July 13

Last September, Eliza and I camped one night here in the Mt. Adams Wilderness. At the time, we were getting geared up to start working on making this hike happen (it was a slow start at that point). I was packing up all of my belongings and preparing to leave my home on Williams Street in Portland. My sister, Sarah, and her, now husband, Nouru, were visiting and we had spent the day wading in some natural hot springs just west of the Wind River. That evening, Sarah and Nouru met up with friends in Hood River and Eliza and I drove our rental car up this way, past Trout Lake, and into the wilderness. It turned out to be quite a disconcerting night and we both showed just how fearful and weak-hearted we could be in the face of a vast, and sometimes very loud, great outdoors.

After setting up our tent next to the car, just off to the side of the dirt road we had been on, we debated whether to go ahead and cook or not.

"Are there bears up this way?" we wondered.

"Probably. Best to not cook, right?"

So we let the sun sink away and crawled hungry and unsatisfied into the tent. And that's when it started. Horrible, blood-curdling banshee-like screams came howling toward us from the distance. Carnivorous, angry ghosts were descending from the skies. Un-dead wolfmen had come to life (was it a full moon out there?). And there we lay perfectly still, petrified, frozen, unsure what to do, think, say, or feel. The terrifying unknown had us both by the throats.

I tried to play it cool.

Don't worry, I'm sure they don't mean any harm. They're really far away, I can tell.

I assured and reassured, but Eliza wouldn't hear of it. She had sat bolt upright. She was getting into the car and locking the doors. I insisted that there wasn't anything to worry about. She unzipped the tent door, let herself out, and slammed the car door behind her scurrying, blanket-bearing body.

And there she sat for hours, staring at the tent, ready to save me with a blaring horn and flashing lights when the moment of judgement finally arrived -- which, surely, it would.

Of course, morning came and we were fine. The coyotes, because that's what they were -- we heard some yesterday morning, those same squealing, awful howls -- never bothered us in any way but aurally. We took a short day hike after packing up, both of us entertaining the notion that this hike we had started planning just weeks before might not be the right thing for us after all . . .

***

We hiked down from Adams' western flank this morning, passing a few PCT hikers on the way (northbound flip-floppers out of Ashland, OR), descending comfortably and easily. The day is a brilliant, sunny summer day. July as it should be. Yesterday's struggle is left behind and our spirits are revived. Early yesterday morning we had entertained the idea of trying to push through to Cascade Locks by Friday night by pulling down three 30s and a 32. We both agreed, we could do it, let's try! We were destroyed by the end of the first day, and only a 27 at that. Today we decided that these plans we make are only as good as it feels to break them. With Mt. Hood appearing on the horizon and Oregon smiling patiently at us from across the wide Columbia, we determined that we would get that hitch into Trout Lake after all and make today a half-day. We had passed through and stopped at the corner espresso shop last year on the morning after our night with the coyotes and we figured we owed it to ourselves to round out the experience.

And here we are, bellies full of huckleberry milkshake, bare feet falling asleep on the green grassy lawn. When we rouse ourselves from this glorious state, we will walk the quarter- mile down the road to the Forest Service/ Northwest Service Academy center -- the sister center to the organization I worked with last summer. I contacted them earlier this spring and they have offered to shower us and feed us whenever we arrive.