Alone in the Woods

I have had the idea of doing a solo trip simmering on the back burner of my mind for a while now, and the opportunity finally presented itself this past weekend. With two entire days off, good weather, and enough oatmeal to swim in, the conditions were perfect. Off I went.

It took two cups of strong coffee to get me on the road Monday morning, but thankfully you can't be late to an appointment with the wilderness. There was heavy cloud cover as I drove from Tupper Lake towards the High Peaks, and the earth was still damp from the downpour of the past few days. As I crested the hill into Lake Placid I spotted my first patch of blue sky, and I actually whooped  out loud. A small patch of sun in the Adirondacks can be greatly deceiving, but I had a good feeling about this one.

My good feeling grew as I turned onto the access road for the Adirondack Loj. Directly before that turn is one off the greatest views of the High Peaks; the green fields of the valley rush into the sudden skyline of the mountains. The sky was still grey but the mountains were taking on the infamous Adirondack shade of blue that promises a good day.

At the Loj I rented a bear canister that comes dangerously close to being human-proof and readied my pack. I was antsy to get into the woods, and so I plunged in quickly. In the register at the trail head for Indian Pass I accounted for myself for one night, and the reality that I was about to spend a night alone in the woods set in, and it was thrilling.

No more than half a mile into the trail I began criss-crossing swollen brooks, and from that moment on the sound of moving water was the insistent backdrop of my trip. For the most part the river is just out of sight, and the only water I was crossing were those little mountain streams that pop up after rain storms and run themselves dry in a few days. A few miles in, however, the trail turned and ran right along the river, and eventually in the river itself. There was one memorable spot where the trail marker was fixed to a tree in the middle of the river.

As the trail approached the pass it began rising steeply upwards, and I found myself scrambling up a nearly vertical boulder field along a waterfall. Between two of the boulders my foot broke through a thin layer of moss, and my entire leg disappeared up to the hip. For a moment I was swallowed up by the mountain, and I had to dig my nails into the boulder's coat of wet moss to climb my way out of it. Amazingly I was unhurt beyond a scrape, but I had to sit down and let my heart rate settle. Danger takes on a whole new meaning when you are alone in the woods; whatever you get yourself into, you have only yourself to save you. I was lucky this time, and in just a few moments I was scrambling back up the trail.

The real treat of crossing Indian Pass is the views of the cliffs on Wallface Mountain. I caught them just as they were reflecting the long light of late afternoon, rising grandly all around me. Nothing like a good cliff to remind you how small and transient you are. I rewarded myself with a snickers, brushed the drying mud off my calves, and shouldered my pack for the descent to my campsite.

I stayed that night at Scott's Clearing Lean-to. I was the only tenant that evening, and so I was able to spread my hammock from the rafters and sing while I cooked dinner. After dinner I read until the light faded, then tucked myself into my hammock. It was cold that night-Adirondack cold-and so I pulled on my puffy jacket for an added layer of warmth. As I was hunkering down I felt a strange lump in my pocket. I reach in and found...a small plastic banana. I had hid it in a friend's boot a few weeks ago, and she had managed to slip it into my pocket without me noticing before I left. I laughed myself to sleep, plastic banana in hand. Solitude may be good for me every now and then, but friends are what pulls us wanderers back out of the woods.