Photo Courtesy of Bony and Bono
I have been writing a short book about life lessons I’ve learned from backpacking. I have also given slideshow presentations on my lessons to middle school students. I thought I would take excerpts from my “book” (I use that term very loosely) and post them here since, this is a blog about the outdoors. So with out further ado here is the excerpt from…
Chapter 4, Lesson 4
Now here is where the fun begins, with lesson 4. You’ve done your dreaming, you’ve dealt with the naysayers and the crazy talk, and you’ve done your planning. Now is the time for doing.
Once you start down the action path, the physical act of working towards your goal, be aware that things don’t usually go as planned. In our idealistic planning stage (lesson 3) things typically get scripted for how they can be executed perfectly. That’s all well and good but let’s be honest, things happen. In this case you are left to rely on your best asset, you. This is where your brain power and your preparation come in to play. With quick thinking, creativity and flexibility, you can overcome obstacles that appear in your way.
Case in point, on the Pacific Crest Trail, one of the most highly anticipated sections of the trail is the High Sierra. It is a couple hundred miles of high altitude, fairly remote hiking. In fact, there are a 100+ miles of trail where you don’t even cross a road. So you need to have a plan, you need to be prepared but you also need to be ready to deal with obstacles as they come up.
When I was getting ready to enter the High Sierra, I got food poisoning. It knocked me on my butt for a few days and put me behind schedule. No problem, I adjusted my schedule. That’s an easy obstacle to over come. However, in the week and a half to follow, I fell off a high mountain pass, lit my tent on fire, was bitten by a dog and almost drowned crossing a river. Yeah, it was a heck of a week.
Now anyone of these things could really put a damper on my trip, even possibly ended my trip (death is usually a trip ender). However, by thinking fast, being creative and flexible, I over came all of these obstacles and still made it to Canada.
So how did I overcome these obstacles you ask? You are curious as to how I got myself out of these messes? Well, briefly here is the low down. Falling off a high mountain pass was pretty unnerving. I was climbing up Forrester Pass, the highest point on the Pacific Crest Trail, and I was transitioning from snow to rock and one of the rocks gave way and sent me plummeting to what I was sure was going to be serious injury but I stayed calm and divine intervention took hold, a rock appeared and I landed my butt right on it, stopping my fall. Now you ask, how does that apply to quick thinking, creativity and flexibility? Well, I think the big lesson for me was to slow down, don’t stick to my schedule, be flexible with it and you won’t get yourself in to such jams.
Lighting my tent on fire was pretty funny (now that I reflect back on it). I was camped with 2 friends at the base of Mather Pass and we were getting up very early, 4 AM, to climb the pass while the snow was still hard so we could use our crampons to get up and over before the snow turned to mush and we’d be post-holing the whole day. Now for reasons of full disclosure I should mention that I am not a morning person. I was using my tent as a ground sheet since it was a beautiful night and I wanted to sleep under the stars. In the morning I rolled on my stomach to heat some water for morning oatmeal. I had my stove on the ground, past the edge of my tent so that I could cook on my elbows from the comfort of my sleeping bag. Well, unbeknownst to me, I dragged and dropped the guy lines of my tent over my stove. I didn’t realize it until they were burnt all the way through. But after a few expletives, I realized I could field repair it without compromising the effectiveness of the tent and life was good again.
The dog bite was an interesting situation. My friends, Nightingale and Bono and I were hiking out a side trail to pick up more food. We had to hike 9 miles off the Pacific Crest Trail, to get to a road to get to a town to get to more food. En route, someone’s dog came up to me and bit me on the leg. I was pretty angry with the situation. I mean I am hiking from Mexico to Canada and I need my leg. It was a small bite but drew blood and left a small scar. We had to be flexible with our schedule and decided to take a day off in town to make sure it stayed clean and started to heal without infection before we got back on the trail. By making this simple schedule change we averted what could have been an infected leg. Simple really.
Now here is the biggie. This is the only time I actually felt like my life was in danger. Not everyone has one of these moments during their quest to reach their goal, and I honestly hope it doesn’t happen to you but it did to me. I had to cross a pretty big river, we found what seemed to be a slower, better option for crossing. Bono, being the tall guy went first and shuttled Nightingale’s pack and then my pack across for us. Nightingale crossed next and made it with no trouble. Then it was my turn.
I hate being wet, I think it’s from years of springboard diving and always being wet. I hate it now. I wasn’t looking forward to crossing the stream and getting wet but I went for it. It turns out that somehow, I walked into a big hole in the stream bed and my feet no longer were touching the bottom of the river. My head was under, the water was snow melt and I was an active drowning victim. The frigid temperature of the water took what little breath I had, away. Things were not looking good. Finally, I got a hold of myself and managed to get myself pointed over toward the bank and let the river current push me there as I kicked and paddled. I managed to beach myself on the shore like a whale, soaking in the warm sunshine as I lay there, replaying the last few moments in my head. Scary moments but staying calm and thinking fast had probably saved my life.
Now all these crazy stories happened in a short span of time and I managed to overcome these obstacles and I still made it to Canada. Other obstacles popped up along the way, but none in such rapid fire succession.
So remember this: Obstacles will come up, but with quick thinking, creativity and flexibility you can overcome them.
