August 7, 2013
23 miles today
Mile 1852 on the PCT

Fell asleep in the pages of war. Woke up to the real thing. A massive cannonade at 2:30 signaled the start of an attack. I tried to ignore the onslaught. After an extended artillery bombardment of our position the pitter patter of bullets indicated that the enemy was drawing near. The intensity increased. No heroics for me. I surrendered quickly. And meekly, by putting up my tent. Soon the storm was directly overhead dumping rain and putting on a sound and light show. Ignoring weather forecasts is for fools.

Woke up part two to a wet and gray world. Drizzle is eased when a comforting omelette is loving and nearby. I started to pack up and head over for an embrace. A sudden violent cramp rushed me to toilet. With no time to dig a hole I miraculously spotted one already dug. I filled it. Emergency over, it came to me that I had just blocked the exit to someone’s home. I apologized the best I could but some ground dweller is going to have a crappy morning and learn hate thanks to me. Sometimes we do wrong in the world.

Into the warm dining hall. For some reason all the PCT hikers were seated in a far section apart from the civilized. Their wall of collective odor a hint. All were still talking about “the event.” PCT legends usually build up around a sustained effort. This person completed the trail in 64 days unsupported or this guy wore a wedding dress the whole way or this woman walked the trail 17 times. But every once in a while a single event will create an instant legend. This happened yesterday. It seems Orbit was eating a hot dog coated with mustard while sitting on the ground in front of the general store. Multiple legend witnesses were seated around her. A large blob of mustard fell to her calf and ran down it. (Orbits calf, a general description. Though shapely, at that point, it was covered in the mud, crud and the beer of multiple days of hiking without any form of washing. A large swollen spider bite featured prominently. Through all of this grows a thick forest of hair that challenges both mosquitoes and cosmopolitans view of American womanhood.) Back to the mustard. As the blob made its way through all of this following gravity, Orbit casually reached down with her dog and swiped the blob back on by dragging her hotdog up her leg. She then took that bite. Silence, then pandemonium. “No! You didn’t just do that!” Her studied and deep response “Do what?” The PCT summed up in a single moment and a legend birthed.

Feeling in need of refinement myself, I took a lukewarm four minute $.75 shower and watched the water run black. Then put back on my filthy’s. A quick resupply and then set off for the trailhead. Every cold wet step I regretted my snap decision to rinse out my shorts during the second half of my shower. As we came up Ole and Track Meet came down. A good reunion, but as always, another close call when it comes to hiking together.

Climbed 4 miles to the rim of Crater Lake in a steady rain and cold gloom. There a warm café with top-end prices and bottom end food فياجرا جيل. A quick lunch and then a 26 mile waterless stretch awaited. The plan was to walk into the night and knock off as much as possible. But an immediate return to the misery outside was too much to ask. Hot chocolate and journal work delayed for one hour. It was a debated hour, but the waiters prevailed. At four we would go.

Four and still gloom and doom. At 4:03 the storm fled and glorious sun smiled on Crater Lake. Out came the cameras and smiles. A strategy of waiting actually worked for once. For five miles we circled the rim trail stopping often to gaze at Wizard Island and the bluest of blue water. At 1,900 feet it is the deepest lake in the States. Seventh in the world. By average depth it is the deepest in the world. It has frozen over twice in recorded history. My question is why doesn’t it fill up and overflow? I’ll let the photos do the adjectives’ work.

We flew along in good spirits that only good weather after bad can provide. The trail stayed kind as the light faded. Dinner at 8:30. Veggie and I wrapped up our review of the collective unconscious and I pushed on alone to escape the gathering cold. Orbit and Slack were happy as I left. Slack had gotten down on his knees and proposed to Orbit that she become his future climbing partner. He then handed her a rock. She accepted. My congrats.

Flying once again. The right temperature, trail, music, frame of mind. Through a tunnel of darkness. Core warm, belly full. I’m trying to describe perfection or is near to attaining it as I’ll ever get. Of course it can’t last. But that’s okay. A windstorm had knocked tree after tree across the path.The PCT turned into a miles long hurtling event. Tough going in the dark. But as Taylor Swift would probably say, “What doesn’t kill you makes you more romantic.”

Finally 20 miles into the dry stretch I hit the highway around 11 PM. There someone had left it a few gallons of water. But a passing night car will always cause a PCTer to slip back into the forest. I pushed on a little, found a flat and waited for the others. The usual track down and to bed we were. A good night and a good coma in record time. All thumbed their noses at the weather gods by cowboy camping. Nunc pro tunc.

Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!

August 4, 2013
35 miles
mile 1771

Awoke to tales of deer and a bear wondering through camp all night. They may as well have been someone else’s dream for all the effect they had on me. I wrote in late. By the time I rolled out of my bag at 9:30 Slack and Orbit were long gone. By the time I was ready to move out, Veggie had rolled in. He caught me up on some wild times in Ashland. It seems that Ole and Track Meet’s return to oval health has them back on the party circuit. We took off together for points North.

The terrain in Oregon is easier which reflects well on the passage of miles. We chatted and flew. Came to a road crossing and met Ron Strickland and his wife. They photographed us and pressed bananas and cookies upon us. Ron founded the PNT (pacific northwest trail) that connects the PCT and the CDT. At 1,200 miles long it was recognized by Congress in 2009. He encouraged us to give it a go. His dream to connect it all the way to the Appalachian trail. My thought, one trail at a time for me is perhaps a wise thought.

Low on water, we had a quick dry lunch and pushed on. On the lookout for a spring with a faucet, we blew by a soggy area of trail. I called for Veggie to stop only to point out the large rattlesnake he had almost stepped on. Looking up he pointed out the dripping faucet that caused the puddle, that caused the rattlesnake to come down for a drink. All is connected.

Caught up to Orbit and Slack at the turn off to the Hyatt Lake Resort where they had detoured. Kindly, Slack had brought me a giant burger as well as some pizza. Veggie and I inhaled our second offering of lunch compassionately. A destination was determined. Brown shelter would bring the novelty of a roof to the trail and create a 35 mile day. The issue, the day was running late. The cure, walk faster. And off.

In the daylight we met Spitfire and geared up. The miles ran up as the sun went down. Passed a canal with a swift current that Samba planned to navigate on his sleeping pad. Back to the headlamps. Past camps in the dark and their snippets of sound. On went the headphones to accompany the bubble of light. Luminescent deer eyes provided atmosphere. And then a distant light. Orbit had found a road shortcut, that would save a mile. Wide, flat and free of obstacles it would save fading batteries because we could walk by braille. Lights off. And on to my late night star lesson from my Astro physics professor.

10:30 PM brought us to our little log cabin. Sleepers surrounded the cabin but the cots inside were ours. A classic hand pump brought well water to the surface. All was to the turn of not this century but the last. Sleep easy in those simpler times.

Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!

August 3, 2013
9 miles
mile 1736

A genuine sleep in. And then an hour wait to gaze upon morning glories and take breakfast at the restaurant, Morning Glory. Worth the wait for the huge and unusual breakfast. The waiter warned me of my over order. I smiled. He back. Both confident in our positions. I chewed on the last sprig of parsley, my smile retained as well as consumption victory in the bag.

Moved back to downtown. Orbit to hunt for new shoes. Myself to the Christian Science reading room to write. The woman monitoring the empty room said, “Well, you’re only supposed to study religious material here.” My reply “My writing is somewhat spiritual.” “Why not?”, she sparkled.

Afternoon arrived and we took in the matinee, “The Way Back,” which was a small, excellent coming-of-age story. Check it out if the opportunity presents. The opening scene magic. Afterwards had ice cream for lunch where we ran into Sundog and Giggles. They filled us in on upcoming fires in Oregon and their possible effects on the trail. I’ve always loved the coming attraction part. Then Slack strolled in with his buddy Alex, our taxi ride back to the trailhead. The sound of Velcro being pulled apart was heard as we were torn away from the ice cream parlor. It was 4 PM.

Waved goodbye to the fine town and even remembered to grab my water bottle from Alex’s car, though Slack did not. While he hunted the shoulders of the road for a new one, Orbit and I set off. To pass the time, we conducted a postmortem of the film. Then I took a break and strolled the last miles into camp in silence. Upon arrival I listened to the news of the day. Orbit had seen a bear and Slack had shared the path with a squirrel for a quarter of a mile. I watched the video. The squirrel would run along about 10 feet ahead. Then stop and beckon Slack to pick up the pace. It was adorable.

Perhaps I solved the mystery of the exploding bluejays. Today I passed Pilot Rock where a sign informed that Peregrine Falcons nest there. Mated for life and always returning to the same nest for egg laying. Diving at 200 mile an hour, prey tends to explode upon contact with a falcon. As I observed a pigeon do once in Washington D.C. when a falcon decided it was lunchtime. Riddle explained?

Couscous and then to the reading mat. Studs Terkel’s, “The Good War,” an oral history of World War II, is the selection on tap in my personal reading room. In it he interviews a generation called on to do things that mine was not. I fell asleep jealous and relieved at the same time.

Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!

August 2, 2013
4 miles
mile 1727

Woke up feeling surprisingly normal. Orbit also felt no ill effects. Coasted down to the familiar I-5 for the hitch into Ashlandia. A truck showed up shortly and dropped off a hiker. Orbit and I jumped in for the turnaround. And listened to the driver’s hard luck story of an inescapable criminal past that haunted his present. Both financially and prospects wise. “I mean what if I were to pull a gun out and rob you guys at the halfway point.” I’m just not that kind of a guy. But the system treats me like I am. I was glad for the hypothetical bent. Meanwhile Orbit is texting goodbye to friends and family in the backseat. Then he filled us in on a recent decapitation in Ashland. The Forest was sounding safer and safer.

Still, in the end, a cool guy and an interesting ride. He dropped us off next to the post office and I flipped him some cash for gas and to help with the hardluck. We parted well. Recaptured my bounce box and headed for breakfast. My familiar oatmeal immediately tapped out to Spanish omelette with chorizo. Then to the shop and kart where Orbit figured out a way around sending resupply boxes out ahead. Basically carry more food. Weight versus hassle and cost. Life simplified, we went back into town and met up with the recently arrived Slack.

Slack had multiple friends of friends in Ashland, so we waited in front of the co-op for him to arrange a home. These things take time, so I put myself to work observing life in Ashland. The world was alive in front of the co-op. Musicians jammed, panhandlers asked and the liberal world supported their co-op. People had time and many stopped to chat about through hiking. It was a good place to wait. And wait. Dinner approached with home still a horizon event. So Orbit and I, still draped in the stench of 50 miles, decided a shower was more important than money.

Tracked down a room in an old Art Deco motel that still had an attached garage. Renewed, we met Slack and his friends downtown for a massive Italian feed washed down with froufrou cocktails. Then on to an album release party at a local bar. The place was packed and electric with energy. The band good at times but leaning toward jamming. My least favorite form of music. To my mind music for musicians and not the audience. But clearly, I was in the minority judging from the enthusiastic reaction of the crowd.

The miles creeped up and sedated me. Soon we left the dancers to the dance of 2013. I preferred to go to sleep in the 50s. And probably the music too.

Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!

July 30, 2013
29 miles
mile 1645

Late to the trail because pen was in hand. My pledge to hike first snapped. Writing at night infeasible for too many reasons to recount. So the cows and I to the trail at 9:30. Their bells providing the rhythm. Why the bells? To scare the bears or make locating them easier were my best guesses. They stopped at the next lake. I kept going. The early trail rough going. Complicated and full of rocks, it required concentration and two-foot drive. I gave it that, as my last fall still smarted.

The trail today followed a narrow altitude band, the floor 6,000 feet, the ceiling 7,000 feet. But within the band it resembled a dribbling basketball. So my progress was honest. The fire in Southern Oregon was still funneling smoke into the local atmosphere so I probably averaged about a pack of cigarettes every 10 miles. Tried to enjoy them, as well as the vistas and scenery, but my hiking was manic. The culprit—mio.

For those of you not in the know, mio is a water additive. Every day on the trail I cycle liters of water through my system. The taste, especially with water purifying drops, monotonous or nasty. Mio saves the day. A few squirts and suddenly I’m drinking berry pomegranate juice. That’s a smile bringer. Anyway, at the last store only cherry mio with caffeine was available. So today I was slugging what looked like Sangre de Cristo. Not being interested in the taste, theory or habit of coffee I rarely have caffeine in my system. Thus my supercharged hiking up and down the basketball pattern was mysterious to me as was my decision to walk right through lunch. When I finally sat down at two to eat my heart was still racing. I had caught up with Orbit and Slack, who were relaxing around a cabin. I couldn’t stop talking. Slowly it dawned on me, I was completely jacked up on Mio, my future drug of choice.

I had entered the Marble Valley, that lay in the shadow of Marble Mountain. A white edifice that resembled the White Cliffs of Dover. Of interest in Dover, the first four blocks inland from the shoreline would have a rowhouse missing here or there. I asked a local “why?” “Oh, the Germans had a big gun in France whose maximum range was four blocks inland here. They would lob a shell over now and then to let us know who was boss. We never rebuilt to remember.”

Came across three spooked female hikers. They jumped when I rounded the bend. Apparently they had come upon two separate bears in one hour. What luck, I had seen one bear in three months. Having left the cabin at three there were some miles still left to cover. We hiked as a group taking turns at lead. The air purer there as we were all ravaged by methane. I stopped for a second. From my angle I spotted an ancient canteen that had been left under a bush probably in the 60s. It was tin and the canvas covering had rotted away. I displayed it on a rock pedestal for those to come.

With conversation as a distraction, the miles dissipated. The path helped as it began a 22 mile descent into Seid Valley. The pace quickened. It felt like five miles an hour, an insane speed. Well you had to be there. Pulled up at Buckhorn Spring in the shadow of a triple tree. Loaded up with water for a dry camp and plunged. Arrived into final camp at 8:30. There Swiss Army, Storytime and Rabbit Stick were already laid out.

Rabbit stick was gathering ages of all the hikers he came across searching for an average. So far it was around 28 years old. Today we tried to come up with all the names of the hikers we had met. Made it to 110 trail names. Back to Rabbit Stick. He was the first American and 11th overall to row across the Atlantic. It took him five months of unsupported rowing to arrive in Florida from Africa. In his head he meticulously restored over 200 Ford model A’s in those five months to keep mentally occupied. He found that preferable to tackling the big questions of life. At 70 now he looks like he’s ready to row back. Inspired, as I lay down, I hummed “row row your boat” as my lullaby ticket to dreamland. And, no, I did not consider repeating his feat. Really.

Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!

July 29, 2013
10 miles
mile 1616

The usual mammoth town breakfast lured us from bed. An early start back to the trail dismissed without discussion. All to errands and resupply. Having to print, sign and fax a document sent me hunting. The library closed, I despaired. I asked the checkout lady at the supermarket. “Oh, go down to the Shell station, walk in the back office, ask for Shana, and tell her Marilyn sent you.” I love small towns. On the way down main street I passed a deer eating a front yard. Assuming it was a pet I tried to pet it. It wasn’t.

Shana took care of my business in a saintly way. She refused payment and said “just pass it on.” Living near the PCT makes people very nice. Packed up by noon and headed for the old-fashioned soda fountain for a chocolate malt. There hikers gathered like flies on….ice cream. The day drifted. The magnet for nonmovement a free barbecue in the park that evening. We tried to break away and made it to the pizza joint next door. A simple meal and then we go. Damn, it had a pool table and beer. The struggle to depart crushed.

And then a hand from the heavens. The woman running the restaurant offered us a ride to the trailhead when she closed up shop at 3:30. Fate beckoned, and we helped her shut things down. A sad farewell to the boys. I motivated them by leaving the first half of a novel. May their testicles soon return to even harmony. A quick drive up, filled with stories of a lifelong Etnaite and then we were back at it.

Unfortunately, my water bottle returned to Etna. Always a problem, do I have, with water bottles. Thus my first 10 miles were waterless. The hike was cool as the Earl Grey fire skies screened out the sun. Slack and I had a long conversation about the transitional point in life he found himself in at the age of 21. I did my best with answers.

Bells heralded our arrival in camp. A large herd of cows being busy polluting the only water source. Dinner and to bed early in an attempt to recapture sleep lost to horseshoes. The bells rang on. I pretended I was in Switzerland, which made the sound romantic, and led to my desired destination.

In memory of Pat Taylor who died today. Pat told me that there was a speed between walking and running. I laughed at her. Then she showed me on a furious hike up the San Francisco peaks. “What the hell are you doing?” I screamed from behind. But I wasn’t laughing anymore nor was I keeping up. In essence Pat taught me how to hike the PCT before I even knew what it was. Everyday I do my Pat Taylor impersonation on the PCT in appreciation. Today I added a rock to my pack. I’ll carry her to Canada and leave her at the trailhead. It’s the best I can do.

So Pat, piss on traditional dying. Keep on hiking like you have a naysayer on your tail. The image I’ll keep is of you pulling away and disappearing round the bend.

Steve Halteman
On the Pacific Crest Trail
Hiking the PCT for the Kids of Escuela Verde

If you’d like to help out and donate, please click here!