Into the Wild
WOW, what a day.
Today I hiked to Bonticou’s Crag in the Mohonk Preserve, right outside of New Paltz. If you read my post about yesterday’s hike, you know I was wary of a repeat experience. I went on an actual rant about how much I hate hiking in the snow. But today was AWESOME and it was one of the best hikes I’ve done in a long time.
I had a feeling it would be a good day, because this morning I got a sign. While I was driving to the trailhead, I saw a deer. A deer wandered out onto the road in front of me! There are signs posted everywhere, of course, for drivers to beware of wildlife crossings, but this was the first time it had actually happened to me. It was magical. The deer was in no rush; it meandered onto the road - luckily, I was going pretty slowly and saw it way in advance, so there was no danger whatsoever to either of us - and it kind of stopped there to have a look around before prancing into the woods on the other side. It coyly glanced back as it went. And that was when I knew. A wide smile on my face, I continued onwards to the Mohonk Preserve trailhead.
The parking lot was, a little worryingly, totally empty, save for one other car. There wasn’t even anyone in the guard booth where you’re supposed to get a map and pay for parking. Instead there was a post with little envelopes for you to deposit the fee in. These park rangers are a trusting bunch.
I didn’t have exact change for the parking fee ($15) but the envelope suggested donations were welcome, so I stuck a $20 in mine. But just in case something went wrong - the lack of other hikers alarmed me - and I didn’t end up finishing or enjoying the hike, I decided to hold it back until I returned with a better idea of my overall satisfaction.
I was slightly concerned by how empty it was. Sam’s Point, the day before, had had a good number of cars in its lot, and a small but fair number of hikers on the trails. But today, apart from a couple walking their dog that I passed as I walked from the parking lot to the trailhead, I did not see a single other human soul from beginning to end of my hike. Which was surprising, because the conditions there were so much better than at Sam’s Point.
I had decided upon this hike after perusing this awesome blog, Hike the Hudson Valley, created by a guy who has hiked everywhere in the region and gives detailed instructions for every single trail. He warned that the preserve had tons of different trails and trail markers, so I carefully studied his guide and the posted maps before starting my hike, and boy am I glad I had the guide - it was invaluable. (This, by the way, is the key to good hiking: research.) Especially since I was alone.
Almost as soon as I began, I knew this hike would be different - i.e., way better - than Sam’s Point. First of all, though the ground was still fairly covered, there was MUCH less snow. Most of the trails I walked were already tamped down and easy to traverse. That meant as much neck-craning and scenery-enjoying as I could want.
I find the first leg of a hike is often the hardest, even when it’s not particularly physically challenging. Although none of your energy has been used up and you’re excited for the hike, you haven’t yet gotten into your hiking groove. And in my case, I found I was slightly sore from the day before. The first leg went gently uphill, and it was difficult at first. But I wasn’t discouraged. In fact, I kept catching myself tramping along with a huge smile plastered across my face. While it was still cloudy, the sun was definitely around, and the sky was BLUE. It was warmer, too, than Sam’s Point had been, though only by a few degrees. When I stopped to rest, my fingers would grow cold, but at no point was I even half as frozen as I had been the day before. In other words, conditions were great, and I was very, very happy. This was my kind of hiking.
So much yes.
I assiduously followed the guide for the trail and continued past a few complicated forks onto a skiing path, which was labeled as forbidden to foot travelers, but as I could see several hikers had already broken this rule, I continued in their footsteps (literally). I was totally alone in the woods. I couldn’t hear any other hikers, let alone see any. But I didn’t feel afraid in the least. In fact I enjoyed the knowledge that I had the woods to myself. It was an isolated, complete little world, with me its only inhabitant.
One of the reasons I had chosen this hike was because of the rock scramble, which is basically a 20-minute climb up a massive pile of huge rocks to the top of Bonticou’s Crag. I love climbing, and I find these sections of trail fun and challenging. Bill/Brad had warned me the previous day that I probably wouldn’t be able to do it, but I was still hopeful. When I arrived at the scramble, I saw what they meant. It was covered in snow. Climbing a steep pile of rocks is one thing; climbing a steep pile of snow-covered rocks is another. But when I saw it, I was overcome with yearning. I wanted to do it, and I could see that other hikers had done it despite the snow. I knew it was a potentially very stupid decision, but I felt that as long as they had made it up, I could too. So, adventurous grin on, I began.
Caution indeed.
The Scramble.
“Scramble” was certainly the correct word, and I was covered in snow within minutes as I plunged my hands into deep piles of it to grasp rocks and wedged my feet between boulders to get purchase. Most of the trail blazes (patches painted on trees and rocks marking trailways) were obviously hidden beneath the snow, so I had to follow the paths other hikers had made before me. I made surprisingly quick pace, gaining an impressive altitude within moments of beginning, and I thought, oh, this isn’t so bad.
But I knew I was being an idiot. Even if other hikers had come this way, they’d probably been in pairs or groups. I was trying to climb the scramble, alone, in the snow. I knew how that would sound in a newspaper headline, and I also knew that if I read about a girl who got injured or worse during such an attempt, I would chalk it up as a Darwinian casualty. Yet here I was, doing it.
I got wetter and snowier but kept going. Then I reached an impasse: a sheer rock face which did not reveal its scrambling secrets. There was no obvious way to get up, and the rock point I was balancing on didn’t offer a lot of leverage. The idea that I had made a big mistake began to come over me as I contemplated my next steps. The crevasses between the rocks were . . . deep. It wasn’t impossible to imagine getting stuck in one of them should I fall, which wasn’t impossible to imagine considering that every rock surface was covered in a wet and slippery precipitate. As I looked up and tried to imagine how previous hikers had done it, I realized that there weren’t a whole lot of footprints on the upper side of this rock. In fact I couldn’t really see any, which led me to believe that other hikers had also gotten stuck at this point and then turned back.
But there was one curious print on the rock itself, and I couldn’t quite figure out how it had been made. It looked like someone had tried climbing with baseball gloves on . . . ACTUALLY, IT LOOKED LIKE MASSIVE BEAR PAWS.
Please look at the next photo and tell me I’m wrong. Also note the complete lack of HUMAN prints beyond that point.
Bear tracks, or a guy in baseball gloves?
Well, that helped me decide my next step. Don’t mind me, I’m just taking the quick way down on my ass. I nimbly slid and jumped back to the beginning of the scramble, satisfied that I had tried my best, that the scramble was clearly only accessible by bear, and that I could take the long way around without any feelings of guilt.
Black bears are common in the Hudson Valley. There was even a warning about them on the informational sign posts at the beginning of the trailhead. I knew there was a real chance I could see one on my hike. I knew what to do if I did see one. But why tempt fate?
So I took the long way, looping around the Northeast Trail (blue blazes) to the Bonticou Ascent Trail (yellow). At times it was difficult to follow, but I got used to tracking previous hikers and keeping an eye out for blazes on trees and rocks. I tramped along, happy as a clam, loving the woods, loving the twisting path. It was just the kind of hiking I like: a narrow path winding through trees, wooded, alternating between dirt and rock (and in this case snow), requiring just a little clambering, the surrounding scenery shifting as you went along. The ascent was a little difficult - going uphill sometimes is - but as I began to approach the summit, I felt that unmistakable thrill of anticipation, that growing sense of coming wonder. I could catch glimpses of the views through the trees as I climbed upwards, and I knew splendor awaited at the top.
I was not wrong.
As I emerged onto the crag itself, a series of the jagged, exposed clifftops at the peak, the beauty and amazement was, quite literally, overwhelming. I couldn’t take it all in. The views were fully 360 degrees: the entire Catskill mountain range was laid out before my eyes. It was incredible. Beyond incredible. Stunning. Views on views on views. It took my breath away. I can’t even describe how it made me feel. The awe of it physically acted upon me, brought my entire self into this unknown state of . . . I don’t even know. I don’t have anything with which to compare it.
And honestly, I think the reason I could feel it is because I was alone. I wrote about this in my sum-up post about my trip - about how being alone actually heightened moments of joy.
I wrote (since I can’t really express it better than I already have):
...All of that happiness and wonderment, all of those feelings I thought I would want to share, having no other soul to flow into, possessed me completely.
In a sense, being unable to express it, to speak it, to release it, meant that moment of pure aliveness had no choice but to feed back into itself, a loop of ecstasy surging through me.
That’s what I experienced today, at the top of Bonticou Crag: a moment of unadulterated amazement, joy, wonderment, fully and completely enclosed within my being. My body, my physical and emotional self, had to contain it. It was like nothing else I’ve felt.
And the truth is, this wasn’t the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. That accolade goes to the French Alps, which contain the most jaw-droppingly, stunningly gorgeous views I’ve ever seen in my life. There’s really no contest. Today was beautiful, but it still was nothing like the French Alps. And yet I did not fully experience this moment in the Alps the same way I did today. And I didn’t realize it until now, but the reason why is because I could turn to my family and say things like, “ARRGG! I can’t believe this is real!!!” and “Oh my God, this is unbelievable!!!” and “Are you seeing this??!?” In other words, that wonder was allowed to exit my body, to flow into others, to be expressed into the air, to be received by the outer world.
There’s much joy in that, too. Our shared memories of the Alps are precious to me, and I am beyond glad and grateful that we were all together there, that I could exclaim to them, that I could jump up and down and point and wave my arms emphatically at them to try to express my amazement.
This was different. There was no one up there, not a soul. No other hikers, even ones I didn’t know, with whom to share the glory of our perch in the sky. I could shout in joy - I did do so - but no one heard me. I was completely, utterly alone. This was my view, my sky, my world.
And I even got pictures of it, for once!
I scampered over the cliffs, checking out the views from this or that rocky bluff. They extended narrowly in both directions, and I could see the scramble down below that I hadn’t climbed. I sat on the edge of a rock and dangled my legs, glad my father couldn’t see me. I sprawled out in a comfortable nook, stretched my body out over the rock, closed my eyes, listened to the sound of the wind - the only sound I could hear - felt the surface of the rock beneath my fingers - inhaled the scent of nothing but nature.
It was freaking incredible.
I had a snack, and reflected on the knowledge that this moment would forevermore be a pinnacle point in my life, an experience carved into the fabric of my being, that later I would be sitting on my hotel room bed thinking about it, that I’d think of it again and again for years to come. I did my best to pull back from that metamoment, to stop thinking about what it would mean and instead simply bathe in the meaning itself. I think, for the most part, I succeeded.
Eventually, I had to get going. My fingers were starting to freeze, and I still had a lot of hike to do. I packed up, got up and started looking for the trail. And . . . I couldn’t find it.
The area wasn’t that big. I knew the trail wasn’t far. And yet I couldn’t find it. I couldn’t figure out where I had come in from. I tried following footprints in the snow but most of them were my own, and pretty soon they were just loops of me fruitlessly trying different directions, seeking something that looked familiar. It all looked equally familiar and not familiar. Which way had I come? Which crag had I climbed? Where the fuck was the trail?
For the first few minutes of this searching, I was just bemused. Then for a few minutes after that, I was a little nervous, and increasingly frustrated. In the next few minutes I was scared. And then I was full-on panicking.
Let me be clear. I knew that at no point was I actually in any danger. Should worst come to worst - if I really, truly could not find the trail after a significant amount of time had passed, if the sun started going down and I was still stuck on the rock (unlikely, as sunset was still five hours away at this point) - I had my phone, it was still alive, it had service. I could call the park rangers. I would not be left up here to die. I knew that.
But I still panicked.
It’s scary. I didn’t want to have to call the park rangers, of course. I didn’t want to have to be rescued because I couldn’t wander properly enough to find a tree with a yellow streak on it within a half-mile radius (at most) of an exposed rocky peak. I knew it was there, dammit, I had come up on it. But still, it was scary, and I could feel the constricted flow of breath in my chest as I paced, I could feel my jaw clenching anxiously, I could feel the fear of getting lost creeping over me, irrational as it was. I was alone. I knew no other hikers were on their way up. I couldn’t find the fucking trail even though I knew it was there.
So what’s a Jew to do when stranded in the wilderness? Well, the answer should be obvious (to anyone who reads this blog).
“Hashem, help me. Help me, Hashem. Hashem, help me, help me, help me,” I muttered under my breath as I frantically searched for signs of the trail. “Guide me, help me, rescue me.”
I cried out to God. And he answered.
I took some deep breaths. I told myself I would find the trail. I found some footprints. I followed them back, back, back. They carried me up over the crags, into the trees. And there it was. The yellow trail. The sign pointing, clear as day. The path, tramped down by hikers, leading down the mountain.
I cried out to God in the wilderness, and he was there.
I've never been so happy to see the color yellow in my life.
This all sounds very dramatic, I know. I wasn’t in real danger. I had plenty of food and water. I had a phone. I was warmly dressed. BUT I WAS STILL SCARED, OKAY?!!?
And the truth is - as I rushed onto the path with relief cascading over me - I realized that it didn’t really matter whether Hashem had led me back to the trail or whether my own clearheadedness had done it, as skeptics might say. I believed, fully, that any ability I had to find my way had come from God. My self-confidence, my logic, whatever it was that helped me find the path, were just divine tools. It didn’t matter because I believed.
I was still keyed up, stressed, as I started down. I was dismayed that the perfect experience of reaching the peak had been marred by this less-than-perfect conclusion. But I stopped myself. Literally, I stopped in the middle of the trail. I didn’t want to think that way. I wanted to self-correct. I wanted to be happy, I wanted to return to the ecstatic joy I knew I could feel. I thought of what had just happened, what I should learn from it.
But the lesson that came to me wasn’t about myself. It wasn’t anything I could or should change, or anything I could or should do. It was just the simple knowledge that God is with me. I hadn’t gone on a hike alone. I had gone with Hashem! Ridiculous to think that anything could happen to me when He was my hiking partner!
The thought did cross my mind that many hikers who had gotten lost and starved or frozen to death had, in their dying days and moments, probably very fervently prayed to God for deliverance. That was not lost on me, and I don’t really have an answer. Maybe I should talk to a rabbi about it.
But with the joyful thought that God was with me, had answered me in my moment of need, I was able to continue, my beam restored, phrases from psalms echoing in my head.
I tramped happily onward. The next stretch of the hike was particularly beautiful, with more stunning views of the Catskill mountain range peeking through the trees as the trail wound around the mountain.
I didn’t see any animal life, and I heard few birds. At one point, I know I was near a large animal, though I have no idea what it was. I saw a shape out of the corner of my eye, and I distinctly heard something moving about in the brush. It could have been a bear, but it was probably a deer. Nevertheless, I began singing “Mr. Golden Sun” at the top of my lungs, just in case. (Bears don’t like being surprised. If you think you’re in the vicinity of a bear, make lots of noise so they know you’re there.)
Though I didn’t see animals, I know they were around. The snow was full of all kinds of animal tracks - birds, deer, dogs (I assume with hikers), lots of other kinds that I wish I could identify. I keenly looked for more bear tracks, but didn’t find any.
Thankfully, Mr. Golden Sun had indeed made an appearance in the afternoon, and he stayed out well past the end of my hike. The weather was beautiful (for winter), and other than my fingers and occasionally my face, I wasn’t cold at all. Of course, my two layers of socks (and boots) were absolutely soaking by the time I was halfway through the hike. I REALLY need waterproof boots.
The next part of my hike would take me to the Table Rocks, which the Hike the Hudson Valley guy said were not to be missed, even though they added two miles to the hike (one mile each way there and back). It was still early, I still had energy, I wanted to see the Table Rocks!
When I got to the turn-off for the Table Rocks trail, it was clear that no other hikers had been that way in quite some time. There were no fresh footprints, so I had to blaze my own trail. Trailblaze, if you will. It was okay, especially on the way there, which was downhill. The path was boring - just a long, straight trail bordered by trees and thin woods. But the trail was badly marked, with blazes hundreds of feet apart, so that I kept wondering if I had accidentally gone off somehow. I was impatient to arrive.
But the Table Rocks were a letdown. Covered with snow, it was difficult to see the appeal. I could imagine that during the height of summer, the massive black slanting rocks would probably be really cool, but in the winter, on a cold, exposed surface buffeted by wind, it was less than impressive. I sat down and ate a snack, but it wasn’t a satisfying experience, and I was ready to be on my way back.
Yawn.
Here, I hit a stumbling block. I hadn’t realized just how downhill the path there had been until I had to head back up. I don’t know why, but sometimes after I eat a snack or take a break while hiking, I become sluggish rather than energized. And I was sapped at this point. It was just one of those phases during a hike when you’re miserable and you want to stop. I had to drag myself uphill, constantly halting and stumbling. I felt like those old people yesterday. If a younger hiker had been there, she would have outpaced me for sure. At one point I even had to sit down on a fallen tree. I was just so not feeling it. And for what? For the dumb Table Rocks.
That was the worst part of the hike, also probably because it was so boring scenery-wise. I was very happy when I returned to the intersection and set off down Farm Road, which would lead to the end of the loop. In fact it was a surprisingly quick shot from there as I passed through several large meadows which I imagined would be very pretty in a greener season.
Towards the end of the trail, I reached the so-called “Million Dollar View”, visible from a massive, beautiful gazebo overlooking a field. From that point, you could see all of the Catskills. (Of course, you can also see them from the Crag, but for the lazy, this view was vehicle-accessible.) It was very pretty, and the short rest was appreciated. Who knew New York was so beautiful? (Everyone who lives north of Manhattan, that’s who.)
The Million Dollar View.
The last few bits were fields and roads. My smile was bigger than ever as I rounded the last bend and glimpsed the parking lot in the distance. I had, for once, completed a perfect loop. I had done the hike I came to do. I had followed the directions carefully, and I had had an incredible hike. Sure, my feet were squishing in my shoes, but at least my toes weren’t frozen. Better wet than cold! I marched happily up to the guard shack and deposited my envelope - $20 well spent! - in the designated slot.
I was surprised, when I looked at my watch, to discover that I had only been hiking for four hours. In that time, I had covered about 6.5 miles of trail. The time was shorter, and the distance longer, than the previous day’s hellhike through two feet of snow. But oh, what a difference as I returned to my car! Yesterday, I was disgruntled; today, I was euphoric. Yesterday, it took all my strength to wrench my boots off; today, they slid off with ease. Yesterday, my pant legs were encrusted with several pounds of snow; today, they were just damp. I dried my feet on the heating vents and pulled on clean socks and dry shoes. Ahhh! Is there any better feeling?
"This makes up for everything!" - My feet
It was an amazing hike, the reason why people hike in the first place, and a world away from the previous day’s misery. Sometimes hikes work, and sometimes they don’t. There’s no way to know beforehand which kind you’re going to have. Today’s hike rocked. No pun intended. I hate puns.
After my hike I returned to my hotel for a long, hot shower (another amazing post-hike feeling! Sometimes I think people only hike to more fully enjoy the pleasures of not hiking) and then headed into New Paltz for some local vegan cuisine and shopping. New Paltz is a cute little hippie-dippie college town, and my family used to come here every few years for cross-country skiing, so I knew which shops to hit. I had some vegan soup and then dropped $50 on souvenirs. (Grr! I know I vowed last time that I wouldn’t, but I can’t help it. I LOVE souvenirs. There’s nothing better than a new experience, but since you can’t take that with you, you might as well take something to remember it by.)
Dinner was instant soup in my hotel room. Later in the evening, I went to the movies just to have something to do. I saw “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri,” which won a lot of awards, but I didn’t like it at all. I regretted my decision to go. But at least the ticket was only $8. Go New Paltz.
Tomorrow, Friday, I’ll return home in time to bake some bread and prepare for Shabbat. Man, I’m so glad I came up here! I had my doubts after Wednesday, but Thursday put me to rights. There’s nothing like this! I LOVE LIVING LIFE!