Alberta, Alberta - Where You Been So Long?

Because there’s a $700 surcharge to rent a car in Montana and return it in Canada, I come to you tonight from Calgary.

Let me explain. Originally, this trip had us flying into Kalispell, renting a car, making our way across Glacier, crossing into Canada to see Banff, and flying out of Calgary. The surcharge effectively ended that idea. Fortunately, I managed to pry enough brain cells away from the Rule Against Perpetuities to come up with a solution: Do half of Glacier, go to Banff, do the rest of Glacier, and return the car in the country from whence it came. In my eyes, an eminently reasonable solution. And one that no one wanted to do. I’m still not entirely sure why the opposition, but in my delicate pre-bar state, I had no patience for people being irrational. The only obstacle keeping us from visiting the Canadian parks was gone, so what was the problem?

In any event, if they wouldn’t do my solution, I’d split off from the group and do it myself. I figured it was a good idea anyway, in the event of a repeat of the Yosemite situation, to give us all a break if needed. It wasn’t really needed, but it did get me the opportunity to see another of the world’s most scenic landscapes. So here’s how that went.

He Liked to Drink a Lot of Juice

After yesterday’s crazy hiking shenanigans, this morning came as a warning from each of our bodies that we daren’t try that again lest the bodily rebellion we were feeling today return even more forcefully tomorrow. It turns out that when I call hiking down 3,200 feet a knee breaker, that’s pretty accurate. This morning my knee (only one though… weird) was so sore from turning through all the switchbacks yesterday that I was often reduced to going on stairs using my blown-out-kneed-mother’s mantra of “up with the good, down with the bad.”

For sure, we were all in need of a quieter itinerary today. Tioga Road was more than ready to answer the call. It was a peaceful drive with occasional stops, like the obligatory one at Olmstead Point and a less-obligatory but felt-essential one at the Tuolumne Meadows Grill and Store for lunch and junk food (all of which disappeared within 4 hours). 

And When You’re Up You’re Up

Finally, a day free of drama. A day when we were finally free to do what we wanted, without constantly looking over our shoulders. In short, a vacation from what our vacation had become.

Who Says You Can’t Go Home?

Last night’s saga continued into this morning, although the worst was behind me. I woke up less angry – as tends to happen – and by the end of this morning’s trials, I was past it. I was too busy getting excited about what would be revealed the moment we emerged from the Wawona Tunnel. We had planned Tunnel View as the very first perspective on Yosemite Valley my mother would see, and it did not disappoint: 

On Top of Old Smoky

While it wasn’t covered in cheese, it was still the main event on today’s schedule. But before I get to that, there is much scenic driving to report:

I Saw Below Me That Golden Valley

Finally.

After a week of delays, my Great Dixie Adventure culminated with a visit to Virginia’s Shenandoah National Park, which was once again open for business. Well, at least the road was open for business. From what I could tell, I seemed to be the only person who knew about that, because I only saw 7 other people during my day in the park. This helped to provide an added measure of privacy and seclusion, because those are two things that Shenandoah, through an unfortunate accident of geography – doesn’t really have going for itself, most of the time.

Country Roads, Take Me Home

Most of the time, I love my Copina Jr. She reliably gets me from point A to point B, only ever getting confused at times when it doesn’t affect (there’s that word again) my directions. She can usually figure out where I’m trying to point here, even if, like today, all I tell her is to find “Grandfather” near “Newland, NC.” Her “warnings” about traffic conditions are largely useless, but we’ve come to an understanding on that point, and I no longer hold it against her. She can even perform slightly better than a blind toddler when GPSing in Boston.

But sometimes it becomes painfully obvious that Copina Jr. a machine and doesn’t comprehend the emotional impact of sending me through, say, 25 miles of hilly southern Virginia farmland via windy backwater roads on a day when I’ve already traveled 300 miles and still have another 150 to go. When we can manufacture a GPS that takes this into account and offers “least frustrating route” under its options, then we’ll know that we’ve truly created an artificial sentient being.

Blue Smoke

Have I mentioned that mountain weather changes rapidly? If not, you should know that mountain weather changes rapidly. In addition to doing things like closing Skyline Drive in 13 minutes, today I saw firsthand some more results of the strange confluences of moisture and strong winds that occur in places like this. And once again, nature did its best to foil my plans. But today I was not about to be defeated.

Can’t You Just Feel the Moonshine?

This morning I awoke in the east, and now I am in the uttermost west. Well, probably not the most uttermost, but there are several 6,000-foot peaks between Asheville and my current home: The Comfort Inn & Suites at Dollywood Lane in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. Let’s parse that name for a moment, because it’s perhaps the greatest place name in the history of mankind. Dollywood Lane does, in fact, refer to the theme park based around the large-bosomed country singer. Dollywood is right down the street, and while I don’t plan on going, Ms. Parton has infiltrated much of this town, for better or for worse. Her ghoulish likeness is on my room key, advertising “Dolly Parton’s Dixie Stampede,” which is apparently some kind of strange animatronic dinner theater production. I bet if I tried hard enough I could come away with at least a life-sized cardboard cutout of her. But wait! We haven’t even talked about the name “Pigeon Forge” yet! Picture, if you will, a pigeon forge. Is this an iron smelting forge fed by pigeons? “Quick, Larry! Throw some more pigeons on the fire before that metal hardens!” Or maybe it’s a forge that makes pigeons? Who knows.

Snow & Opulence

Really only one thing happened today: The Appalachian mountains became larger, closer, and more picturesque; going from this:

 to this.

Long May You Run

Sitting east of Cleveland, a mere 450 miles from my parents’ house in New Jersey, I feel it’s time to pay homage to the true unsung hero of this trip. Over the last 37 days, she’s acted as my closet, my bedroom, my kitchen / dining room, my power supply, my home, and my transportation, She’s been my travel companion, there every step of the way, doing everything I’ve asked of her and not complaining or putting up any resistance whatsoever. She goes by many names. At times I’ve called her the Horse with No Name, the Hyundai, or just simply – the car.

Hellfire and Brimstone

At 3:00pm I had given up on Yellowstone. I had written it off as just another Grand Canyon experience, and had begun counting the hours until I could move down to Grand Teton.

It had been a day filled with nothing but frustration. The day had an ominous start as I hopped back on I-90 for 30 miles on the way into Yellowstone. Of those 30, 29.5 were under construction. When I say construction, I mean that half the road was closed and there was nary a construction vehicle nor a sign of any construction project in progress. And no, we do not have construction like that in the northeast. We have road work, but you will never see a 30 mile stretch of continuous interstate brought down to 1 lane.

After fighting my way into the park, my first stop was Mammoth Hot Springs. All I knew about it was that it was some sort of geothermal feature, which meant it should be cool to look at. Well, it kinda was, once I got past the veritable city surrounding it, complete with a post office, 2 gas stations, a police station, and a courthouse. The one thing that wasn’t marked on the signs was the actual location of the hot springs. Eventually, though, I found them.

The Hunt for Mt. Rainier

Last night, since I didn’t stay out to watch the sun set, I was able to make and eat dinner relatively early, which allowed me to finish my writing early, which allowed me to go to bed early. By 11, I was in-tent with the flashlight off. What followed was some of the best sleep I’ve gotten on this entire trip. With a fleece jacket on, the temperature inside was perfect (I’d assume it was probably around 45 last night). I remembered to orient the sleeping bag the right way this time, so that my head wasn’t constantly rubbing against the pockets where I kept my wallet and other toys. I had a good 10 hours before I needed to be up. To top it all off, after my adventure gathering firewood, there was no way my blood sugar was going to go high on me in the middle of the night.

Speaking of that adventure, it occurs to me that I neglected to mention it yesterday. Since I’m camping in the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, and not Mt. Rainier National Park, I’m allowed – nay, required – to gather my own firewood. This has its advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, I get more of an authentic camping experience like the ones I had as a Boy Scout, where the entire afternoon was spent wandering the wilderness looking for, cutting, and chopping wood for the night’s fire. (I’m not sure why we needed so much wood, though.) On the other hand, now I have to go out and find, cut, chop, and haul back my own firewood. With my hatchet and saw in hand, I was bounding over 5-foot diameter logs and scaling steep hillsides. When I finally had an armload of wood, enough for a 3-4 hour fire, I was ready to get back to campsite B-1. That’s when I realized I would now need to do all that bounding and scaling once again, in reverse, carrying a hatchet, a handsaw, and a cord of wood. Suffice to say the return journey involved lots of throwing of the wood over said giant logs, followed by then throwing myself, and then retrieving it all to do again. By the time I got back to my beloved B-1, I was hot enough that if I wasn’t going to use this fire to cook dinner, I would have been warm enough without it.

So that probably had something to do with the great sleep I got last night, too.

Anyway, on to today.

The Mountain Is In

As I’ve said before, there are certain things about the natural world that some take as fact, but of which I deny the very existence. No, I’m not talking about global climate change (the condition of Yosemite Falls, the amount of snow at Crater Lake, and my surroundings this afternoon basically prove that one). I’m talking instead about moose and bison. People assure me they exist, but I haven’t seen either with my own eyes, so I can’t be sure. And as of today, you can add one more item to that list of objects of questionable existential status: Mt. Rainier.

Here On This Mountainside

As I began the second half of my journey, instead of focusing on geographic and geologic features, today was almost entirely about life. Specifically, the largest life forms the earth has ever known. There is a reverence that comes from walking among the giant sequoias. Even without fully comprehending their sheer immensity, it is plainly obvious to anyone who visits them that they are enormous and nearly indestructible, and that our presence among them is possible only but for their grace. Should one choose to shed even a small limb while crowds are gathered beneath, there would be nothing we could do to save ourselves. We are lucky that these are peaceful and hospitable giants.

The I-It Relationship

It’s possible that I built this day up a bit too much. True, the scenery was spectacular and did live up to my expectations, but the experience as a whole was less pleasant than my days at Tuolumne Meadows and Glacier Point. There was far more people in Yosemite Valley, many more of whom seemed to be there to see Yosemite rather than to do Yosemite. While this wasn’t inherently a problem, I didn’t find myself surrounded by folks who wanted to immerse themselves in nature. While it never seemed as crowded as the Grand Canyon, the peacefully seclusion that other parts of the park had offered were nowhere to be found here. In short, while in the past few days Yosemite and I have approached I-Thou status, today was firmly planted in I-It.

The Mountains Are Calling And I Must Go

There is a magnetism to this place. More than its spectacular scenery, Yosemite just feels different than the other parks I’ve visited. There is a real sense of unspoiled nature here, where we are just a piece of it and we do not control it. Unlike Death Valley, where the wildness is intimidating in its power, the wildness at Yosemite is inviting. Deer graze just feet away from people, with a seeming understanding that there’s no reason for them to act defensively if the humans let them go about their business.

With mountains, waterfalls, cliffs, rivers, meadows, birds, wildflowers, geology, just to name a few, the park invites visitors to try it all on for size. And people certainly take advantage of that. People, by and large, are not here to see Yosemite; they are here to do Yosemite.

To See the World, To Stand Among the Trees, and All the Living Things

Yosemite is for real. The embodiment of the national parks idea in all its glory. A source of refuge and recreation for millions, it is full of people but isn't crowded. Its focus is on nature, not what we have been able to add to it. It is what the Grand Canyon should be, and it is exactly what I had hoped to find here.

It Takes a Hole to Know a Mountain

This has been quite a day. A long day. An eventful day. An exciting day. A great day. In every sense, a day of extremes.

“Now THIS is Colorado!”

Thus announced one of the many county welcome signs I passed today. And it was right. Today’s’ vistas were exactly what I had imagined when I first pictured Colorado. Either my teachers or the media have done an excellent job telling me what to expect from the state.