...Be someplace else.
I spent six years in the military on active duty; another six years in the reserves. I didn't learn this rule from any lessons taught in the Navy that I can recall. It's more likely that I learned it playing video games.
This weekend we set plans to hike around Three Finger Jack north of Three Sisters in Oregon. A few miles into our hike, about 4800ft elevation, we found too much snow to keep on the trail. This meant we would not be able to stick to our original hike plan. We hoofed it back to the truck and decided to head to the south end of Three Sisters hoping for less snow in lower elevations.
A mile into that trail we found snow again but would not easily be dissuaded. Trail maps showed 3.5 miles to Horse Lake. We lost the trail so many times that we made it into 4.6 miles by GPS. I think we would have been better to just pick a compass bearing and GO!
As we neared Horse Lake we knew it was all down hill and figured we would be able to get off that cursed snow. The snow was our first enemy. We wouldn't fully realize that until the return trip. We had lunch at the lake and headed west via the path of lowest elevation that seemed like we could make a decent hike of the weekend.
That would have been fine if not for the mosquitoes (mozzies) that started to plague us at lunch time and continued to become more hostile as the miles progressed. We had a few small spray bottles of Deet insect repellent that would prove just enough to get us home and almost enough to fend off the mozzies. Even with deet bug spray applied more than hourly, the enemy persisted at attacking us. We found ourselves engaged in a speed march for miles on end.
If the enemy knows where you are, don't be there. We were constantly running from this mozzie threat. While I appreciate feeding the wildlife, I generally try not feeding wildlife in flesh and blood. Our hope was to reach a spot for camp where the bugs weren't so aggressive. We found such a camp at Dillon Lake.
Near Dillon Lake I saw something moving out of the corner of my eye. I first thought it was a person and was about to tell Gena there was a hiker ahead. But the movement and form wasn't right... and not many hikers wear all black. Pointing out mama bear and baby bear to Gena, I had her leash Jane who was oblivious to the entire thing until she caught the scent. Our trail did cross where the bears had been but we did not see them again. I guess they saw us as the enemy and changed their position.
Reliably we hit snow again on our way out and even decided to follow the same return path from Horse lake thinking we could follow our tracks out and knowing that the mozzies were not as fierce on the way into the forest.
Our legs grew tired of slipping on the snow and ice. At one point Gena slipped completely off a snow berm headed toward a tree. At another I fell, twisting side ways so that when I landed on my ribs below the nipple my pack weight could help drive the air out of my lungs and drive my chest into the snow. Jane smiled her usual mocking dog smile.
We were growing impatient and wanting to get away from this frozen white enemy. We didn't consider this a retreat so much as an aggressive attack-the-hell-out-of-here!
All told, it was a great weekend even in consideration of the pains. Gena and I needed a trip away from people and we had just that. Gena got more familiar with gear set up, navigation, and better use of trekking poles. I focused hard on navigation and learned to rely less if at all on where the trail was or wasn't supposed to be.
Who needs trails on a hike anyway?
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