Driving to Queens River Trailhead

The water wasn't as high in this reservoir as I expected. Still plenty of beach showing. 

An awful lot of water coming out considering how low it is down there. 

I guess it's because the spillway isn't completely full. 

That's more like it. Water right about to the high line. 

I wonder why I never see any rafters in the Middlefork? Maybe it's too calm most of the year and too deadly right now.

Backpacking and Crossfit

When I was on my solo trip this year, I used a tactic similar to one that I used the year before to make sure I got sufficient rest and took regular breaks. I had a timer set for 50 minutes and when it went off, it was time for a break.

Now, last year, I was a bit more flexible with it, because if I came across water, which I did with great frequency in the Sawtooths, then I might want to stop and fill up outside of my 50 minute intervals. In the desert, there was no water to tempt me to stop early or keep walking until I reached it.

I hiked for 50 minutes and then I stopped for 5 to 10, sometimes sitting down on the ground with my pack on, sometimes standing with my pack off. I also tried to limit my "bathroom" breaks to those breaks so I wouldn't impinge on the 50 minute intervals with activities that tended to take a long time.

And, sometimes I thought about how Crossfit had prepared me for such a strange thing as hiking over 25 miles in a day.

I explicitly thought of the intervals in Crossfit terms - they were the time domains for my "AMSAPs" - as many steps as possible. I never counted the steps, but I could pay attention to the mileage. I was travelling between 2 and 2.5 miles every 50 minutes.

I hurt while I walked. My feet hurt, my legs ached, my shoulders were bruised after the first half day.

But I kept on moving, pushing through the pain to get to the next rise. To finish the next interval. To get to a place where I could stop for the night and make my miles the next day.

I'm not going to be backpacking like this for the rest of the summer, because I'll be travelling with my husband. He's slower than I am. On trails we both know, I might still hike intervals, but my rests will be waiting for him to catch up, and they'll be longer than 10 minutes most likely.

But now that I know what it's like to maintain that kind of pace, I won't forget.

Eyeing the Bar

A while ago, I was at the gym, getting ready to do a few pull ups before ending my workout and heading out. My favorite pull up bar was occupied. Well, not really occupied, but the space around it was occupied. My favorite bar is at a cable cross machine, between two lifting set ups that people often use in such a way that the bar can't be used.

And that's fine. There are other bars. They're thicker, which make it harder for me to grasp them, but I can handle them. So I walked on and came to the other bars - also around cable cross set ups, but there were a lot more bars to choose from. Since people were using some of the cable cross set ups, I chose the one closest to the mirror. I put down my gym bag and started to move a few free weights that someone had left lying around when a man walked up to me.

This was an older guy who I often see around the gym. He lifted, mostly, but also had a pair of metal ankle thingies that he used to hang upside down from the pull up bars. I had been at a point of friendly nodding with him until this very day.

"I'm eyeing the bar," he said. Then he proceeded to edge me out of the space and blatantly steal the bar I had been intending to use. He acted so benignly, as if he had every right to take the bar I had arrived at and claimed first.

There was another bar available, between two people using cable cross stations. I did my pull ups and went on my way, but I didn't forget that strange assumption of primacy. Since that encounter, I stopped smiling or nodding at this guy at the gym. I might not have had the ability in the moment to respond appropriately and tell him I had already "eyed" the bar, but I wasn't going to reward that kind of behavior.

100 Mile Failure; 92 Mile Success

The desert caught me by surprise.

Flatness, I expected. An arid landscape, lacking drinking water. Wind, tearing at my face, pushing against my body with every step. The terrain was miles of sameness appearing in every direction, hiding draws and canyons in its rolling.

But I was fast. In spite of the wind, in spite of the lack of water. I moved with a speed that I didn't even believe when I camped on the first night, more than 25 miles from the border with Nevada. Tomorrow, I told myself, I'll see whether I really hiked that far. Because if I could reach my husband, waiting with the car at the 50 mile point of my hike, on the second night instead of halfway through the third day as planned, then I would have proven I could hike over 25 miles in a day.

And, to my surprise, I did.

I slept in a tent with my husband the second night, a tent that I did not have to pitch, with plentiful water and food, and a friend to bring me one or the other if I asked very nicely. It would have been so easy to call it then. To declare that 50 miles in 2 days was plenty.

But I didn't.

I pushed on the next day through another 24 miles. I met up with Ambrose twice more that day, at the Bruneau scenic overlook and again on the road. Then I hiked off for my third night, knowing I would have about 26 miles to go to finish up my planned route. Not knowing whether Ambrose would be able to drive the car to pick me up at the designated spot.

Between that uncertainty and the intense pain that developed on my right foot when my pinky toe decided to try to bore a hole into its neighbor, I ended the hike at Hammett, ID. With the out and back on Sunday, that made for a total of 92 miles in about 3.5 days.

I've learned to be more careful in trimming down my toenails before a long fast hike. Next time, they'll be close trimmed and filed. I'll do more route scouting beforehand to make sure my car can handle the pickup where I want it to, though for next year, I know it can meet me at either end to link the sections from this year and last year.

I believe that I can do a 100 mile hiking trip. I'll have to, for some of the sections of the ICT that go through remote areas. I know I can handle the weight and the distance. Next time I will have to pace myself a little better, and it sure would help if those sections weren't through desert.

Pre-Trip Jitters

This post was written Saturday night (4/29). 

I'm not as nervous as I feel I should be. I don't have burgeoning confidence, but I'm also not scared. Today I did a practice pitch of my tent to be sure that I still remember how to do it. It was amazingly easy, even with a bit of wind blowing and my husband playing the part of the peanut gallery. Every step followed naturally and I made a pretty pitch even though the sidewalk prevented me from pulling one of my lines taut. 

I got everything packed today. It was already mostly gathered, but I went over it all again and gathered the bits and pieces that I had left strewn about the apartment. Including 5 liters of water and all of the food for the first segment, the full pack weighed in at 35 pounds even. But it didn't have some of my outer wear in it because I anticipate wearing that when I set out on Monday. So gear-wise it's probably a little heavier. 

I'm not sure if the temperatures and wind will warrant keeping my rain jacket on at all times, but it might. And I invested in a down vest today because lows are going to be in the low 30s and highs might reach the low 60s if I'm lucky. I've got the layers I'll need I think, but I don't know how much I'm going to have to be taking them on and off. 

I also finally purchased a replacement of sorts for good old alti-baro. After the buttons fell off last year, I knew it was on its last legs, but I couldn't bring myself to buy a replacement. Ambrose really wanted me to get a GPS watch or something else super fancy, but I wanted simple. I really only used the alarm and countdown timer functions with altibaro, so the replacement I got has those functions. It's a watch, and I don't like to have things on my wrists, so it will hang from my chest strap on my pack. 

If all goes well, I'll be doing the first 2 miles of the ICT tomorrow as a short out and back with Ambrose. I've read that one can't actually drive to the start and I think it will be nice to spend that extra bit of time with him before I set out. He's planning on trying to meet me on the trail at various points, which I don't mind at all, though I kind of doubt that he'll be able to find me like that. 

We've gone over the maps together and talked about what he will do if I don't show up as expected. He knows exactly where I'm planning to hike and approximately where I'm expecting to camp. It should be easier to camp this time, because I won't be looking for a water source - I'm expecting to dry camp each night in the desert.  

I'm excited. But also a little numb. 100 miles is such a huge number. 100.7, technically as Ambrose keeps reminding me. Can I really do it? In 5 days? Or even 6? Though I'm not sure how 6 would work out since the last 20 miles or so will take me through a town where camping might not be appreciated...