. We could have dayhiked the loop on a long summer day.
The following day we drove up to Mukilteo and caught the ferry to Whidbey Island, where we tasted wine and spent money at Greenbank Farm Winery, formerly the home of Whidbey's Port but apparently not any more. We took pictures at the other Deception Pass, then returned to Seattle to go to Stone Gardens. I muddled through the belay test after about an hour of unofficial instruction from Roland (including how to tie a figure eight knot with eyes closed until checking the result) and climbed and downclimbed a couple of easy routes, but bailed on the third after two holds in a row turned under me. That happens occationally, but isn't supposed to happen on two in a row. Even so, Roland was happy that the instructors on the floor were diligently correcting saftey errors rapidly.
The next day, Thursday, Roland was due to fly out, but Hurricane Isabel had closed airports. He watched my martial arts class after I picked him back up at the airport (wrong day to not check flight info). Then I took a long nap. Next morning's first flight out was successful, and I took the day off to catch up on paperwork (bill paying, taxes, balancing checkbook).
In theory, I probably should have continued to take time off, but Saturday I was back at the insanity: I climbed Mt. Pilchuck, end to end in a few minutes under 4 hours, with a 15 minute break at the top for lunch and the (limited by some clouds) view. Today, Sunday, my heart rate refuses to drop below 80, so I'll be writing, and possibly shopping for replacement hiking shoes, despite the fabulous weather. Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, Roland was back to his usual tricks, 30 mile bike rides. Several days out, we're both still craving protein.
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Copyright Rebecca Allen, 2002.
Created: September 23, 2003 Updated: September 24, 2003