July 31, 2013
27 miles
miles 1672
All left early, but I remained in my office. Down until my constitution, location limited to a long straight dirt road. Looking back I discovered a misperception. Alone I was not. Rabbit Stick remained in his red sleeping bag, yellow pack to the side. The walk to constitutional liberation turned long. There were no curves,. Privacy required passing the horizon. The mandates of decorum met, I returned to pack. As I passed Rabbit Stick I said good morning to a red log and an old, rusted out, yellow gas can. Hallucinations, both real and imagined, are ever present in the forest.
Packs awaiting mules
Shortcut
All downhill to Seid Valley, accompanied by the crash of Creekwater. I sped up as there were burgers and shakes in that Yonder Valley. Passed over a wooden culvert held together barrel style with metal straps. Ancient beyond me. Emerged from the forest and onto a dirt road which then morphed into asphalt. Road walking is free from obstacles so I left reality behind. Wondered around in my thoughts picking and choosing. Brought back to reality after an hour or so by a sense of desire. The road was lined with blackberries. Few walk these roads, so they were all there for me, and free, so I took more than three. The burgers could wait as I ate my way to stomach pain distention.
Sometimes the PCT follows a road
Dyed purple I strolled across the Klamath River and into the Seid Valley Café where I ordered a blackberry shake on a trend. And kept on ordering lunches and shakes. Full past full, I went outside to the picnic table to plan my resupply for the next 2 1/2 days. There are two theories of resupply. Buy as you go or send packages of food to yourself at prearranged destinations. I am of the former. The picnic table was crowded with the latter. The surplus bountiful. I was handed enough of the leftover bounty to accomplish my resupply without entering the store.
You never know what you will see on the trail
The sun had turned hot, as the 4,000 foot climb got underway out of Seid Valley. A fire had burned off the forest umbrella so that same sun went to work on my milkshakes. Between too much food at lunch and the new food in my pack I felt like I was pulling a Vons shopping cart behind me. To pass the time I thought about Rabbit Stick’s age numbers. He basically found two significant age groups on the trail. People in their 20s just starting out in their careers, lives etc. And retired people in their 60s. The youngest on the trail he had run into 18, the oldest 75. People in my age group 35 to 50 the rarest because we were enmeshed in capitalism and family. To confirm his findings I thought of all who I was hiking with. All of Orbit and Sons were in their 20s, myself the elder. Thinking of all this did divert the intensity of the sun but it never lightened the cart.
In Costa Rica, it’s known as the tourist tree because it resembles a peeling nose
Spring surrounded by flat called a halt to the day and relief to my pull. We shared our campsite with a trail maintenance crew from AmeriCorps’s. A guitar appeared. Good night turned cold in apology for its counterparts excess. The conversation centered on sustainable building practices. I learned about a new method that involved ramming earth into tires. And then a realization. The post office in Ashland, Oregon was closed on Saturday. To receive and send my bounce box as well as send out resupply boxes for Oregon would require a full postal day. It was Wednesday night, and 55 miles to Ashland. To arrive in Ashland on Friday morning would require a big Thursday. A post office run was called for. The alarm was set for 3:30 AM. The motor revved. Time to put all those shakes to good use.
Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde
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