From the Gym to the Mountain: Mushrooms

Today was going to be the longest day of hiking for us on the whole trip. We were going to hike from Mosquito Springs all the way to Sheepeater Lake - a modification on our original plan. When Bill was still coming with us, we were going to spend this night at the tarn, a small body of water where frogs like to congregate. The tarn is about a mile from where the trail has a junction to go down to Sheepeater Lake, or up to the Sheepeater Lookout.

Our mantra for this day was the old one about eating the elephant. How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. All we needed to do was keep putting one foot in front of the other. And the first bit we needed to chomp down on was getting to Chicken Peak.

We got up at the same time as the day before, 5:30 am, and got to work. No time to dilly-dally! And no need, because it was again so warm (relatively, like 60's). I didn't feel rushed as I filled up my pack, took down the tent and fetched my bear bag. It was going to take the time it took. After warmups, we were off.

The sun hadn't quite come into view as we started, though it quickly caught us. We were on the ridgeline, after all, up high with nothing to block the sun's rays. The trail was in good shape, and we moved quickly, finding snow on the trail, but not too much. It seemed like no time at all before we reached the pair of springs that we were so overjoyed to find the first time. This time we walked on by, no need to get water there.

Ambrose again stepped off the trail to catch some better views, and he continued to talk while backpacking. His fitness has improved so much! In fact, it's almost gotten annoying for me. See, he's hiking faster now. I can now follow him without feeling like I'm going excessively slow. But that means I'm no longer zooming ahead and resting to wait for him. Therefore, I'm spending more time wearing my pack and on my feet, more time under tension.

I kind of miss the rest breaks, to be honest.

But it's wonderful to be able to hike with my husband and chat with him as we hike.

My mind likes to simplify the hike after the fact. But the trail remembers every bit that I forget. That mini switchback? Oh yeah, got to hike that before the place we dry camped. And then after that, it was so much farther to Chicken Springs than I thought.

Yet, for some reason, the distance from Chicken Springs to Chicken Peak actually seemed shorter.

Just before we reached Chicken Springs, there's a trail junction. The sign points downhill and indicates the Salmon River is that-a-way. And it was there that I heard voices. I asked Ambrose to be quiet and then asked if he heard them too. He did. We thought we saw footprints going down as well, so we figured they were headed away from us and we wouldn't ever see whoever was speaking.

On the long switchbacks up to Chicken Peak, I took a break to dig a hole while Ambrose hiked on. It wasn't far from there, so I caught up quickly, and then watched while he made a path across the massive snowbank blocking the trail. I sat on the dirt and took pictures and video. He made it safely, and then it was my turn.

Getting off the snowbank is always the hardest part; this time, Ambrose chose a slide descent for us. Now, on this trip, Ambrose had specifically requested that I bug him more about taking pictures of me. So I did. I made my way carefully across the snow bank to an edge and handed him the camera before I took my slide down the snowbank.

We didn't go up to the lookout this time, because we saw it in 2020 and had no time for it. Instead, we started hiking down. This part of the trail is much easier to go down than up. It's pretty steep at first, and then it gets rocky as it winds over to a saddle where we cross over to another ridgeline.

The views from that saddle are some of my favorite. Deep valleys, bright green with growth, sparkling with hidden water, dotted with trees... I want to go down into those valleys. Ambrose plans to, one of these days.

From the saddle, my mind had again elided just how far it was until the trail turned north again and brought us to the first of four (or five) springs. We planned to stop for water at the last spring, but it ended up being the second to last. Which was fair, because sometimes that last one is dry. The water break was nice, but all too short. The heat was starting to rise, and I was wondering if our pace was as good as it needed to be. We'd find out when we got to the next water, which would be the last for several miles.

Oh, and the next section of trail had very little shade. It's a recovering burn area, maybe 15 years post-burn. There are a lot of trees, but none of them are big enough to cast significant shade on the trail. But more trees means less views, so there's some rewards for hiking in the hot sun.

I actually love walking through recovered burn areas repeatedly over years. It's fascinating to see how the landscape changes, how the plants grow and recover. Sure, the sun can get hot when there's no shade and little water, but if I avoided areas that had been burned, I'd have very little of Idaho to hike.

This section of the trail went pretty fast for me. We made it to the next spring right in time for lunch. The spring hosted a single big shade tree that we took advantage of, sprawling our gear and ourselves in its shade before getting to the work of filling our water bags and making lunch.

Then the voices appeared. Three young men hiked up the trail. We scrambled to make room for them at the spring (though not necessarily in the shade). And then we moved away from the spring to a nice shady spot to eat and take our lunch break, giving them full use of the spring.

They had hiked up from the South Fork of the Salmon River, a trail that asked them to climb something like 6000 feet on their first day. Yikes!

They were planning to go to Sheepeater Lake, too, but their trail information came from one of their grandfather's having hiked this area in the 70s and the 90s. I hoped they would be okay and be able to find their way. They hiked off before we were ready to go.

Ambrose tried to take a nap, and I did a little reading while I finished eating lunch. Then Ambrose was ready to go. I was not quite ready, because I wanted to finish drinking my electrolyte drink. But I figured I could catch up to Ambrose so I told him to go on ahead. Once I was underway, I made sure to wet my hat at the spring as we crossed it, but I knew that wouldn't last very long.

This section is brutal. Not only is there still no shade, there's the prospect of shade that gets cruelly ripped away. The trail seems to be approaching a shady copse of trees, but then it turns aside at the last moment, avoiding all shade. Oh, and it's uphill. A couple thousand feet over a couple miles in the hot hot heat.

It took me a lot longer to catch Ambrose than I thought it would. I felt completely alone as I hiked through yet more bear grass blooms, trying to remember the lay of the land from prior years. But it really does look different with all those flowers in bloom. I was just starting to consider stopping to dig a hole and sending Ambrose an inReach message to let him know when I spotted him up ahead.

In the past, spotting him would be the next thing to catching him. Not this year! Every time I paused for a picture, I lost ground. I had to really up my pace (and take less pictures) to catch up to him. He really made me work for it.

Now, my plan was to hike to the Sheepeater Lookout, and then go down to the lake to set up camp. We'd talked about that, and I thought we'd agreed. But some time after I caught him, Ambrose said he now planned on going down to the lake, skipping the lookout. The idea was to go back up to the lookout the next morning.

In my years of backpacking, I have never chosen to hike up 800 plus feet first thing in the morning going back. And, although we've hiked to Sheepeater Lake four other times before, we'd never made it up to the lookout. Always too tired or something. I just felt in my bones that if we passed it by this afternoon, we wouldn't be going back.

So I said I would be going up without him.

But I also started thinking about how I might persuade him to come up to the lookout with me.

Ambrose is just about ready to go.

The sun hadn't quite risen.

Snow on the trail! But too cold to put any under my hat.

Sure, it's water, but it's full of plants and bugs that love to clog filters.

More bear grass in the morning light.

We camped up here once. It has to be a dry camp, which we don't prefer.

So. Much. Bear Grass.

On both side of the ridge!

This is near the junction where we heard the voices.

Ambrose is standing in a patch of bear grass that I pitched our old Duplex tent on the first time we came through here.

A lovely shade on this paintbrush.

Chicken Springs is flowing.

Part of the snowbank below Chicken Peak.

Ambrose crossing another part of the snowbank.

Ambrose watching me prepare to slide.

This was super fun!

The landing was a bit hard with the weight of the pack on my back.

I liked the way the light and shadows ran across the snow.

There's such a sense of vastness when you're out there.

It's hard to pick a favorite view.

More bear grass on this side of the peak.

And more snow, even after we descended a good distance.

I always forget how far we have to hike before the trail turns left.

This really is a big year for the bear grass blooms.

I call these ant plants. I'm not sure what they're actually called.

This is the last of the 5 springs.

I was happy to see signs of recent trail maintenance.

Heading down before we head back up the other side.

The last water for a while.

Yes, more.

I finally caught up to Ambrose!

A mushroom in a beam of sunshine.

We stepped off the trail to get this view to the east.

I got better at the selfie lighting, but my timing could improve.

To be continued...

Now, before we went to sleep the night before, I had talked to her about the next morning. While we certainly could have a late morning, I reminded her that the sooner we got moving in the morning, the sooner we’d be back into cell service range. She agreed to try and leave camp by 9 in the morning.

That worked for me. I was up around 7, even without an alarm to wake me, and I started by making up some hot tea for us, and then breakfast. Turns out, she doesn’t like the protein bars that I had for breakfast, nor the Spam, so we had to improvise a bit with her breakfast, with her trying a couple different bars and rejecting them. I guess next time I should provide the menu and have her cross off stuff she won’t eat.

But we did manage to get going and headed out of camp by 9:16 am. I was happy with that departure. We would be hiking in much cooler weather than the day before, and get a lot more shade. Unfortunately for her, the river had not miraculously gone down overnight, so it was back to the high road for us. By taking it nice and slow, we were able to make it up to the high point without too much difficulty and it was mostly downhill from there. I was proud of her for making it up the hard climb, especially considering that she normally lives at 500 feet above sea level, and here she’s hiking at around 5800 feet. And we encountered a snake in torpor draped across the trail, which we delicately stepped over. The snake flicked its tongue at us but didn’t move. She liked it!

After we got down from the high road, we passed a group heading to the hot springs. One man had a child carrier pack, complete with sleeping toddler, so she got to see how some people take their littles out on hikes. Some of the people we passed were dressed differently than we were, with tank tops and shorts, but I’m a big believer in wearing synthetics, long sleeved and long panted, for protection out there. It can get hot, but I like the protection afforded, both from the sun and from random branches and brambles trying to scratch me up. I think my niece would have liked to wear something a bit more fashionable, but I’m all about function when it comes to backpacking clothes.

After the hill, the going was pretty easy. Some ups and downs, but nothing that we couldn’t handle with ease. I was happy that she had made it through the night, and I believe she was happy to get closer to cell service so she could get back in touch with her friends. When we got to close to the campsite, she asked if we could go over to where we had left our art rocks the day before and see if they were still there. Since no one else had claimed the campsite, we hiked on through it to find that our little art gallery remained undisturbed overnight.

Then it was time to pack up the car and drive off. Now, when Ambrose first brought me out to Skillern for my first backpacking trip, he didn’t tell me about the roadside hot spring on the way home. It was a complete and total surprise to me. For my niece, I felt like a little advance warning was in order, so she’d know why I wasn’t going to change into cleaner clothes right when we got to the car – and why she shouldn’t either. So she knew we were coming up on a hot spring bath, but I think she was still surprised to actually see it. It’s a neat little hot spring. You pull over on the side of the road, then walk about 15 feet on a path and poof! There’s a hot spring, just big enough for 2 if you’re okay with being cozy. She wasn’t sure she wanted to get in at first, so I went first and got myself all rinsed off. The day was warm by then, so I wasn’t inclined to stay long in the hot water. After I got out, she took a quick turn and we both got cleaner clothes on for the remainder of the drive home.

We stopped in Fairfield to get milkshakes and onion rings. And by that time, we had cell service again, though not very many bars. Not enough bars to stream music, but enough bars to get her back in touch with her friends, which was good. We listened to another musical she had downloaded, 36 Questions, which I am now in love with. Then we listened to one of my albums, Ben Folds' Way to Normal. And, once we got closer to Mountain Home, she got enough signal to stream and we started listening to the Heathers musical. I’d heard they were making Heathers into a musical, but I hadn’t been really interested in listening to it. I’m really glad she shared it with me, because it was quite fun, mostly following the plot of the movie, which is one I enjoy.

Back in Boise, I got us checked in to our new hotel, much closer to downtown and much nicer. We spent some time at the hotel pool, even though it was just a kiddie pool and a hot tub. Then it was time to figure out some dinner, and I wanted to show her Freak Alley. When we got in the elevator to go to Freak Alley and find food, I noticed a Boise events flyer hanging up. It advertised the musical Dear Evan Hansen, which was another one she likes a lot. In fact, she loves that musical, but hadn’t had a chance to see the show because she didn’t get into it until after the Chicago run had ended. And now, here was her chance! I told her to look up tickets and we’ll see, but I was honestly feeling a bit cranky. Or perhaps hangry. So we walked to Freak Alley, which she thought was very cool, and then picked a place to eat.

She had found $6 tickets for decent seats in the mezzanine, and, after some trials and tribulations figuring out how this particular ticket vendor worked, we got them. The total for both of us was less than $20, and all we had to do was get over to the Morrison Center before the 6:30 showtime – the final show of the run! Needless to say, we were a bit impatient at the restaurant, but we got some food in us and were able to make it to the show. I had read reviews of the Dear Evan Hansen movie and I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about it. But my niece was correct in saying the show was a cry-fest and wonderful.

And while that was definitely a high note of the trip, we also had a low note. The airline had moved her flight. I specifically got her an afternoon flight when I bought the tickets months ago. I knew I didn’t want to have to get a teenager up early to catch a flight, so 3:40 seemed ideal. Yeah, no. They changed her departure to 10:30 AM. I was not happy, and I apologized, but the fact of the matter was we needed to get up around 7 in the morning. Bah!

While it was difficult for her, she was a trooper and we got to the airport in plenty of time to figure out how to get me a pass to escort her to the gate AND to visit the arcade past security. When we were waiting for her flight to board, she spotted a cat in a carrier. The woman escorting the cat thought we were looking at her because we wanted to sit. We did want to sit, but we were more interested in the kitty. The kitty’s name was Garbanzo, and he was a sphynx cat being flown out to his new home. She let us pet him, too. I thought hairless cats would feel weird, but, as she said, he felt like a warm peach. If I’m ever in the market for a hairless cat, I’ll definitely be reaching out to this lady.

Then, before too long, it was time for her to board. I saw her through the gate and then hustled upstairs so I could get a picture of her boarding. At the Boise airport, some gates have outdoor ramps for boarding and this was one of them. So I got one last picture of her and then waited until the plane was in the air before taking myself home to my husband. Next year, it’s her sister’s turn.