Old Lady on the Trail- Triple Crown at 76

by Mary E Davison

  I laughed and laughed. It really struck my funny bone. I remember the line every time sweat pours into my eyes on an uphill trail, and I have another good chuckle.

  Billy Goat said he was impressed that I, a woman over 65, (then 67) was hiking the trail. He said he didn't meet many of that age and gender who did. He said I was an inspiration. Me? An inspiration to a trail icon like Billy Goat? Amazing. I was just another hiker, although older and slower than most. It made my day.

  When the forest changed from tall trees to shorter ones, I found a barely, sort of flat spot in the middle of a large, open clearing and cowboy camped under millions of stars in the night sky. Life was good.

  In the night though, I had one of those what’s out there? nervous feelings. Nothing came into the large cleared area in which I’d placed my sleeping bag. But in the morning back on the trail, there were cougar footprints in the soft granite sand, disappearing after about a mile and a half in the middle of nowhere. The prints looked fresh as they were sometimes on top of Billy Goat's footprints, the only hiker I’d seen the evening before. I wondered if the cougar might have been the source of my sixth-sense of danger in the night.

  Seeing critter prints is fun as long as nothing is threatening, and rarely do any animals stay close to humans or threaten them. Mostly, I saw lizards. Still, I was glad I’d camped in a very large open area, which may have deterred the cougar.

  An unmarked trail left a dirt road, and I couldn’t decide if it was my trail. I walked down both directions, while rereading the guidebook pages and staring at maps before I decided the trail I’d walked down first was the correct one. My dithering around being stupid took more than an hour and a half and an awful lot of energy, physical and mental, as well as two extra miles. Tiredly reaching Robin Bird Spring, I sat down for a late lunch.

  The top pipe to the trough at Robin Bird Spring had no water, but there was a nice stream from the low pipe below the trough. I was dirty and disgusted with myself for having walked a one-mile stretch of trail three times in confusion, so I took a bath. I could fill my pot with water for bathing while standing naked in the sunshine and dispose of used water well away from the spring. Bathing helped my mental attitude, and I also washed my socks, undies, shirts, and bandanas and hung them to dry on the fence around the spring. Reasonably clean, I felt much better.

  The trail led me through a burn area with a very few struggling purple flowers and white daisies poking up through fire-blackened ground next to fire-blackened boulders. Once out of the burn, the terrain down 2,000 feet to Kelso Road had non-burned boulders, pinion pines, and a few short oaks. The boulders would have been great to play on, in, and around as a kid. In my day, (How’s that for an old-lady phrase?) we called it cowboys and Indians, or cowboys and outlaws or even hide and seek. I liked the boulders.

  Mary Barcik, a delightful 74-year-old trail angel, who loved to hike, walked up the trail to meet me with my resupply box and water. She didn’t normally serve as a resupply angel, but had agreed to meet me with my box and get a bit of hiking in herself. We sat in the shade of some bushes and talked all the time I was loading my water, making my dinner and repacking. Somehow, probably because we were talking so much, that all took a couple hours. I went on to a saddle Mary recommended for camping and enjoyed a lovely sunset beside Joshua Trees and an equally lovely sunrise in the morning.

  Mary met me the next day for a few miles of hiking. She was absolutely delightful. We enjoyed sharing hiking tales and other life tales, too. Now there was someone who was inspiring. She cheerfully kept the water caches full for hikers on a dry stretch of trail on her motorcycle, taking many gallon jugs at a time and a hundred empties tied on her or the motorcycle for the return trip. Her trail name was Motor Mary. Her motorcycle, worn out doing water runs, left her using a pickup when I met her.

  After lunch, Mary returned to her truck, and I continued up the hill in the hot, sun, pausing in the meager shade of Joshua Trees whenever possible. They were few and small and then none at all. Less than a week earlier snow and ice had blocked my way to the trail, but snow and ice were distant memories trudging up that hill in 90-degree weather

  Walking off the trail toward one lone pinion pine, I crawled under its branches, other footprints telling me I wasn’t the only one who had craved shade. Later on, I stopped in deep shade cast by a cliff. My water supply was running out. I took a mouthful of water and held it in my mouth as long as possible before swallowing. Keeping my mouth closed with water inside, I imagined I was in a swimming pool feeling the water swish in my mouth. Mind games for the PCT.

  Reaching Bird Spring Pass, I sat in the shade waiting until the sun went down to camp. Sitting under a somewhat scraggly tree, I watched a billion flies land on my sweat-soaked pack leaning on a rock in the sun.

  Chukkars (desert hens) were clucking merrily across the road in the morning. Just as I was ready to go, Motor Mary drove up in her pickup, and we started up the hill together. She loved to hike and liked to have company, sometimes hiking with thru hikers.

  We climbed up Skinner Peak, fortunate for morning shade on our side of the canyon, we passed yellow snake heads, paintbrush, maroon bells, lupine, fiddlenecks, desert daisies, desert dandelions, comets, gilia and other flowers for which neither of us knew the names. At the saddle a thousand feet up from her car, I gave her a hug, and she went back down the switchbacks. I hoped I would be that energetic when 74.

  Inspired, after lunch, I hiked seven miles in three and a half hours. While not fast for a thru hiker on such nice trail, it was amazing for me. The next morning I walked the final miles to Walker Pass on bear-track-imprinted dusty trail.

  Kickoff Again

  When planning my hike, I’d contacted the nearest Lutheran Church for assistance. As a pastor, it seemed a logical place to search for help. I was connected with Steve, who met me at Walker Pass and drove me to Ridgecrest, where I could take a shower at the city hall/community center for $5.00, using a towel and washcloth he brought for me. I probably smelled a good deal better as Steve drove me to Loma Linda to meet my cousin, Liz, who drove me further south, arriving at Lake Morena about 9:00 that night to experience my second PCT Kickoff, even more enjoyable in 2009 because I knew so many more people. Mssnglnk, Ceanothus, Beeman, Papa Bear, Jelly Bean, RockStar, Asabat, Billy Goat, Meadow Mary, Meadow Ed, Casey, Splash, Nitro, Teddy, Slojo, Indiana Red, Half Mile, Sparky, Warner Springs Monte, Captain Teacup, Backtrack and Cog were some of those whose trail names I wrote down. Cog had been Mr Clean on the AT in 2004. What a delightful mix of people, personalities, backgrounds, and energy.

  I made out like a bandit with a playful complaint to the vendor from Gossamer Gear about changing the color of their pack from my favorite blue and was given, free of charge, a last years’ model someone else had turned in. I had a new pack for next year in my favorite color. How lucky was that?

  Snow on Fuller Ridge

  After two days of merriment, I said good-bye to Kickoff friends and my cousin Liz, and my hiking friends from Washington, Kathy and Roz, (now with trail names Grapevine and Lipstick) whisked me to the trail to complete the section over Fuller Ridge missed due to fire in 2008. We were all excited to be on the trail. Lipstick found us a perfect cowboy-camping spot behind a large rock just off the trail out of the wind, and we snuggled into our bags under the bright stars. One of us slept. The other two listened to high-decibel log sawing. I wasn’t the log sawer in the night.

  The next day was interesting uphill trail, mostly on a nice grade. We made it to Fobes Saddle, and I walked down to get water from the spring on the other side of the pass while the other two set up camp. The third day after Kickoff, we had more uphill, probably around 2,600 feet, through magnificently rugged scenery.

  Grapevine struggled with her usual foot problems. We also had to use our ice axes. When I was 20, I’d been part of Mountaineer climbs up Mt. Rainier, Mt. St Helens, Mt. Baker and Mt. Hood, so I knew something about snow travel and ice axes in my ancient past, al
though I’d not touched an ice axe for years. Kathy had similar past experiences. We taught Lipstick how to self-belay (A self-belay involves jamming the long spike into snow at each step on the uphill side of the trail, giving you a solid anchor to hold if your feet slip.).

  Lipstick had never done anything like that before. In fact, this was the first backpack trip she’d taken in her adult life. She was a real trooper, following directions from Grapevine and me, she came through with flying colors amid mastery of a large component of fear. The higher we went, the more snow we encountered, though the trail leveled out. Snow slowed our pace. We followed footsteps before us, hoping they knew where they were going.

  We plugged on in the late afternoon light as the sun went below the horizon, very definitely still on deep snow, not knowing if the trail was under our feet, when suddenly, there was Taquitz Creek, and thru hikers directed us to a snow-free patch of ground, where we could camp. Putting the tent up, we crawled inside. It was too cold to cowboy camp with snow all around us at 7,600 feet.

  Grapevine and Lipstick bailed out at Saddle Pass and went to Idlewild. They said they’d been having a good time, but Lipstick didn’t want to face more snow and possible dangerous conditions on Fuller Ridge as a neophyte. Grapevine’s feet hurt, and she feared she was holding me back. Determined to complete my planned hike, this section already skipped once, I didn’t want to skip it again. I went on.

  Not all of the day was on snow. I caught up with some thru hikers having lunch, who said I could descend Fuller Ridge with them. Unfortunately, I had to stop for lunch, too, and couldn’t catch them before they started out on Fuller Ridge.

  Getting my water at the crossing of the second branch of the San Jacinto River, by snowbanks, huge rocks and sparkling water plunging down the creek, I found the trail snow-free for the first two miles. Great. This wasn't bad. What was all the fuss about Fuller Ridge? Maybe I lucked out, and the snow would be melted all the way. Wishful thinking.

  A very steep snowbank covered the trail, but it had good footprints to follow. I took the ice axe off the pack and put on my Yaktracks (tire chains for your feet). Holding the ice axe with one hand, I stowed one hiking pole and started out. Except for very brief glimpses of ground, and more rarely, trail, it was snow all the rest of the day. I tried to be VERY careful.

  I slipped a number of times, but my self-belay functioned just as it should. Once, I found myself suspended by one arm from the ice axe on a steep hillside above a tree well. Younger, more able thru hikers were going through without ice axes or crampons. I was very glad to have the ice axe, and my old skills from my 20s came back to me. I had a scrape on one elbow from an intimate acquaintance with some granite but overall, I was coming through pretty well.

  However, the trail was elusively hidden under the snow. I couldn’t find footprints. It looked like footprints ahead and below me. But when I reached what I thought were footprints, I found only dappled shade. I climbed up and down Fuller Ridge more times than I could count, chasing non-existent footprints.

  Following footprints to stay found is never a sure thing. If snow is frozen hard there are not many footprints that actually show. If sun is melting snow, footprints blend in with the snow around them. And footprints do not guarantee the one making them knows where they are either. Anyone following mine, no doubt also went up and down on fruitless wild goose chases. Such travel requires lots of energy, and I was rapidly losing all vestiges of mine. And I was losing daylight.

  A sheltered valley showing real trail and a few bare spots of ground appeared just at 7:15. I decided it would be foolish to pass up the possible camp spot at that time of day and under those conditions. I camped. I had no idea how far I yet had to go to get off Fuller Ridge. I wasn’t exactly lost. The trail had miraculously appeared with bare ground right beside me.

  But I had no idea how far I’d come or how far I was from Black Mountain Road. I slept inside the three-person tent collapsed like a bivy as the warmest option for one person. Quickly getting out of wet shoes and socks and into warm night clothes, I cooked my dinner from inside my sleeping bag.

  In the morning, I wandered around Fuller Ridge for another three hours of hard labor before reaching Black Mountain Road. Being misplaced takes an enormous amount of time and effort. Finally at Black Mountain Road, I was ready to start my planned day, 16 miles of downhill dropping 6,000 feet, and it was already nearly 10:00 in the morning. I could bail out down the road, but I didn’t want to have to come back and finish this trail some other year. After a snack, removing my Yaktracks and stowing them and the ice ax, I headed down the trail.

  Starting a 16-mile hike at 10:00 in the morning after three hours of wrestling with steep snow was a lot to ask of an old, slow lady. Fuller Ridge is notorious among thru hikers for long switchbacks that accomplish very little elevation loss for many miles under foot. My feet hurt. They screamed. I had to take a short break every half hour. Darkness descended, and I was far from the end of the descent.

  The good news was cell-phone reception was great. I could communicate with Grapevine and Lipstick. My friends decided to walk in from the bottom of the trail to meet me. Two headlamps came up the trail to meet one headlamp coming down. I drank my fill of the water they brought and gobbled energy candy they provided. They even took my pack, which Grapevine carried after giving some of the contents to Lipstick.

  Wow! Did I have wonderful friends? They must have walked in four miles. I hobbled behind my two friends down the road from the water fountain. We reached my cousin, Liz, at 9:30. (Meeting Liz was pre-planned.) Not planned, my feet hurt so bad I couldn’t let them touch the floor of the car and held them in mid-air while sharp pains shot through them on the drive to Palm Springs.

  I needed a zero.

  Luxuriating in a motel pool in Palm Springs on our zero day, my cousin laughed uproariously at white lines from my knee brace next to sunburned skin as I traipsed around in my swimsuit. Lipstick decided to get off the trail and go home. She concluded Grapevine and I were a little nuts to hike when we had such problems with aging body parts, amazed that we liked to hike anyway. Probably an accurate assessment.

  After a day of rest I walked through sand from the spot Liz had picked us up to Highway 10 where I’d commenced hiking after the fire in 2008, making my missed section complete, a nice short stroll ending under the overpass talking to thru hikers including Billy Goat, Socks, and Ice Axe.

  Back to Walker Pass

  Time to return to Walker Pass using a reverse of the travel arrangements I’d taken to the Kickoff. Liz drove us back to Loma Linda, where we met Steve, who took us to Walker Pass. Section hikers sometimes have complicated logistics.

  Having reversed the wheeled trek south, we jumped on the trail and headed north. I had a slow start trying to settle in again with my pack. Though I had a hard time moving, something had lit a fire under Grapevine, and she fairly zoomed up the trail. There was no way I could keep up with her. We made our campsite, four miles, in less than 2.5 hours, well before dark, good time for old ladies with bad knees and feet.

  Grapevine led most of the next day until we began to leapfrog occasionally. Descending to Spanish Needle Creek, we found water; a little farther on we had dinner, and then we walked some more, not having the good sense to stop when planned as we wanted to get a little jump on the next day. Near dark, we made a little nest right on the trail in the bend of a gully as there were no other even faintly flat spots on the steep hillside. I thought I was going to be squashed and smothered by Grapevine’s weight pressing me against some rocks, and I kicked back. Then she was afraid to sleep for fear she would roll on me again and receive another thunk. It wasn’t our best campsite.

  Both of us had hurting feet as we walked over decomposed granite trail. Stopping at Chimney Creek for a rest, Grapevine said she could stay there forever if a helicopter would just drop off food and books to read.

  I bathed and did some laundry, hanging things to dry on a bush. An hour later we collected o
ur drying laundry, packed up and hiked uphill to get a jump on the next day’s elevation gain. Without water weight, we went up a thousand feet in 2.2 miles to Fox Mill Spring, making the next day’s hike much easier. The last mile or so we saw bear tracks.

  After a frosty morning and another 1,500 feet of climb, we came out to a large burn area with no shade and very hot sun. We improvised a precariously constructed shade with our tent for a break and scrunched into a thin sliver of shade from a ledge of rocks beside the trail for lunch. As we leapfrogged down the trail, Grapevine met an angry rattlesnake, probably a diamondback. It scared her half to death, and she climbed a steep hill to get around him. I’d not seen him when I went by before her.

  After dinner, we did a little night hiking. Feeling like she was in Dante's Inferno, Grapevine wanted to get out of the burn area. The moon was bright and the trail relatively level, although very sandy. I managed to not get us lost, and we hiked another three miles under the night sky.

  Our last day on the trail was another hot one, making us glad we had hiked three miles in the cool of darkness. Grapevine's feet hurt before we even started out, and they just got worse all the way to Kennedy Meadows, necessitating many stops applying moleskin, second skin, and padding.

  We walked beside the Kern River through a rocky gorge, thinking the river absolutely lovely after wandering through such dry and burned-over land before reaching it. I daydreamed about floating down that water on an air mattress or in a canoe. Instead, we kept walking onward over sand. I told Grapevine, "If I’d wanted to climb sand dunes, I would have gone to the beach."

  At Kennedy Meadows, we enjoyed cool shade on the store porch. Grapevine's feet looked terrible. Her hiking was done. She was toast. I found out the road to Horseshoe Meadows was open, but the snow line on the trail was 9500 feet, and I was supposed to be above 10,000 feet for two of the last four days. I would be solo on snow if I went on. I’d had enough of that on Fuller Ridge. It was very hard for me to exercise good judgment and get off the trail. But I did.