Day 61
PCT Mile Marker 1771.00 – 1793.50
Miles Hiked 22.50
Hoards of famished mosquitos were screaming and banging on my tent.
Come Out!! They screamed.
Banshees.
My bug spray seemed to work okay even though it didn’t have Deet. Which is really good because Deet eats gear.
I remember cycling cross country and spraying Deet in stripes down my legs. Pretty soon I looked down and found my shorts coming off of me in ribbons. The Deet had eaten right through them. I put it on my list to buy more of the new stuff this weekend. Soon there will be so many mosquitos, my clothes will turn grey.
Hundreds of trees had blown down across the trail. For miles and miles. This way and that. On top of each other.
Crawl over the top of this one. Climb around down, down, down to the right of that one. Scramble up, up, up the hill to go around the left end of that one. Climb on top of this one, heft yourself onto the one that fell on top of that, slide down the back side of it carefully to land on another fallen tree, work your way through the branches between that tree and the trail, walk on the trail for fifteen feet to twenty feet, repeat.
All. Day. Long.
I couldn’t even listen to my iPod. I needed every ounce of concentration to figure out what to do next.
At first, it was fun. At first it was like, Cool! A Puzzle! Neat-O! I got this!
But after the fourth hour of it, it was more like, Okay. I got this. I can figure this out. There’s more than one way to skin a…rabbit, right?
And after the sixth hour of it, it was like, Really? How long is this going to go on? Not again…
I was mentally exhausted.
My Brain Was Smooshed Putty.
I saw some Southbounders and asked them how long the blowdowns continued.
A hundred and twenty miles. They said.
A hundred and twenty miles.
Oh, and you don’t need your ice ax.
The Now Crafted And Standard Response Of Which You Are Familiar: Yes, but it’s very fashionable…I’m sure everyone will be carrying them in the future.
My ice ax is my woobie. I won’t give it up. Stop trying to make me.
You’re Not The Boss Of Me.
Brain putty smooshed out between the fingers of an invisible giant hand.
I was beat up.
I was wiped out.
I lay in my tent, looking at the fading sky.
I started singing to myself…
Lord, I’m one…
Lord, I’m two…
Lord, I’m three…
Lord, I’m four…
Lord, I’m five hundred miles away from home…