The Final Month?

October 1

I tried to get going early.  For some reason I woke up at 3:30 and stayed awake.  There was some creature breaking branches deep in the dark, motionless forest which did not help.  Unfortunately, my dang headlamp was stuck on an even lower setting so hiking in the dark was out.  So, I packed up and huddled around my gear until just a little dawn showed through.

The headlamp I have is from Black Diamond.  It came with an instruction sheet that unfolded into a sheet of paper large enough to sail a boat.  I would not be surprised if it offered instructions in Esperanto.  It can strobe, glow red, lock itself, and have high beams and low beams like a car.  All these functions are achieved through a series of taps and holds, like Morse code, via a button on top.   The first thing any real man will do is throw away an instruction sheet bigger than 8 1/2 x 11, especially if it has  Esperanto.  In the field, the lamp unilaterally decides its base level.  If it is high beam, great.  If not, and you haven’t memorized the code of taps and holds, you are screwed.  I was screwed.  Even doing the old computer reboot by removing the batteries did not seem to work.

Once able to move, I made great time. It was fantastic hiking for most of the day.  It was high forest of mixed deciduous and conifer.  There were plenty of elk.  I went around the Vallecitos Ranch which is a wilderness retreat center focusing on mindfulness.

Later in the day, I got my final water supply before moving away from water.  The trail then went on a weird tangent.  Somebody had posted a sign about a reroute due to dangerous trail conditions. It said to follow the flagging for an alternate.  The problem was there was no flagging.  Regardless, I eventually got synced back up.  The trail went through an aspen forest blow down.  There were a few hairy workarounds.

As with most things, it eventually cleared up.  I was in high meadow territory.  I climbed to the crest where a forest service road crossed and I found a grove of young aspen.  I was able to cowboy camp.  There were some hunters across the valley, but they were pretty mellow.