Etna, the Mecca of Culture and Thought

It was suggested in the last post that my next stop was to be Seiad Valley. It wasn't. I'll be honest. The hike into Dunsmuir, with its solitude, poor trail maintenance, and clear cuts, left me feeling a little down. Fortunately, this section proved to be a moral buster. After hearing from a few southbounders and hiking with two new friends, I decided to follow them into Etna for a one-night layover. It was a wonderful decision.

I left Dunsmuir in the middle of a hot afternoon, and I was feeling a little down, as I have said. I even read the letter my friend Mike gave me at the beginning of the trip that I was not to read unless seriously considering quiting the trail or feeling terribly lonely. It was funny and encouraging and got me going again. Thanks Mike. I still have it in case I should have another bad day. As I got moving again I passed under the impressive Castle Crags. These enormous pillars of granite stretch almost completely vertical into the sky and are very reminiscent of the Sierra country. The next few days to Etna would contain more Sierra-like granite, minus about 4000 ft of it.

It was uncertain that moral would improve right away, because shortly after leaving town I encountered my first black bear. It was so small however, that I thought it to be a black German Shepard at first glance. I easily scared it away with some aggressive shouting and after waiting a few moments to let it create distance between itself and the trail, I continued on. To make matters worse, I encountered yet another rattlesnake before making camp. This being about the sixth encounter I am getting better at controlling my fear and heart rate. I made camp near a small stream and was joined shortly thereafter by another thru-hiker. Fox Trot was probably in his early thirties and is a commercial fisherman in the winter. Having ample time for hiking, he has amassed over 30,000 miles of trail over the last fifteen-some-odd years on every trail you can think of.

I hike alone the entire next day. It was almost thirty miles exactly when I came to Highway 3 at Scott's Summit. Upon arrival, I noticed a small handwritten note on the trail head to make my way 1/2 mile down the highway to Camp Independence for some refreshments. I figured it was a YMCA camp or something of the like, but it was just a dad and his son enjoying their own little getaway property in the mountains. I made it just in time to catch dinner. The dad's name was Cub and he told me to hit the barbecue for some chicken and Chet, his son, brought me over a beer. They said I could role my sleeping bag out where I'd like and I was welcome to whatever I wanted. Still pretty full of three BBQ chicken breasts, I managed to have a few peanut butter cookies too. We then move the cooler over near the fire pit and continued talking fireside. Cub had hiked the trail back in '78. He graduated high school a year early because he wanted to go hiking so bad. Back then it was mostly logging and forest service roads but he made it the whole way in just over six months. His memory of every detail of the trip impressed me after so many years. He really got me excited about making it all the way to Canada again. Cub and Chet were so generous. They woke up with me the next morning and cooked breakfast and gave me a ride back to the trail. My luck was perfect because they were only there for that night and it turned out to be some of the best trail magic of the trip.

I eventually made some more friends with some hikers I could actually keep up with the following day. At lunch by a nice spring, Ice Ax and Heaps came hiking by. Ice Ax is forty and finishing the hike after one failed attempted 18 years ago. He hikes a brisk pace, but if you get winded you need not worry about an awkward silence, because one will never come. He is never at a loss for things to keep the conversation rolling. Heaps is about 22 and came to the trail from Sidney, though he was born and raised in New Zealand. We had a lot of fun chatting down the trail that afternoon. It was nice to talk with new personalities and make new friends. We all camped at different miles for the night but regrouped in the morning for the hike to the highway, and boy was it a great morning.

The fourteen miles we hiked to the highway was filled with interesting people. It started out simply enough with a couple of over-nighters but quickly got interesting. Coming around one corner, we are all surprised to see a number of goats in the trail. Scanning the area we find a woman who could have been Mother Nature herself standing among the trees. She greets us and the questions begin. Soon her friend hikes up to the trail from below where more goats were grazing. He had a wide brimmed hat on and some high water trousers held up by suspenders well clear of his sandals. They told us that they had just hit the trail a few days ago. They lived completely off the land and their goats. They had 18 goats all together and would get as much as 4 gallons of milk a day. They offered us some milk and it was quite taste. They said they also make cheese and yogurt and always have more than enough to eat. They told us they even slaughtered one disagreeable goat when some friends of their's came out to visit. They said that they would stay out until the weather turned cold. Then it would be back to the abandoned hippy commune for the winter. As he put it, they live completely off the grid and they seemed to like it that way. The three of us were quite impressed with their lifestyle. It was so simple and organic; just natural. We ended up talking with them for just shy of an hour, but town was calling.

The next group we met was about 6 guys, all over sixty. They said they had been hiking in the summer together for 40 years. They were super nice and we all agreed how wonderful the hiking community and lifestyle was. There was quite an aroma about the group. I'm sure they had just been enhancing their hiking experience before we met them. You could tell they were familiar with the Haight/ Ashbury scene and wished it were still around. Again, it was unfortunate, but we eventually had to moved on.

It was a tough hitch into town. The third car we saw picked us up but that took over an hour. When we got into town we found ourselves at the local drugstore which had an old fashion soda fountain and ice-cream bar. We all had milkshakes and then went to the cafe for lunch. We heard about this school that hosts hikers for free so we made our way over. There were some hikers already there that gave us the rundown of the place. The school is a sort of alternative college that focuses on intercultural studies and humanitarian projects. There are a number of students from South Korea, Germany, Brazil and the US. After grabbing dinner we came back to the school because Tim, the German student, was leading a discussion on patriotism for his peers. We were welcomed into the discussion and what a blessing it was.

Boy was it refreshing to exercise the brain instead of the body. It was such a wonderful platform as well. The opinions encompassed a wide scope and it was beautiful to learn how each felt about his or her country. The conversation was, understandably, clouded with semantics, as most were using their second language, but all managed to convey passionate ideas about boarders, government, and environment. Tim mediated the conversation beautifully, always ready with another question or example when silence approached. The discussion continued well after its formal conclusion. I began to think about the ironies of my own trip. The two boarders I would be crossing greatly differ. One is a fifteen foot fence with barbed wire and armed guards. The other is a row of trees that have been cut down without so much as a single customs agent. It was interesting to think of all the many complications reported by the news from around the world when this group of a dozen students from its every corner sat together in loving conversation with one another. Its almost as if the lines that were drawn in the sand so long ago have failed to serve their purpose. I'm not even sure what that purpose was. To the couple we met that herds goats in the mountains, these lines that, in most cases, exist only on paper maps are senseless markings by a child with a crayon. They have no bearing on the way one lives when herding goats. They need nothing from a government or union or state. They have no income so they are nothing to the government, but the government can't provide them with land or goats or each other, so the government is nothing to them.

Don't be too worried about me though. I have plenty to keep me tied to a mainstream American lifestyle. I'll be to Seiad Valley in a couple of days and then Ashland shortly after. I'm so thankful for my unplanned stop in Etna. I'll never forget the people I've met today. They've certainly given me plenty to think about on the trail for the coming miles. Its nice to know where I'm hiking from day to day and now I have to figure it out for the coming years. I'm sad to say that I may lack the courage to be a wondering mountain goat herder but "off the grid" does sound like a very interesting place.