Through all this, I scoured Washington for supplies, worked out a route around the flood-damaged area north of Stevens Pass, and made sure Scrambler and the Captain had a place to stay out of the rain every night I could manage it. I was busy! Dang, I said to myself once or twice (or maybe more) every day, this trail angeling is hard work! And, of course, I worried myself sick about them every minute we were apart. But thanks to me, Gary and Mary made good time with relatively light packs. They were able to sleep in towns rather than the tent on many rainy nights, catching up on their rest and their calories. They slack-packed some days, and avoided having to carry more than a few days’ worth of food, in a state that’s notoriously difficult for resupply. Their three days of slack-packing while we were based at the Dinsmores’ River Haven in Skykomish provided them with a much-needed respite.
The morning after our last night at the Dinsmores, it was drizzling lightly. We drove back to Trinity, where Gary and Mary would tackle some of their worst weather, terrain, and route-founding conditions on the trail so far. In three days, they would meet me again at Rainy Pass on Highway 20. Gary was at the wheel. As we passed several deer hunters’ camps, he remarked on the difficulty he had getting the car to stay on the road going up the muddy slopes. “When you leave,” he advised me, “get a running start on these hills so you don’t have to accelerate once you start. Otherwise you could spin out, slide off sideways, and end up in a creek bed, miles from help.” I followed Gary’s advice and got down the dirt road fine, but later, as I drove along paved Chiwawa River Road, the light sprinkle turned into a heavy rain. With every hour, the weather worsened, and I reached Mazama in a downpour. How were Gary and Mary doing? I felt plenty anxious—and a little guilty for spending my day inside a warm, dry vehicle.
In her journal, Mary described the day they left Trinity Trailhead, heading for Rainy Pass:
Day 168: We left this easy life to do some true backpacking. At first, it rained very lightly, and then became heavier. It then commenced to snow thickly, about 2 inches. We finally found a wide spot in the trail. We set up camp there and ate a cold, substantial dinner. Lots of hills, including a 3,000-footer right off the bat!
As I drove away, Scrambler and the Captain’s worries about me gradually faded. Gary remembers those three days and two nights from Trinity Trailhead to Rainy Pass as the worst stretch in all of Washington. While they worried about whether I had spun off the dirt road into a ravine, the light drizzle that was falling when we parted turned to rain, and then to snow. Soon, Gary thought to himself, “If Barb’s in the creek bed with the car, she might be better off than we are.” Snow was falling hard as they reached Buck Creek Pass, and the footing was just horrible: a thin coating of ice over about 6 inches of water. Every now and then, they’d break through and get their feet even colder and wetter.
Finding the right trail was nearly impossible in the blowing snow. They found a signpost, but the words were covered with ice that refused to break off. A snack break under a tree, where they hoped to find shelter from the wind, was cut short because the wind kept knocking the snow off the branches and onto them. They managed to add another layer of clothing, and chose a trail that went downhill. The snow turned back to drizzle, the path went from snow-covered to just wet and muddy—and they still didn’t know if they had chosen the correct route. By the time they reached an intersection with the original PCT and knew they were in the right place, it was dark and time to set up camp. The next day was equally bad, only longer. The day after that, I met them at Rainy Pass.
We were all happy to reunite in the tiny northern Washington town of Mazama, an oasis of liberal blue in a sea of conservative backwoods red, where Dick and Sue Roberts, who have since retired, ran the North Cascades Basecamp.
Mary has read J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings trilogy two or three times (three or four times for me), and we sometimes drew comparisons between Frodo’s adventures and our own along the trail. Reaching Mazama would correspond with the scene in The Fellowship of the Ring in which Frodo and his companions, after much hardship and many perils, reach Rivendell and finally feel warm and dry and safe. They only leave because they have to, if they are to complete their quest. We only left because we had to, if we were going to complete our quest. The Roberts took such good care of us, on the one hand, and the weather and terrain were so forbidding on the other, that we felt we were leaving Rivendell directly for a frozen version of Mordor.
Mary described the North Cascades Basecamp as “a spectacular bed and breakfast.” If she could build a dream house, it would probably bear a close resemblance. The Basecamp has a delightful living room with a woodstove and carpeted steps around it, perfect for lounging. Comfy couches and chairs are ideal for reading or watching videos, in both of which Mary indulged. One night while we were there, two women who were staying overnight made friends with Mary and played board games with her after she finished helping her Dad waterproof our boots. One flight up, there were four bedrooms, and on the top story, there was a children’s bedroom and also a playroom, with books and toys and a soft day bed with a view out the window. Our bedroom had a queen bed plus two bunk beds. (We wouldn’t let Mary sleep on the top one at first, for fear she’d fall out, but later she got her wish.)
The Roberts loaned us gear, gave us rides, and tracked down backcountry rangers to help us plan a route through the wind and snow. And beyond that, the food was top-notch. But the best thing about our stay in Mazama was knowing that I was healthy enough to hike again. The abscessed tooth had healed up completely, and my shin splints bothered me hardly at all. For this last stretch of 70 miles from Rainy Pass to the border, we would again be a threesome.
Our stay at the Basecamp gave us a chance to visit the nearby town of Winthrop, which dates back to the 1880s, when gold prospecting brought settlers to the area. Until the 1970s, the tiny town’s only claim to fame was that author Owen Wister was inspired to write the 1902 Western novel The Virginian after spending his honeymoon there. But then Highway 20 was completed through the North Cascades, and the town reinvented itself as a Western-themed tourist destination, a sort of Cascadia version of the Comstock Lode’s Virginia City. Architect Robert Jorgenson of Leavenworth, a town in central Washington that resembles a Bavarian village, designed the false storefronts and wooden sidewalks.
Most of Winthrop might be only pseudo-historical, but there’s real history behind the Duck Brand, a small restaurant with a big reputation and an odd name. The original Duck Brand Saloon opened in 1891, identified by a cattle brand shaped like a duck. A fellow named Guy Waring started the saloon because he hated drinking. It seems he knew a saloon was inevitable, so he opened the first one, but he told the bartenders to eject any customers who appeared drunk. Waring also hosted author Owen Wister. The original saloon is now the Winthrop town hall, but the name lives on at the restaurant just down the street. Today, Winthrop is primarily a tourist town, but only for seven or eight months of the year, and less during heavy winters. Highway 20 is closed every winter, and the annual reopening of the highway is the occasion for great celebration among the community’s business owners.
Winthrop’s Wild West credentials may be only a Hollywood set, but its small-town friendliness is genuine. While Gary got maps at the Forest Service’s visitor center, Mary and I played in the adjacent park. A woman walking her dog welcomed Mary’s request to pet her pooch, and soon we were discovering mutual acquaintances and learning the history of the beautiful Methow Valley (which I quickly learned to pronounce “Met-how”).
It’s a very good thing Mazama was such a great place to stay. In spite of our best efforts to get to Canada, we couldn’t seem to get any farther north. After a night at the Basecamp, we ate the extra-big breakfast Sue prepared, and then hit the trail from the Rainy Pass trailhead at noon on October 20.
At the trailhead, it looked like autumn, with fall colors and no snow on the ground. But as we gained altitude up a series of switchbacks, we began to see snow. Soon we we
re taking turns breaking trail as the snow became deeper and deeper. Just moving forward was exhausting. At some points, the snow was thigh-high on Gary, and almost waist-high on Mary. Little Scrambler would have to pick up a leg with both hands and set her foot down in the print left by her dad, who ended up leading most of the time. Worse, snow began to fall—flurries at first, and then dense flakes. Snow on the ground obscured the trail, and the wind and snow made it hard even to read a map. And still we climbed higher, contouring around hills and always searching for the vestige of a trail. Gary’s route-finding abilities were stretched to the max as he guided us down into a valley in the gathering dusk, sometimes plowing through snow-choked ravines. It was completely dark and snowing hard when we set up camp at a flat spot below the trail. We tried to memorize our location in relation to what we thought was the trail, because in the morning, with more snow, everything might look completely different. It was very cold.
We set up the tent, arranged the bedding, had something to eat, and crawled into our sleeping bags as snow continued to fall. Gary was very worried. The pass ahead of us was higher than the one we’d crossed that day. He didn’t know if we’d be able to find it, much less get over it. In fact, he was concerned about whether we’d even be able to backtrack to Rainy Pass, with the snow covering up our footprints.
Between the cold and the worrying, we didn’t sleep much, but by the next morning, it had stopped snowing. Gary got us up early, and we headed north for a very long day. Our destination was the Pasayten Wilderness, more than 25 miles to the north through snowy forests where the path was often invisible. Gary kept up his route-finding miracles, relying on his compass, map-reading skills, and decades of experience finding trails by figuring out where they were most likely to go. Late in the day, we reached Harts Pass, where a dirt road from Mazama twists its way up to an intersection with the PCT before climbing gradually to Slate Peak’s fire lookout tower about 3 miles away.
We arrived at Slate Peak in the dark. It was cold and getting colder. Gary began searching by headlamp for a trail slightly to the east of the crest, which would run roughly parallel to the PCT but at a lower elevation, thus avoiding the deepest snow. Unable to be certain where the trail was, Gary decided to turn back, camp for the night, and try again by daylight. We backtracked about a mile and a half to a parking area, complete with an outhouse, near Harts Pass. We got to bed past midnight, after our longest day—about 26 miles—and again it was too cold to sleep well. (Mary slept soundly both nights, just not long enough.)
It had been snowing when we set up our tent, and 2 or 3 inches had accumulated by the time we got up the next morning. It was still snowing lightly. Things weren’t that bad at first, as we once again marched along the dirt road toward Slate Peak. But as soon as we topped the ridge, blizzard conditions set in. Leaning into the gusting wind, we headed across a steep slope, with Gary breaking trail through snow that was in places thigh-deep on him. The howling wind meant we could barely hear each other, even when we shouted, and the strong gusts made it hard to keep our balance. Mary and I followed Gary as closely as we could, as the snow lashed our faces and the wind pushed us all over the place. One gust knocked Mary flat on her back. “Stop!” I screamed to Gary. “We’ve got to go back! This is crazy!” Gary turned around at the sound of me shouting and Mary screaming (being knocked over by the wind had really frightened her). He gestured to us to indicate that he understood. Conditions really were too terrible to continue. With the roaring wind now at our backs, we slogged back up and over the ridge, and down the icy, slippery road. Dejected, we trekked back to Harts Pass and then began walking down the dirt road toward Mazama, 20 miles away.
That’s when Eli showed up.
Trail angels come in all forms, but not many come armed to the teeth. Eli had not just one deer rifle, but two, lying on the front seat. He also came equipped with a long-bed pickup truck that had an extra seat. He was making one of his frequent trips into the Mazama area, where he and his brother had spent years sharpening their hunting techniques. He told us about his wristwatch GPS system and his methods of keeping in touch with his brother while they roamed the foothills in search of elusive mule deer. He showed us where deer fleeing the winter snows for the warmth and cultivated crops of the Methow Valley crossed the road, leaving obvious trails for anyone in the know. Mary was fascinated by the highly polished stock of one of the rifles. I was more interested in the probability that the rifles were loaded and the possibility that one of them would discharge accidentally as we bumped and bounced down the narrow, rocky road. When we arrived at the Mazama Store, Gary interrupted his profuse thanks for the ride with a caution to Eli about trying to lift his pack. No problem, Eli told us; the last time he’d carried a big pack, it contained an entire case of beer. Sure enough, he had no trouble lifting Gary’s huge pack out of the back of the truck. If only Gary’s spirits could have been lifted as easily.
Back in Mazama, the weather was lovely for October: warm, calm, and partly sunny. Yet only 20 miles away, the frigid wind was blowing the snow horizontally. Gary began to think we weren’t going to make it to the border after all. That’s when Scrambler delivered a pep talk. “Daddy, we can make it,” she told her father. “We’ve never given up before, no matter how bad it got. And we’re so close.” Months later, Mary told me, “I knew that we were going to succeed. I thought what Daddy was saying about not being able to finish was absolutely ridiculous. I knew we were going to succeed.”
I didn’t. I thought we’d reached the end, 40 miles short of success.
We kept a stiff upper lip in public—meaning in the Mazama Store, where we consumed an excellent black bean and tomato soup—but after Dick Roberts gave us a ride back to the Basecamp, we let our true emotions show. Gary was really depressed at the thought we couldn’t finish. But that morning’s experience with the weather over Slate Peak had made a deep impression on both of us. I wanted to finish, too, I told Sue later as she drove me up to Rainy Pass to retrieve my car. But I wasn’t going to let us head off into conditions like that. With even worse weather expected in just a few days, missing the trail and getting lost didn’t seem merely a possibility; it seemed highly likely. And in the wind and snow, a bad fall for at least one of us loomed large in my imagination. By the time I returned to Mazama in my little red Ford, I had made up my mind: We’re not going on.
Gary, however, had a different plan. After looking over the maps, he discovered a number of ways to reach Canada. If we started again at Harts Pass, but then took an alternate trail well to the east of the PCT at Buckskin Pass instead of Slate Peak, we’d miss the worst of the wind and we could drop into the Pasayten River drainage. Dick Roberts called a backcountry ranger and verified that even with the recent snow, this lower route should be possible. I still argued that we should give up. The weather forecast wasn’t encouraging, and we’d already seen how cold and snowy it was up in the Cascades. But Mary wanted to go on with Gary, who was sure we could finish. My resolve to quit began to fade. “Think it over,” Gary told me. I studied the map and concluded that it might just work.
Taking a zero day in Winthrop allowed us to rest up as well as to get a little more gear and some maps, plus lots of advice from the Forest Service. The hardest part was calling my sister, Liz, with the news that we weren’t done yet. I had told her just a few days earlier that the next time we called, it would be from Canada, and here we were, still stuck in the States. It was also difficult to look at the weather forecast, which showed a narrow window of decent weather, followed shortly by yet another storm. Throughout the evening, Sue kept getting updated forecasts from the internet for us. They worsened by the hour.
The next day, Scott from the Mountain Transporter charter van service took us up to Harts Pass. He seemed honestly worried about us and spent much of the drive seeking assurance that we possessed adequate experience and equipment to have a chance. He asked us to call him when we finished so he would know we were safe. Due to his obvious concern abou
t us, I was beginning to get a bit nervous myself. But as soon as we started walking, everything became much easier. Heading over Buckskin Pass, a few hundred feet lower than Slate Peak, we avoided the gusting wind that had turned us back two days earlier. The trail rapidly disappeared under the snow, but Gary was able to pick out a route through the snow banks and, sure enough, several miles later, as we dropped down to where there was less snow, he found the trail leading down to the Middle Fork of the Pasayten River.
We made good time and set up camp at 6:45 p.m., which seemed very early by the clock, but very late by the sky—it was already completely dark. It was very cold, but calm—that is, until a mouse ran into our toothbrush bag. I had just set it down for a second, but that’s all it took. Don’t those little pests ever hibernate? I made quite a racket, chasing away the tiny creature. Worried about contamination, Gary, Mary, and I shared the one toothbrush we were sure was clean: the one clutched in my hand.
At that point, I began to think we might actually make it to Canada, although the last weather forecast we’d heard still had me worried. Gary and Mary would be genuine thru-hikers. I would still have to come back in a year or two and hike most of Washington, but I could do that during good weather. And with the border tantalizingly close, I began to let my mind drift to the prospect of making the transition back to ordinary life.
Mary would be returning to school, after having missed more than two months of sixth grade. How would her friends and her teacher react to her long absence, and her unique accomplishment? How would Mary adjust to the regimented routine of dress codes, class projects, and homework, after the freedom of the trail? Gary would finally shed the heavy responsibility of keeping us alive and on track. But he would also be giving up his leadership role, and moving from a wilderness where he felt so at home, to a home where he sometimes felt surrounded by an impenetrable societal wilderness of rules, deadlines, and annoying phone calls. I would be returning to my newspaper job just days before a presidential election, and exchanging the simplicity and beauty of trail life for immersion in an electoral jungle. As success on the PCT started to look possible, I began to realize we would be exchanging one set of uncertainties for another. But at that moment, exchanging the uncertainty about whether we would survive our attempt to reach Canada for the uncertainty about whether John Kerry could give George W. Bush a run for his money seemed like a pretty good deal.
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