Skywalker--Highs and Lows on the Pacific Crest Trail

by Bill Walker

  “Do you think they’ll come back?” I asked Ingrid (I knew Dirk would).

  “I don’t know. Their feet are hurting pretty badly.”

  Snake Charmer and Laura had met at the Kickoff and hiked every step of the way. In fact, in what would be the culmination of their PCT romance, they even got MRI’s on their feet together. Then they quit together. Shades of Romeo and Juliet, but with a much less tragic ending.

  Ingrid and I stood there chatting about the sights in Yosemite when we heard loud screams, followed by banging of pots and pans. There was only one possible explanation.

  “That’s probably a bear,” said Ingrid, the former student park ranger. We heard more people yelling “bear”. Apparently, it was moving our way. I stood there watching over Ingrid’s right shoulder looking for the bear to appear. The gentlemanly thing to do was not to impede her view of the bear, by standing between the bear and her. Right?

  “Where is it?” I asked.

  “Over there somewhere,” Ingrid said.

  Finally, somebody’s flashlight shined on a medium-sized bear strolling through the campground like an insolent teenager.

  His or her attitude seemed to be “You’re all a pain in the ass. And I know you’re not going to shoot me. So just shut up and let me see what damn food is lying around.”

  Soon an armed ranger came up trying to shoo the bear away. Alas, this may have been one of this bear’s last passes through this campground. The next morning somebody told us he had seen two tags on the bear. That meant it had been anesthetized and moved from the area twice, but kept coming back. The policy is ‘three strikes and you’re out’.

  This was a fitting end to an eventful day. I was in high spirits because tomorrow I was taking a bus down into Yosemite Valley to get a tour of Nature’s Cathedral.

  It had been the life mission of one most extraordinary man to preserve it for us masses to enjoy.

  Chapter 25

  Scottish-American Beacon

  I care to live only to entice people to look at Nature’s loveliness.

  John Muir

  On the streets of Dunbar, Scotland, thousands of miles from where he would later achieve fame, it was evident early on that John Muir was different. The popular Scottish poet, Robert Burns, was the most decisive influence on his youth.

  “On my lonely walks I have often thought how fine it would be to have the company of Burns,” Muir wrote. “Wherever a Scotsman goes, there goes Burns.”

  Like so many Scots, Burns had a burning sense of social inferiority. Defiantly, he refused to use the imperial English language—the language of conquest. Burns wrote such classics as Auld Lang Syne, Tam O’ Shanter, and Sweet Afton in the old Scots dialect.

  The Scots revered Burns as a national hero. His poetry, along with other Scottish poets (Robert Louis Stevenson and Walter Scott), would inspire John Muir for the rest of his life in his fight on behalf of underdog causes.

  “This sudden splash into pure wildness,” John Muir exulted, “How utterly happy it has made us. Oh, that glorious Wisconsin wilderness.”

  In 1848, Muir’s father had uprooted the family from Scotland, due to a dispute with the Church of Scotland. Nothing was more important to a Scot than land, given their bitter experience with imperial English landlords. Because Daniel Muir had saved up enough money in thrifty Scottish fashion, he was able to purchase 300 acres of Wisconsin farmland.

  John was eleven at the time of that first American summer, and slept outside most of the time in order to fully imbibe the pristine wilderness. The amazing array of wildlife—squirrels, frogs, turtles, bears, rabbits—left him positively rhapsodic. The biggest cloud on the horizon, he would later recall, was that he soon joined all the other American boys in carrying a rifle. Like everyone, he killed animals in scores.

  But John Muir was different than most red-blooded American boys. Soon he recoiled from this practice. In fact, he thought the whole practice had revealed a dark side of human nature.

  “Why should man value himself as more than a small part of creation?” he asked. “Every species has been made in the same way as humans.” Using alligators as an example, he even went so far as to reason that because they have a right to live, they have a right to eat whatever they catch. This would include an occasional human!

  “If a war of races should occur between the wild beasts and Lord Man,” he wrote, “I would be tempted to sympathize with the bears.”

  Muir’s father was a stern Calvinist, and often set up piles of burning brush on the farm, signifying hellfire and brimstone (beatings soon followed). Ultimately, his father’s harshness towards both himself and the farm animals drove Muir away from the farm. He enrolled at the University of Wisconsin in Madison where he soon faced another major moral crisis. The Civil War broke out. Muir considered himself a Scot, first and foremost. More importantly, he didn’t believe in killing humans any more than animals. So he took the time-honored route of pacifists and headed to Canada.

  After the war, Muir decided to travel the length of the country. Quickly, he developed his trademark style. He traveled on foot, carrying a loaf of bread and tea. When his loaf gave out he was known to occasionally knock on people’s doors asking for a loaf of bread in return for giving a hand at chores. Often he went hungry. But he never worried. Nature, he assumed, could never harm him, for it was the fundamental source of all health. Sickness was something that belonged to the cities.

  During his extensive wanderings, Muir began hearing about a place called Yosemite in California. Quickly, he resolved to seek this paradise out. California would prove to lay such a deep hold on his affections that he would never again live anyplace else.

  When Muir arrived in San Francisco in 1868, he allegedly asked the first passer-by how he could quickly get out of town. Asked where he was going, Muir simply said, “any place that is wild.” The trail led across the Bay and eventually into the Sierras.

  Ecstatic is the only way to describe Muir when he first spotted the dark-green forest and smooth, unbroken walls of granite peaks. His first summer in the Sierras awakened the deepest and most intense passion of his life. His whole body seemed to pulse with the beauty around him.

  “This splendid country,” he wrote, “flowing with more of milk and more of honey than did old Canaan in its happiest prime.”

  Muir thought nature—especially mountains—actually led humans to goodness and light.

  “I am hopelessly and forever a mountaineer,” he exulted.

  Californians who witnessed Muir wandering around the Sierras marveled at the risks he took. Muir simply couldn’t get enough. On a later trip to Alaska, he and his dog had gotten stuck on the massive Taylor glacier, and made a harrowing escape. Telling of the dog’s bravery jumping over crevasses became one of his famous tales.

  Not everyone was enchanted, though.

  He “knows less about camping than almost any man I’ve ever camped with,” remarked an amazed member of one of Muir’s far-flung expeditions.

  He often set off deep into the back country with insufficient gear, and went long stretches with no food. He could easily have died from hypothermia or a fall off one of the precipices he constantly sought out. But Muir trusted so deeply in the benevolence of nature that he simply didn’t worry.

  California’s population exploded upon completion of the Trans-Continental Railroad in 1869. Far-reaching decisions about the American West quickly moved to the forefront. Muir’s outdoor exploits had already made him legendary, which allowed him middle of the fierce debates.

  He bought a house in San Francisco. In Donald Worster’s brilliant biography of Muir, A Passion for Nature, he points out that Muir was actually embarrassed at this bow to civilization. In fact, when greeting visitors he always tried to give the impression that he had just returned from the mountains. But it was a necessary evil, and gave him a larger platform. Better yet, unlike Thoreau who preferred to live in monastic-like solitude (Walden Pond), Muir was a people person who could wi
n over almost anybody.

  Great moment in American wilderness preservation. John Muir and Theodore Roosevelt posing at Glacier Point with Yosemite Falls in the background. No offense, Mr. President, but my vote goes to the dapper gentleman to your left!

  One of those in the thrall of the Muir legend was the 26th President of the United States, Theodore Roosevelt. Roosevelt fancied himself an outdoorsman par excellence, and figured Muir to be a kindred soul. When planning his tour of the West in 1903 he wrote Muir a letter asking for a tour of Yosemite.

  “I do not want anyone with me but you,” Roosevelt wrote him.

  Upon arrival, President Roosevelt gave all the other gathered dignitaries short shrift, and shunted the Secret Service aside. Thus set off together two of the great raconteurs of all time, as well as seminal figures in American outdoor history. They would be together for three days and three nights. Needless to say, Muir knew exactly where to take him. They hiked to and camped in the most beautiful spots in Yosemite, including at the foot of Bridal Veil Falls with its fantastic view of El Capitan and Ribbon Falls gushing down from the valley’s north rim.

  Muir proved masterful at stoking up Roosevelt’s wilderness fervor, filling him with one tale after another of reckless timber cutting. Soon he had Roosevelt shouting “swine” at these villains.

  “I stuffed him pretty well regarding the timber thieves,” Muir fondly recalled.

  Now he sought to get Roosevelt to add the scenic wonders in Yosemite Valley to the already federally-protected Yosemite National Park. Roosevelt heartily agreed and proved good to his word.

  The only sour point in this veritable love-fest came one night around a campfire when the 44 year-old Roosevelt uncorked his colorful array of tales of big-game hunting. The 65 year-old Muir couldn’t resist himself.

  “Mr. Roosevelt,” he asked, “when are you going to get beyond the boyishness of killing things?”

  Roosevelt was temporarily taken aback, but finally responded in an uncharacteristically soft manner. “Muir, I guess you are right.” However, Roosevelt never gave up hunting big game.

  Their three days in Yosemite rated as a highlight in both of their lives, and both would speak glowingly of the other (Muir—“I fairly fell in love with him.”) for the rest of their lives. Unfortunately though, his greatest defeat would follow on the heels of it.

  The flowering of interest in wilderness preservation was now to run into the great reality of the West—the scarcity of water. San Francisco was growing into a world-class city and needed more water. The city set its periscope on Hetch-Hetchy Valley, which lay 150 miles away inside Yosemite National Park. This valley, with its scenic waterfalls and surrounding mountains, also happened to be one of John Muir’s favorite places.

  He was horrified when he heard what was afoot.

  “These devotees of raging commercialism,” he fumed. “They’re temple destroyers.”

  However, Gifford Pinchot, who was Theodore Roosevelt’s point man in these matters, proclaimed a wise-use doctrine. The water should be used in the way to benefit the most people. It came down to the most basic philosophy. Pinchot thought allowing San Francisco to have the water was the best possible use for the most number of people. Muir, with his absolute faith in Nature, thought keeping the valley pristine offered the most long-term benefits for the most number of people.

  It is impossible to conclusively say who was conceptually right. Pinchot probably had the best argument for the next century—Muir for the millenia. Objectively, though, Muir was making his argument at the wrong time and in the wrong country. Theodore Roosevelt listened sympathetically to Muir’s pleadings to stop this abomination of nature. But ultimately Roosevelt was influenced by the fact that the United States had just passed the European powers to become the world’s largest economy. Roosevelt didn’t want anything to derail the nation’s industrial might and chose not to intervene to save the Hetch-Hetchy Valley from being dammed.

  It was a bitter defeat for Muir and one he never recovered from his remaining few years.

  The famous diplomat and historian, Henry Kissinger, is fond of saying, “Ultimately, a person’s place in history is determined as much by what he set in motion, as by what he actually accomplished.” His formula could well apply to John Muir.

  Muir helped found the Sierra Club in 1892, which now has a membership totaling almost a million members. Most importantly, an entire culture dedicated to preserving wilderness has reached critical mass. Its best days are likely yet to come because it is so wildly popular amongst our youth.

  Nobody has ever played a bigger role in that movement than the gentleman with the longish gray beard, merry blue eyes, an inimitable Scottish accent, and the pose of an Old Testament Prophet. John Muir probably rates as the greatest proponent of Nature in American history.

  Chapter 26

  “Worst Bug Day in PCT History”

  Never kill a mosquito or blackfly. If you do, a million other ones will come to its funeral.

  Verlen Kruger

  If you had asked me in the desert what was the most important piece of equipment in my backpack, I might have said my wide-brimmed sun hat. In the High Sierra, I would have dithered before possibly answering my long-johns. But for the next 100 miles through Yosemite, there was no doubt, whatsoever, what was the most critical item. It was a piece of equipment that probably weighed about 1/100th of a pound. My headnet.

  Yogi had recommended carrying a headnet in her guidebook, but it had almost seemed gimmicky to me. Obviously, you couldn’t keep it on while eating, drinking, defecating, or hiking. So why carry one? Right? Wrong. Fortunately, Dirk had deftly negotiated one for me in the desert from a section hiker who was ending his hike.

  Yosemite National Park is an unbelievable world of sheer rock cliffs and running, plunging water. The sheer beauty of it is staggering. I had toured the Yosemite Valley the previous day and been blown away by the sights I had heard about all my life, including el Capitan and Half-Dome. Waterfalls were everywhere, including Yosemite Falls, which drops off 2,425 feet, the highest waterfall in North America.

  Rushing streams are one of the major reasons I love hiking. Along with everything else, their power to clear the mind better is incomparable. But they come with a price, at least at certain times of the year. This was one of those times. The next five days going north out of Tuolomne, the bugs were to be hellish. It almost felt like a hot needle was being injected, every time one of them bit me. At first, I wore the headnet only on breaks. I would lift it up to take bites of food, and then quickly lower the veil to chew the food. Soon, though, it became obvious I was going to have to wear the headnet while hiking.

  Relieving myself, however, proved to be terribly complicated. Twice my unit got bit while urinating. In both cases, it took a couple days of triple-antibiotic treatment for the wound and pain to go away. I took to frantically fanning everywhere when taking a leak, but wasn’t confident in the technique.

  “We’re lucky to not have outdoor plumbing,” one Canadian girl chortled, when other male hikers complained about having suffered the same fate.

  The women didn’t have a free ride by any imagination. They had to expose their full behinds to attack several times a day. I didn’t envy them. But I sure admired the way some improvised. They learned to squat with their backpacks attached and get the job done quickly. I had never seen that before.

  “You should put that technique on the internet,” I sincerely suggested to a couple of them. It almost matched us males in its efficiency.

  The challenge was psychological as much as physical. It was impossible to relax, knowing these bloodsuckers were savoring every moment.

  “You look dazed,” CanaDoug observed one day to me. “You’ve got cuts everywhere.” He was an unabashed defender of Canada’s geography, periodically mentioning this or that great mountain or water source as being equal or superior to the one in America. But he finally had to admit, “Yeah, these bugs are probably worse than anything I�
�ve ever seen.” Plenty of hikers’ shirts looked like they were changing to a darker color from all the dead bugs smeared on them.

  The second night into Yosemite, CanaDoug, Ingrid, and I hiked until arriving on a sandy beach surrounding yet another large lake. What in the world is a beach doing here in the middle of the mountains? It was a total anomaly, but also gorgeous. Indeed, the Sierras doled out endless delights. But the hardships were formidable. Here on the sandy shores, the wind was overwhelming and I had to quickly take umbrage in my tent. But when it had died down the next morning, the bugs quickly smelled blood. It was unbearable and I literally had to run of there.

  One rushing stream and amazing view after another presented themselves here in Nature’s Cathedral. Amazingly, the bugs got even worse. Often, I would feel an ecstatic bug trilling in my ears, presumably to get at the wax inside. Instead of looking forward to breaks, I was now dreading them. But you had to have them. The three of us took a break at Kerrick Canyon before a big climb that lay ahead. But I quickly jumped up.

  “I can’t stand it,” I said in a state of angst, and rushed off ahead of them. A higher elevation should bring relief.

  Forget it. At the top, I came to a fork in the trail. Stopping to check my maps would have meant Chinese torture treatment from these invisible terrorists. So I just went straight. I headed up a mountain for two miles before the trail became ragged, and I realized I was lost. Dispirited and anxious, I hurriedly retraced my steps. Worst of all, once I found the PCT again, the trail led down to Dorothy Lake. There, all wind and all life appeared to have ceased—except for, of course, mosquitoes.

  I had only a half hour of light left and hiked as fast as I possibly could, hoping to get to somewhere with at least a whiff of a humane breeze. I barely found it. After fording yet another creek, I quickly threw up my tent right in the middle of a fork in the trail, and