Trail #132 to Leigh Lake, Cabinet Mountains Wilderness, Montana

Trail #132 in the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness begins at the end of an atrocious, crater-filled road that winds through a logged area for about two miles. No, "road" is too generous a word. A road is what we turned off of two miles back -- an unpaved gravel affair, but nothing too dire. This, on the other hand, is a two-mile ribbon of unforested space covered in large rocks, pitted with gigantic holes, and actually strewn in places with fallen trees. This cannot be called a road so much as an obstacle course.

I've been on some bad roads. We once hauled a canoe along the Inside North Fork Road in Glacier National Park, and I think I have some residual brain damage from that ride. Though I'd thought it impossible, this one was worse. What I'm trying to say, in my customary delicate manner, is that one really ought not to attempt to reach Trail #132 to Leigh Lake without an extremely sturdy vehicle, or at least a healthy dollop of idiotic bravado. Both would help.

But if you get there, it's a treat. First hikes of the season have always been misery for me. I get all soft and flabby in the winter, mentally and physically (even softer and flabbier than usual), and hauling it all up a mountain is kind of a challenge. The hike to Leigh Lake is only 3 miles round trip with an elevation change of 1,000 feet each way. (I was also carrying a full pack and tripod.)

It wasn't hot, but it was warm enough that we became hot as we climbed steadily up to the lake. Large patches of snow lingered off trail, and we could hear the constant sound of snowmelt rushing off the mountains. After about an hour we arrived at a sheer rock face deluged in a seasonal waterfall. I placed my hands on it and let the ice cold water run over my wrists. Thomas, our year-old dog, had a drink.

At length, I turned around and saw this:


Hmm. Not bad. So I turned back around and kept going. Once you reach the base of the waterfall where the lake spills over into the valley, the trail forks and you have two options. One is to the right and one is to the left. The trail to the left is supposedly well-marked and not quite as steep, while the one to right involves scrambling on a scree-strewn trail that braids often and is easily lost.

So naturally we never found the left fork. Scrambling over the rock I was amazed to see that the alpine wildflowers were in full bloom, even though it was only Memorial Day weekend. Once we clambered up over the lip of the cirque, we could see the trail to the lake winding through a carpet of glacier lilies.



To me, an ascent is much less painful than a steep descent. Sure, it's harder on the lungs, but it's infinitely kinder to the feet and legs. Maybe it's my center of gravity, but I have to make a steep descent low to the ground. This produces what my husband calls "machine-gun leg," or the staccato quivering of muscles that have been overworked. The insult continues on a normal but still descending trail, as one's toes jam mercilessly into boots with every step down.

But it doesn't last long, and it's all part of the game, and it still beats the living hell out of any other day parked at a computer. We made it down, though we were slightly dehydrated from a mistake calculating our fluid needs for the day. We went to the DQ on the edge of town and I sucked down a root beer float, which solved the problem immediately.

Dipping a toe back into the blogging pool

Yep, that's an alpine lake your eye has deftly discerned in the corner of the photo, along with a footpath lined with glacier lilies.

It gets more and more difficult to go back to the burbs -- even the burbs of a wonderful city like Portland -- every time I am compelled to do so. At the risk of saying too much too soon, that may become less of a problem in the coming months.

A long meditation on the backcountry

I've been too long in civilization. Too long smelling of laundry detergent and soap, and too long coddled by conveniences. My muscles and body are soft from relative disuse, and my fingernails are too clean.

Almost everyone I know has places they long for at certain times. When the midwestern winter gray lingers just a hair too long, my brother's thoughts turn to sunsets on Mallory Square and conch chowder by the docks. One friend thinks of Venice; another pines for skiing in the Andes.

This time of year I think of a trail, and carrying the necessaries on my back. I enjoy the exertion, the heat, and the sweat. I take a perverse pleasure in the barely perceptible slide into personal squalor. I feel vaguely grubby the first and second days. After that, I know I smell like a dung heap, but I don't care, because I can't smell myself or my partners, and they cannot smell me. It's a happy arrangement in every way.

I enjoy how a trail unfolds with every step. What's ahead? Where will we camp tonight? Will it be a stream or a lake? Or perhaps by the ocean? I relish the way every muscle hurts after a proper day of hiking, so much that lying down on a sleeping pad on the ground feels like a gift. I love it all. I love the smell of the bagels I pack on each trip, the whish of the nylon as I cinch the stuff sack, and the fuzziness of hiking socks as they hug my feet.

Almost exactly six years ago (before my son was born), my husband, my sister and I were suffering just this kind of post-winter discontent. So we packed up our dogs and drove to Southern Indiana, right up to the border. Indiana is not all flatness -- the southern part of the state boasts some hills. We arrived at the trailhead on a Friday evening, and hiked a mile or so to a bluff overlooking the Ohio River. We camped there at a shelter with a guy and his two kids. We made a fire and enjoyed the kind of easy merriment that occurs when you meet someone on a trail.

We hiked together for the next two days among the blooming redbuds. We did nine miles the second day, and four the day after. We were soft, just emerging from a slothful winter, and so that was enough -- at least with full packs. That weekend we were all able to feed our urge to follow a path with the people we loved best. Tonight is much lonelier. We're all scattered away from each other; Mr. T is half a world away in south China, I am here at my laptop in Portland, and my sister is asleep in Indianapolis. Both the dogs that went on that trip have passed on.

I've never been able to do enough of this -- at least, not with my favorite partner. At first I was kept from it by a demanding job; for the last four years parenting duties have made it difficult to get away together. But the kid is almost five now, and frequently demands to be taken to a "hiking place." It's astonishingly easy here to get out in relatively short, kid-appropriate distances. There's a cobalt blue lake nestled in the shadow of Mt. Rainier that feels like the end of the earth. It is, in fact, a mile and a half off the road up to Paradise -- perfect for a quick overnight trip. After that come multi-day excursions. It's almost here.

I still ache to do the long-distance, six-month journeys. I won't get to do that for many years yet, I know. I wonder whether I'll still be in good enough physical condition when that time comes. My mother is 64 and needs both knees replaced. Will I be able to do a long trip in my early 50s? I don't know.

But for now, all I can do is get short snatches of time on wilderness trails. And I've learned that the truth is simple and immutable: the more I get, the happier I am.

Tragedy in southern Oregon

Last night, I opened the door and stepped out onto the deck. I wore a fleece, but no coat. I had socks on, but no shoes.

It was cold. The air was stiff, and a bit moist. And the cold was unmistakable. It enveloped me immediately, snaking up my fleece and stinging the bare skin on my back, biting the tips of my ears. It instantly soaked into my wool socks, stripping the warmth from my feet. I stayed only a few seconds before returning to the warmth of my bedroom.

But before I did, I breathed deeply and thought about James Kim, who didn’t have the option of returning to a warm space. Motivated to save his family, he pushed into the Siskiyou National Forest after nine days in his snowbound station wagon. I can readily understand why he did it. I think almost anything would be easier than watching your family die, even plunging into the frigid Oregon wilderness in shirtsleeves to seek help.

I can only wonder what Kati Kim was feeling. There could have been no question which one of them would go. She was the source of the nutrients keeping their girls alive. She was left with a task that was, in its own way, as monumental as the one her husband faced: to wait, caring for two children, and reassuring the one who was old enough to know something was very wrong. She had to grapple with what must have been monstrous fears, without the comfort of a sense of acting concretely to alleviate them.

In the end, James Kim made eight miles in the freezing air on nearly impossible terrain, having had little to eat for nine days. I’ve hiked – mostly on trails – in Southern Oregon. Well-fed, with the proper gear, and walking on a clear footpath, traversing this terrain under your own power is a strenuous task. Under the conditions James Kim faced, it’s an epic.

Sometimes the world is too hard.