Epiphany
It was sad to leave my little clearing in the forest and the
friends I made, but it was time to hit the road. I’ve been pretty busy since I left and I just
realized I haven’t posted a thing in weeks.
Now that I’m on the road again, I’ll try to go back to weekly
updates.
From Sonora I headed north to Redding for a week. Man was it hot!! I took a drive out to Lassen Volcanic
National Park and hiked a trail called Bumpass Hell. It went past some mud spots, or roaring
fumaroles (steam and volcanic-gas vents), thumping mud pots, boiling pools, and
steaming ground. That’s something you
don’t see every day! The road that goes
through the park was closed due to active fires in the area, so I didn’t get to
see the whole thing, but I did see some interesting sights. There was no guard rail, a narrow road and
steep drop offs. That morning I saw a
video of two guys racing on Pikes Peak and they went over the edge. I couldn’t get that image out of my head and
my truck is a whole lot wider that that little race car. I was kind of glad to have to turn
around. Check it out
http://video.today.msnbc.msn.com/today/48687179
For my next adventure, I hiked some more of the Pacific
Crest Trail (PCT) in the Shasta National Forest.
The views of Mt. Shasta were beautiful!
This type of forest was much more to my liking, with more trees and lush
vegetation. The trail followed a river
with some very nice waterfalls. At some
point it turned away from the water and I started climbing. The temp was about 111 in Redding, but it was
much cooler where I was, or so I thought.
As I climbed I realized it was still pretty hot; I was dripping with
sweat. I have always hiked with a frozen
bottle of water in my pack to make my drinking water cooler and wow was it
refreshing. I planned on a long hike, so
this time I brought two frozen bottles, nestled on either side of my water
bag. Of course the ice in the bottles
eventually melts, but not for a surprisingly long time. And when it does, I have more water to
drink. On this hike, I sucked down the
64 oz bladder bag, both 24 oz water bottles, a nectarine and apple and an
orange. I realized pretty early on there
was no way I was going to hike the 4-5 hours I had planned. I think I did a total of 3.
As I was hiking along I was thinking about what kind of job
I was going to look for when I got to Florida.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized how much I loathed the
thought of going back to work. With the
astronomical monthly truck and RV payment, I’ve blown through my savings (as
anticipated when I hit the road in February).
Plan A had always been to work for a few more years and be debt free
when I started this trip. When I quit my
job in January, I decided to take the
summer off, then go back to work and get back on track with plan A. But what if I could come up with a plan
B? Of course, one option would be to
sell my house in Tennessee but since someone else had been kind enough to pay
the mortgage for the past 10+ years, keeping it is a no brainer. I’ve been stashing money in IRA’s for years,
but there is the whole 10% early withdrawal and tax liability, so I never
seriously considered that either. But on
this day I got to thinking… when I lived
in Oregon, I used to hike the PCT as often as I
could. I had a secret dream of hiking the entire trail, from Mexico to Canada. When I moved back to Virginia, I had the same
thought about the Appalachian trail. 10
years ago, I was physically capable of doing it, but now there is no way I
could ever carry the pack and hike 10-20 miles a day. I got to thinking, if I go back to work and
delay my adventure a few more years, what will my physical ability be like
then? Will I still be able to do all the
things I can do now, will I still want travel, or will I be sucked back into
that life where you live pay check to pay check, just dreaming about the
future. As I said when I quit my job,
life is just too short. I decided the
penalty and tax is a small price to pay for my freedom! So, good bye retirement savings, good bye
debt and hello real retirement at age 50!! I’ll probably do more volunteer jobs to stretch
my retirement check, but it’s a great way to really see the national parks, I only
have to ‘work’ a few days a week, and each gig is only a few months at a time.
On my last day in the Redding area, I decided to hike in
Whiseytown National Recreation Area. It
was still wicked hot, so I decided to take my beach stuff and a picnic lunch
for after the hike. I pulled into the
day use area where my trail started and there in the middle of the road was a
perfectly fine inflatable kayak, just laying in the middle of the road. Being the good Samaritan that I was, I picked
it up put it in my truck. I couldn’t
take the chance on someone swerving to avoid hitting it and wrecking their car
now could I? After I let the air out and
stuffed it in the back seat so it wouldn’t blow away again, I ran like hell,
least the careless driver who lost it should realize it was gone and come
back. Now I had to drive to the other
side of the lake to the other beach and trail head, but some sacrifices are
just worth it! The trail was awesome and
it was early enough when I started that the heat wasn’t too oppressive. At the end of the hike, not so much, so the
cool water was a welcome relief. After
lunch I floated around in the water in my little inflatable lounge chair
thinking man do I have it made!!!!!
The next day I packed up and hit the road into Oregon. First stop, Roseburg, which was as close as I
could get to Crater Lake. My plan for
the next day was to hike more of the PCT, which runs thru the park. I got to looking at the map and realized not
only was the park further than anticipated, there was a lot to do on the Scenic
Drive just to get there. I spent the day
admiring the beautiful scenery and hiking short distances into various sights
and waterfalls. Once I got to Crater
Lake itself, the first overlook was impressive.
The lake is huge of course, with Wizard Island sticking out. I checked the map and made note of several
sights to see, including Pinnacle Overlook which is about 6 miles off the Rim
Road. These Pinnacles are a collection
of 100-foot-tall spires which have been created as the canyon walls around them
have eroded away. The spires are “fossil fumaroles,” each marking a spot where
volcanic gas rose up through hot ash deposits, cementing the ash into solid
rock. (http://www.nationalparksblog.com/pinnacles-overlook-crater-lake-national-park/) Very cool looking! By the time I got back to Rim Road and
stopped at the next overlook, the lake was all but obscured, due to haze
maybe? I fell in behind a car with two
men in it, and we seemed to be stopping at the same spots with the same
disappointing results. They noticed the
Retired Air Force sticker on my truck and asked if my husband was retired. I
informed them that they recently began letting women in the military and in
fact it was me who was retired. I
realized they were probably just making a feeble attempt at conversation and
smiled as it said it, so we began chatting.
They thought the lake was obscured due to smoke, they said there were
several forest fires in the area. It
seems the same story in every forest I’ve been to in the past few weeks. It
reminded me of my last week in the Stanislaus.
Tom and I were working on a project upcountry, restoring
benches and painting bathrooms. There
had been a lightning storm over the weekend and crews were watching for
fires. One of the fire guys came by in
the morning and said that even though the lightening may have hit several days
ago, the spark could smolder for quite some time before turning into an actual
fire. We were at Donnell Vista, which
offers a spectacular view of the Carson-Iceberg wilderness area. He didn’t spot any smoke at our location and
headed further upcountry while Tom and I went back to work. A while later, a lady approached us in a
rather frantic state, asking if we had a radio to contact anyone. We said of course, was there some kind of
medical emergency or something. She said
no, she spotted smoke and wanted us to call someone. We said there were fire crews on the lookout,
not to worry. The more we talked to her
the more frantic she became, finally stating we had to call someone, she didn’t
want the forest to burn down! I thought
about telling her that the forest needed fire, that it wasn’t necessarily a bad
thing, but we could tell from her attitude that she expected red fire trucks to
race into the wilderness and put it right out.
When we called it in, it had already been reported. It was pretty interesting, for the rest of
the day we watched it grow and assured
all the visitors who asked about it that it was reported. Often when a fire happens in a wilderness
area they let it burn. It takes out the
underbrush and allows the trees to grow.
Also, some pines need the extreme heat to open up the pine cones and
propagate. A fire crew came to our
location and told us they were going to try to get a crew in there, because
there was a campground nearby, but it would take several hours for them to hike
in. In the afternoon a helicopter flew
over to assess the fire. By the end of
the day the smoke had grown and turned darker.
We guessed it was at least 5 miles from us across a gorge. As we were leaving for the day, we checked
one last time. By then, we could see
actual flames engulfing trees. An
interesting last day!
Tomorrow I’m headed to Winchester Bay on the Oregon coast
before heading up to Portland. I’m so
excited to see my friends there! I might
just have to extend my stay another week to fit everyone in.
https://picasaweb.google.com/118205599704530902363/ReddingAndRosebug?authkey=Gv1sRgCNjt4dLJrcfBcQ#
Lisa, you are so inspiring. I am very happy for you. In 5yrs I can finally retire. Once the kids have graduated high school, my husband & I plan on moving to the U.P. We are done with what people call "civilization" :-) Jeannie
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