End Of Day Chief Mountain Campsite
Being alone in the wilderness made me feel like the last man alive.
Except for Harvey and his family, I hadn't seen a soul. The last thing
I expected was to see someone enter my camp at dusk, in the rain. But,
that is what happened. Well, that is almost what happened. I was
sitting by the fire, trying to decide when would be a good time to go
inside my tent for the night, when in strolled four men on horseback.
All were wearing raincoats and their horses were loaded down with
packs. The lead rider steered his horse over to wear I was sitting and
said, "Have you been up to the mountain?" I was still tripping. I
didn't know if these guys were real or if I was hallucinating them. I
had never hallucinated something that was totally not there before,
but there was always a first time for everything.
Stuttering, I responded, "Yes, I hiked up there today. I just got
back." "Have you been camped up here long?" came the reply. "For a few
days." I said. I was in shock. I didn't know how to respond to this
guy. Thoughts of Carlos Castaneda flashed into my head. Could this guy
be a Don Juan type character come to teach me, terrify me, or worse? I
didn't know. I was not ready to play host, though, and I think he
figured that out because after an uncomfortable silence, he looked
straight at me and said, "We're heading up the mountain too," and then
he giddied up his horse. The three other horsemen followed him into
the forest and down the rain drenched trail leading to the falls.
I was completely dumbfounded. How could four horses climb Chief
Mountain? They certainly weren't going to climb the mountain that I
just came down from. My mind raced forward, trying to make sense out
of what had just happened, and then it crashed. It just shut down. I
crawled into my tent and went to bed.
No comments:
Post a Comment