Blistered Kind Of Love (5 page)

“I'm not gonna lie; it concerns me that you've never backpacked,” Duffy remarked quietly. We were alone, peeling apples to dry in our food dehydrator, but his tone seemed to indicate that he was afraid someone else might hear. “You might not like it,” he added.

I was floored. Duffy never talked about his fears, especially if they had to do with me—or us. I'd figured he must be nervous about embarking on a three-state hike with someone who was even more of a novice than himself, but if he was nervous enough to mention it, we could be in big trouble. Duffy was having doubts; obviously he wasn't sufficiently impressed by my conquest of Turkey Mountain.

Somehow, I'd have to prove to him that I could hack it.

It was autumn, just seven months before we were due to depart for the West Coast and the start of our long summer's walk. Duffy had created a spreadsheet detailing the miles we'd need to cover between water sources in the desert.

“Some days,” he said, “we'll have to walk more than twenty miles in the sun to get from one soggy creek bed to another.” There was an expectant pause as he tried to gauge my reaction. I shrugged my shoulders and feigned indifference.

I'd read just about every Pacific Crest Trail and backpacking-related book I could get my hands on, including
The Complete Book of Outdoor Lore
by Clyde Ormond,
The Pacific Crest Trail: A Hiker's Companion
by Karen Berger, and
Soul, Sweat and Survival on the Pacific Crest Trail
by Bob Holtel. But Duffy wasn't sold. “Sure you read the manual,” I could almost hear him thinking, “but can you drive the car?” It was time for a trial run.

Living in Pennsylvania, the natural choice was a weekend on the Appalachian Trail, the Pacific Crest's older, eastern sister. On one of our many trips
to the outdoor gear store, I found a book that listed all the best Appalachian Trail hikes in our area and picked a route along Blue Mountain Ridge, past Bear Rocks and Bake Oven Knob to Lehigh Gap.

A few days later, after hours of loading, unloading, and reloading our rented backpacks, my first overnight outdoor experience started with a spurt and sputter. It took us about two hours to drive to the trailhead, where we parked and then made it as far as the edge of the woods before being greeted by signs saying “Beware of Hunters” and “Hikers advised to wear fluorescent orange.” None of our new moisture-wicking hiking clothing was remotely orange. Soon we were back in the car headed to Wal-Mart.

It was a Friday afternoon around three o'clock, and Wal-Mart's parking lot was packed. It was as if the only people working in town were the half a dozen Wal-Mart cashiers. Morbidly captivated, we took in all the mega store had to offer—including a high-tech video surveillance system with four cameras in the women's bathroom alone.

With a gasp of simultaneous relief and surprise, we found an entire aisle dedicated to florescent orange clothing. We tried on hats, shirts, jackets, even socks, but settled on three-dollar plastic vests. By the time we got back to the trail and started hiking it was 4:30 in the afternoon. The light would soon be fading.

Near Blue Mountain Ridge, the Appalachian Trail climbs a rocky knife-edge and weaves in and out of boulders piled high by glaciers. Actually, I don't think the word
trail
applies to the route we stumbled along. Imagine a wall about five feet high, pieced together with rocks about the size of pumpkins but not nearly so smooth. Now picture someone tipping over that rock wall and making you walk over the resulting mess.

“During the last ice age,” Duffy read from photocopied pages of a guidebook, “Pennsylvania experienced a climate that frequently froze and thawed layers of rock. This periglacial cycle caused immense slabs of stone to fracture, leaving a ‘sea of rocks,' or felsenmeer.”

Occasionally Duffy would shift his glance from the rocks underfoot to the meaty packet in his hands in order to give such tutorials, but mostly we just hiked—and hiked quickly. We were determined to reach Bear Rocks before
dark. The one-gallon water jugs strung to my pack bounced off my butt with every step. Duffy had insisted that carrying extra water would be good practice for the desert, but I think he was really trying to figure out how much weight I could handle.

We followed the trail's white blazes for about an hour, but as we neared an immense rock outcropping (the knife-edge) the white marks abruptly disappeared. When we finally located them again, I had to chuckle at the absurdity of the next test.

The white blazes, and the trail, continued directly up the slippery, cold gray rocks—rocks piled precariously on top of one another for as far as I could see. We scanned for an alternate route, but the surrounding terrain was equally treacherous. There was nothing to do but crawl. The sun was dipping low and the wind picking up. We had to make it to the other side of this ridge before it got dark. Hiking over these rocks in daylight was dangerous; add the challenge of darkness, and I was afraid we might leave rural Pennsylvania in body casts. With my heavy backpack leaning one way and the rest of my body struggling to go another, I dragged myself along ledges, hopped from boulder to boulder, and clung to scraggly, naked trees. When we finally got over the knife-edge (with only a couple punctured water bottles as evidence of our peril), our feet were throbbing and our stomachs were growling.

We stumbled upon Bear Rocks just before nightfall and began making camp. Minutes later, a group of high school boys arrived and eyed us maliciously. I got the sense that they'd had their sights set on our campsite. Feeling uncomfortable, we turned our backs to make dinner.

We still hadn't mastered cooking on our MSR Internationale, and the pasta turned into porridge. But it was hot and filling, and that was good enough. After eating, Duffy built a half-hearted campfire from a collection of damp twigs and fall foliage. We watched it fizzle out after half an hour and then ducked into our tent to snuggle under our sleeping bag and cuddly soft fleece blanket. This was my first night camping with Duffy, and I enjoyed the romance of the moment immensely—until the hollering and crashing began. Through the thin nylon of our tent, I could see lights bobbing amongst the
trees around us. Feet rushed through leaves and brush. Voices called to one another in the coal-black night.

“It's those kids,” Duffy whispered. When they finally quieted down, Duffy fell asleep. Not me; I heard every leaf rustle for the next eight hours.

It started to rain. The leaves rustled louder, twigs snapped, and I thought I heard footsteps. Convinced those high school kids were coming back to play tricks on us, I lay on the hard ground as stiff as a corpse. The corner of our tent started to leak, and my toes became cold and wet. I couldn't figure out where the noises were coming from. Suddenly, something brushed up against the tent just above my shoulder. Terrified, I stared at the patch of nylon, waiting for a hand to press against it or a knife to come slicing through.

Finally, as early morning light illuminated the tent, I caught some snippets of sleep. When we awoke, the source of my terror was revealed. Scattered around the perimeter of the tent was a dusting of granola. We'd left our trail mix outside and a squirrel or chipmunk had a fine feast—hence all the nighttime rustling. And that soft touch, the ghostly hand running its fingers along the tent wall—that was our rain fly flapping in the wind.

“Did you sleep at all?” Duffy was still groggy.

“Oh, yeah,” I said cheerfully. “It's so peaceful out here.” I was determined not only to pass this exam but to get bonus points for optimism.

A cold rain appeared to be settling in for the weekend, and Duffy suggested we cut short the rest of our trip.

“Whatever you want,” I said with a smile. My fingers and toes were going white and numb from standing in the bone-chilling drizzle. Soon, I knew, they'd turn blue and start to throb. For the past few years, I'd suffered from Raynaud's phenomenon, sometimes called Raynaud's Disease or simply Raynaud's. Raynaud's, named for the French physician Maurice Raynaud who first recognized it in 1862, refers to a cold- or stress-induced interruption of blood flow to the fingers, toes, nose, and ear lobes. For reasons not completely understood, some people's blood vessels hyper-react to cold. This means that anything from snow flurries to an iced drink can lead to painful and sometimes debilitating symptoms. In severe instances, ulcerations
and infections can occur, leading to gangrene. Nine times more common in women than in men, Raynaud's affects approximately twenty-eight million Americans.

Usually, Raynaud's was just an uncomfortable inconvenience for me, relieved by holding a steaming cup of tea or taking a hot shower. But in the wilderness, I worried about how I would bring feeling and blood back to my hands and feet, especially at 12,000 feet. What if I couldn't? Would I develop frostbite? Or gangrene? I'd sought medical advice (from both Duffy and a fully licensed M.D.), but because people don't really know what causes Raynaud's, there aren't many known treatments. Taking medicines usually used for high blood pressure can help (I'd been taking them for more than a year and found only mild relief), but mostly physicians recommend preventing exposure to cold conditions and objects. Well, it was too late for that now, so I shoved my hands under my armpits and hoped for the best.

“These are hypothermic conditions, all right,” Duffy remarked. He was jumping up and down around our campsite. “Rain, wind, and temperatures just below fifty degrees. It's not worth the risk.” Whatever the reason, I was happy to get out of the miserable, wet weather as soon as possible. My nose was getting raw from wiping away the runniness.

We hiked purposefully the rest of the day, determined to move fast enough to stay warm and to make it back to the car before we were thoroughly soaked. With lighter packs (we dumped our “training” water) and thoughts of central heating to inspire us, we made good time. When we got home we took long, hot showers, huddled over bowls of soup, and slept soundly. We hadn't completed our proposed route, but we'd survived our first thirty-six hours in the wilderness.

Months later, the sweet, sharp aroma of tomato sauce oozed beneath my apartment door into the cramped stairwell. I'd been dehydrating spaghetti sauce all week, trying to add at least one stretchy tomato “leather” to each of our re-supply boxes. In a few weeks, we'd be so sick of those slimy, salty roll-ups
that we'd throw them out or give them away. But for now, the whir of my dehydrator was a constant companion.

Alone in my tomato-scented apartment, I packed my personal belongings and made room for my subletter. Soon I'd have no job and no rent to pay; everything I needed to survive would be on my back. Surrounded by wilderness, there'd be no traffic to fight, no ringing telephones, no emails, and nobody to answer to but my hiking partner. It sounded like freedom—so why did I feel so trapped? After quitting my job, alienating my family, and spending my savings on equipment, I felt frequent flutters of fear. If this didn't work—if Duffy and I didn't work—I had no Plan B.

Under the strain, I started grinding my teeth in my sleep but otherwise kept quiet. I didn't want to discuss the worst-case scenario with anyone for fear of it becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy. Could I hike alone if I had to? And if so, how would we divide equipment, funds, and food? Should I be insisting on the long-distance hiking equivalent of a prenuptial agreement?