Blackmare! Part 1

Ambrose woke me around 8am on Saturday. We were at the Kennally Creek Campground, which was not where we had planned to spend the night, but it wasn’t far from it. (See “What Would You Do for Your Weekend?” for more on how we got there.) The sun had not yet risen high enough to warm the campground, and my feet were cold. Despite it being a late hour for Ambrose and I, the crowded campground was quietly asleep. I had no line to wait in for the single campground bathroom once I roused myself enough to get dressed in my hiking clothes.

I hadn’t gotten nearly enough sleep, but that’s what I signed up for when I decided not to cancel the trip the night before. The temperature was in the low 50s, but it felt much colder to me. We ate breakfast and got ready and headed up the trail by the time the sun had hit the campground.

The first part of the trail is wide enough for us to walk side by side, and so we did, for the short time that we could. My preference would be that we could always do that, but trails are rarely wide enough to accommodate that.

Ambrose led the way, because my morning zombieness was even more pronounced than usual. The first mile of the trail follows Kennally Creek and is not challenging terrain. We were close to a 3 mile per hour pace, and would have been closer once we hit the trail junction at 1 mile if Ambrose had not had to stop to dig a pokey-thing out of his boot.

We stopped between this bridge...

And this sign that marks 1 mile from the campground.

As he sat and took care of that, I stood and tried not to fall asleep. A man and dog came upon us while Ambrose was getting his boot back on. I followed them as far as the junction to determine if they would be in front of us. They stayed on the trail that followed the creek, which I was glad about, because I don’t trust dogs on the trail. They tend to bark at me.

On this second mile of the trail, there would be more uphill hiking, so Ambrose and I agreed to meet at the next stream crossing, which would come right after the junction that marked 2 miles from the campground. I set off on my own.

I’ve hiked before with less sleep than what I consider ideal, but I don’t make a habit of it. Once I hit the switchbacks up the trail, my heart pounded and ached in my chest. My balance felt off, and I really, really wanted to nap.

I kept my rain jacket on for warmth, as well as my gloves. The mile went quickly, especially because I knew that once I got there I could have a little rest while I waited on Ambrose to catch up.

I almost ran once I saw the trail junction sign that marked 2 miles from the campground and was steps from the stream crossing. I needed to answer a call of nature and then I was able to just collapse in a patch of sunshine overlooking the stream. I wanted to sleep, but I’m not good at dropping off on a moment’s notice. But I did rest my eyes until Ambrose arrived. We crossed at the shallowest spots we could find, and used a rotting tree trunk to get us past a deep spot to the opposite bank. Our next junction would be the Blackmare No Trail sign, and we agreed to meet there.

I knew that it had taken me 40 minutes last year on my solo hike to get from the Blackmare No Trail down to this stream crossing. I figured going uphill and being exhausted would add no more than 20 minutes to my time, so I told myself I had an hour to go until my next break and I hiked on.

This trail isn’t as familiar to me as the other end of it is, but I’m starting to learn it. I knew what kind of terrain I would find near the sign, and I could recognize when I wasn’t passing through it, much to my disappointment. I wanted to be there now. Though I really wanted to be at Blackmare “now” so I could really collapse and take a nap.

I split the difference and made it to the No Trail sign in about 50 minutes. I ate a snack and tried to settle down in a position that would let me nap, elevate my already-sore feet and not completely obstruct the trail.
I ended up in a compromise, angled awkwardly across the trail with rocks digging into my butt through the plastic sheet I’d put down. The toes of my right foot were aching already, but I couldn’t exactly complain after all that I’d done to make this trip happen. I wanted to enjoy it, even if it hurt and I was miserably tired.

I had gained almost 30 minutes on Ambrose, and was feeling a little better, especially after he took some time to rest. Unfortunately, the next part of our journey was a 500 foot climb up a ridge that looked uncomfortably close to vertical from where we stood on the main trail.

But, even tired, I do like hiking uphill. Thoughts of having to come down the next day crossed my mind, but I forced them out. Time enough to worry about that when the time came. When Ambrose brought up the downhill portions we would have to hike to get to Blackmare in relation to my past issues with my iliotibial band, I was tempted to ask him not to speak, because I didn’t even want to think about that possibility.

Pretty clear for a no trail.

The trail was easy to find and follow, considering it was a “no trail” trail. There were blazes, cut logs, cairns and flags showing us not only where the trail was, but also alternate routes up the ridge. Sometimes there were as many as three different marked routes that converged.

Before too long, we had reached our high point and started down and around the other side of the ridge. The trail dipped down into a field of boulders, and then headed back up, at a relatively gentle grade. Before it went too far, we paused for lunch in the shade of a tree.

Lunch was potted meat, tortillas and tomato slices. Ambrose had carefully carried the tomato up in his packtop, and he was justifiably proud that it hadn’t gotten smashed. He sliced it up while I prepared the meat and tortillas into wraps ready for tomato slices. I finished one for Ambrose first, and then made one for me.

Despite that, I almost finished mine before he finished his.

I might have been a little famished.

Good thing we had packed enough to each have two wraps.

Sitting down, even on rocks, felt good. Good enough that I wanted to stay, rest my eyes and try to feel more like a normal person again instead of a sleepy zombie. But Ambrose encouraged me and I got up. We kept going. Theoretically, Blackmare wasn’t that far, and he promised me I could nap when we got there. I let myself believe him, even though I knew that nap would probably only happen after camp chores. . .

We came to another steep section, but it was much shorter. I ranged ahead, but stopped often to keep Ambrose in sight. I had warmed up by that point, and the wind was a welcome coolness when I reached what I thought was the top of our last climb of the day. It looked like the rest of the way would be all downhill.

We passed a small lake, and that assured us that we were on track. The ground around it looked grassy, but damp, and I didn’t think it would be a good place to camp. The only thing to recommend it was water, and access might be a bit tricky if the shore was as boggy as the crossing we made of the stream that came out of it.

We continued downhill next to that stream, and soon we saw a larger lake. A campsite greeted us right on the trail, and we each had a few moments where we thought/hoped/wished that this was it, Blackmare Lake, the end of our day.

But of course it wasn’t.

It's still a pretty lake though.

It was too small, and wasn’t the right shape. We followed the trail around it to a section we had read described as steep and stony.

The description was accurate

Yes, that is trail, yes, I came down it.

We were so careful on the rocky part of the trail. Every step placed with care and every foothold considered. I had a few slide outs where I had to scramble for balance, but I made it past the rock field and waited for Ambrose to finish that portion of the trail before I kept going.

The next part of the trail was dirt and rocks, and I wasn’t being quite as careful as before. I might, in fact, have been in a tiny bit of a hurry. And so it wasn’t all that surprising when my footing completely slid out from under me, and I started to fall down the trail.

Well, it was a surprise at the time. I felt as if time slowed down when I fell, and I had plenty of time to tell myself to go with the fall and try to stop when it was safe to do so. I only slid a few feet down the trail, and the rocks didn’t even pierce my pants. But it still hurt. My left leg ached from the impact and my left arm also felt damaged.

Still, there weren’t a lot of options at that point. Turning around would mean heading right back up that rock field, not to mention missing out on Blackmare. We kept going.

After a few more switchbacks, we ran into a couple and their dog. They had just come from a day hike to Blackmare. The man advised us to watch out for where the no trail crossed the main trail and that we had about half a mile to go while the woman assured us that Blackmare was worth it. The dog didn’t like us. It barked and growled.

We’ve seen more people (and dogs) on the trail this year than every other year we’ve been hiking together combined. Well, excluding the time we went to California and hiked on a tiny portion of the Pacific Crest Trail. There were a lot of people on that trail. Still, for Idaho, it’s been a people-full year.

We continued down and everything was going just fine until we lost the trail.

Is this trail?

This really doesn't look like trail...

Now, I don’t think it was entirely our fault. We found a section with three cairns in a wide triangle and we just didn’t know where to go. We couldn’t find the trail beyond either of the two that went in the direction we hadn’t come from. We tried one, we tried the other, and neither one led us anywhere promising.

I’m not sure what we could have done differently. We found a trail and followed it down through meadows, expecting to see the lake to our right at any moment. I was growing more and more irritated that we didn’t know where we were going, and Ambrose and I both ran out of water. We finally reached a point where the trail we thought we were following disappeared and Ambrose decided we had gone too low and had to turn around.

I didn’t want to. I thought if we kept going, then we’d make it.

I’m glad we followed his plan now. Then, I was frustrated. I fell again because I was hurrying, but I just got right up and kept going. I forced myself to keep hiking. We found another trail, and Ambrose thought it was the main trail to Blackmare. I didn’t know, but I figured there was only one way to find out.

I forged ahead and got quite nervous when the trail headed drastically up. I couldn’t hear any water, and we seemed to be climbing more than we should be. But this was the trail he wanted me to follow, so I’d do it, I’d follow it to the top and if there was nothing there, then I’d sit and pout for a while.

This is trail? Really?

The thought of getting to the top and finding no lake actually gave me a second wind. I bounded up the trail, going fast enough that I wasn’t strictly keeping Ambrose in sight, though I could hear him, crashing through brush below me. And, after navigating some gnarly, overgrown portions of trail, I found a nice place to sit and admire the lake that we’d somehow found.

It was Blackmare, at last.

Click the image for a larger view of any of the pictures.

We could see Squaretop, my first (and still only) peak. I remembered looking down on Blackmare during that trip and wanting to visit it. Now that I had made it, all I wanted to do was sleep.

But we had wasted a lot of time being lost. It was after 5 and we had work to do.

Except for a brief lay down in the dirt after I got the tent up, but before we fixed the door zippers, I didn’t get to lay down and relax for 2 hours. That’s what backpacking is.

I set up the tent and filled it with our bedding, Ambrose cooked dinner and then we collaborated on hanging a bear rope. There was an established campsite with a fire ring, and we cooked and ate at the fire ring.

Only after the pot was clean was I able to get into the tent, lay down, and relax. I stayed up for a little bit, reading my Kindle and chatting with Ambrose.

I slept great.

Queens River Loop: Day 4

The campsite, after we cleaned up and were ready to go.

I went to sleep early enough that I woke up feeling rested. I still didn’t want to get up at the alarm, but it wasn’t a chore to do so. Plus, there was bananas foster to lure me into motion. I got dressed and started packing before preparing our dessert breakfast.

The cheesecake and the banana cream pie before it both required cold water, but the bananas foster wanted boiling water. I decided to prepare it in the pot rather than the pouch. Preparing freeze dried food in pouch sometimes means sacrificing the food. Either you can’t get at it or it doesn’t all get sufficiently exposed to water.

I wasn’t sure how tasty this would be, but I had a suspicion that I would like it a lot. I boiled the water and let the dessert soak while Ambrose and I did more prep work. He took care of water and I took care of the tent. I think it’s a bit unfair that since I have the cook pot, he’ll always be ready to go before I am if we’re cooking. But the tent does weigh more than the cook pot, so I guess it’s fair enough.

The bananas foster had only one flaw: there was not enough of it. Not nearly enough. I was glad that I hadn’t put my bug stuff on yet, because I wouldn’t have wanted to clean the pot with my fingers if I had. And there was no way I wanted to leave that delicious sugary sauce on the pot.

This side of the campsite was ruled by the ants.

When I explored the river crossing the day before, I advised Ambrose that we shouldn’t bother to put our boots on in the morning. The crossing was so close to our campsite that we should just walk our packs over in our river shoes. From the campsite we could see a blaze on the opposite bank that we needed to cross to, but the river itself was a lot wider than we realized.

I led the way as we crossed to what looked like the opposite bank, only to discover that there was another crossing to be made. And another. We sloshed through cold water, deep enough to hit my thighs in places, for entirely too long for my comfort until we reached the blaze that marked the other end of the trail.

On the other side, I found a log to sit on while I got my boots back on. I was going to lead the way today. The sleep had made me feel better, and I was dealing with the period with judicious doses of naproxen. This really was supposed to be an easy day. Not a lot of elevation changes, generally downhill and, best of all, the car waited for us at the end of the day’s miles.

One of the hard parts of the "easy" day.

And the car would bring us to Idaho City, where we would purchase some well-earned milkshakes.

But before we could enjoy the fruits of our labor, we had to complete it. I led the way past some tricky fallen trees as we followed the Queens River downstream. I knew that the trail followed the river all the way to the trailhead, and that it would turn from flowing south to flowing west before we met up with the portion of the trail we had explored back in June.

I felt good as I hiked, and so I was a little reluctant to stay at the keep-Ambrose-in-sight pace. I knew from experience that it was only a matter of time before the foot pain from yesterday returned with a vengeance. I’m not sure how long it would take for my feet to get used to backpacking every day, but I haven’t found that point yet. My feet just get sore and sorer.

We hiked past a huge debris covered snow bridge over the river. I was tempted to go closer to it. I wanted to see if a kayak could pass below it, or if it were stable enough to take weight on top of it. But I decided against closer exploration. I really didn’t want to take a single step away from my goal of the trailhead.

Which made getting lost all that much more painful.

Snow bridge!

I was enchanted with the meadows full of flowers ranging in height from my knees to over my head. The trail was a little more difficult to find among them, but I was doing okay until we got to the burned area. The trail took a turn to the right, and then seemed to lead me in a circle back to where I came from.

In retrospect, I should have gone back to that circle and kept going past where I thought it wanted me to turn back. Instead, I went back and tried to forge ahead, directly into a muddy, ashy mess of water, dead trees and some vicious dead bushes that tried to break my ankles several times.

I had to stop for a call of nature. Ambrose tried to quarter the area after putting his pack down. Eventually, he found the trail, conveniently located above the boggy burn out. I went up to the trail and then traced it back while he got his pack.

I might have gotten lost because I was looking at the flowers, just like Max in Flight of the Navigator... 

Soon after that, we came to our second to last ford of the Queens River. The forest service personnel had clearly been out this far, because we found the crossing with the help of orange nylon flags - fresh, clean ones (as opposed to dirty, faded ones).

I think there's a flag in this picture, somewhere across the river...

Again, the waters were too deep for us to cross without doing the boots off dance. Once we reached the other side, we took a break and ate some snacks. We wanted to get back to the car before cooking lunch, if possible, and that meant a little more snacking in the morning to keep us going.

It was on this side of the river that we encountered the worst tree barrier across the trail of the entire trip. It seemed illogical that there should be such a tangle when the forest service personnel had clearly been up that far. My only thought was that this huge tree must have fallen after they had already come back from that area. Uphill of the trail, more tree, downhill, more tree. Tangles of smaller trees, limbs and brush surrounded the trail as well. There didn't seem to be a good way to go.

This is the path I took through the tree. 

In this case, Ambrose and I split up. I went uphill of the trail only a little bit and forged my way through the limbs and over the trunk, only to find a bigger mess on the other side of the trunk. The footing was uncertain, since I had to step on slippery pine needles and piles of limbs. But I managed to regain the trail, and then turned back to watch Ambrose make his way. He got past the main tree more easily at his crossing point higher up the trail, but had a harder time getting back down to the trail through steep brush and loose rocks.

The trail meandered above the river, but before too long it came back down and we reached our final ford of the Queens River. At this point, Ambrose said that I could go on ahead to the car after I crossed. We hadn't quite explored to this crossing back in June, but it was close enough for him. I, however, wanted to be prudent, since this was still our first time in this terrain. I told him he was stuck with me until we found the section of the trail that we had been on before.

The last wet crossing of the trip.

Part of my reasoning for this was that we turned back last time because we lost the trail. And the other part was that I enjoy spending time with Ambrose out there. Even if he is slower than me.

And it was a bit farther to a familiar area than either of us expected, I think. The trail stayed quite close to the river for a time, and then we started seeing flags. The trail was diverted up above the flooded area that we had seen before. To me, the diversion seemed to stay high for too long, but we did finally reach a familiar area of burned forest, and I was off.

Yup, this trail goes to Atlanta. Atlanta Idaho, that is.

I wanted to go quickly, but I also wanted pictures, a perennial dilemma. I stopped infrequently for pictures, because every time I stopped my feet begged me to get off of them. They felt like they were going to burst, but at least when I was walking forward I had progressively less steps to take to get to the car.

The trail was drier than it had been before, but water still flowed in the larger streams. Not enough to justify taking my boots off, but enough that I had to take care when stepping through. The seeps that had flowed down the trail itself were dried up completely, and I could already see some of the flowers dying off from the dryness and heat of the summer at this lower elevation.

I kept thinking that I was there, and then I wouldn't be. But then I was. I wanted to dance, but my feet hurt too much. So I continued walking instead, reaching the car before 1pm.

I moved the car to the small campsite where we had spent Thursday night and started my preparations. I wanted to rinse myself off a bit before I put my clean(er) clothes on for the drive home. When I was still out there, my plan had been to get some water into bags and then bring it up, maybe heat it so I could rinse myself with warm water. Of course, that plan was also dependent partially on an empty trailhead campground, and such was not the case. One of the sites was fully occupied, leaving me no chance to get naked.

This gives me a good gauge on how long it should take me for my solo hike. 

I did, however, remove my boots, and then walk down to the river to get water for lunch. And while I was there, I discovered that I was so hot, I didn't care about the water being cold. I took my shirt off and waded in wearing shorts and my sports bra. Then I dipped my head in.

That's when Ambrose walked up.

As we sat at the picnic table, a girl emerged from the wilderness area. She looked way too clean to have been in there for long, but when Ambrose asked, she said she had done the same route that we had. She was wearing a t-shirt from a cross-country triathlon, but I just wasn't sure I believed her. I mean. She was really clean, not sweaty looking. And her pack was full-looking, as if she hadn't taken any supplies out on her trip. But I was planning on doing the trip by myself in the next few weeks, so it wasn't that I didn't think a woman could do such a journey alone. I just knew that when I got back, my pack would be sagging where my food used to be and I would stink from yards away.