Day 24 : Mike Urich Cabin

Start – Mike Urich Cabin (1450 m)
Finish – Sheep Lake (1800 m)
Daily Distance – 35 km
Ascent – 1215 m
Descent – 915 m

I walked through a land of dust and bone. Only the cockroaches and motel breakfasts had survived.

Burn areas, when shrouded in mist, are eerie places. The trees, dessicated, dead, and bleached white, rise from the mists like bones thrust from the earth. Dead ones, with the age and wisdom of ages, standing in silent judgement on the interloper disturbing their rest. I startled a solitary deer, for a moment I could almost picture it wearing a sable suit and tie, last caretaker of the charnel land. The hoof beats, already muffled, soon fade away, returning the land to its silent state. Silent, except for the creaking of slow breaking trunks and fluted minor chords of wind funnelled through burn forged finger holes.

There is, when observed closely, also a fragile, forlorn, “end of days”, style beauty. Flowers of pink, purple and yellow, which somehow survived the flames, spring up like gifts placed lovingly on a tomb. Chipmunks scurry about, alarm calls warning of my passing. I wonder, were they already here when the flames passed through? Perhaps protected by their burrows, to emerge into a changed and scarred world?

It is difficult to know what to feel when slowly winding through these dead lands. What responsibility do we have? What choices contributed to the almost inevitability of destruction? Are these casualties of a war, which only one side has the capability of waging, even as our victory presages our demise?

Addendum: Sheep lake is beautiful, but the soil is baked dry and fine. Strung gusts of wind have been blowing since my arrival and show no signs of abating. Despite my best efforts, soil is relentlessly blowing inside my tent. Everything is covered in a fine, black powder. It is impossible to keep anything clean. The dirt clings even more readily to wet surfaces than dry. The wind is bitter.