Supai is kind of a dichotomy. Or an oxymoron. The waterfalls are beautiful. The people are friendly. But the trash piles up in the campground and along the trail. The floods have scoured the campground and there aren't many flat camping spots left.

In the National Park, numbers are limited below the rim. In Supai, anything goes. Reservations are "required" but arrive without one and you are still allowed to stay. You pay twice the fee, but they don't make you hike out (note, this has since changed -- no reservation, no stay).

Group size is not limited. When we left, there was a group of 70 people hiking down. Seventy! They will spend the whole weekend just keeping track of each other. And we were thinking: 70 people swimming in Havasu Falls. 70 people climbing up, or down, the Mooney route. 70 people lined up to get water from the spring. And I know they all didn't wait in line for the bathroom: they would have, ahem, taken matters into their own hands. No matter how careful a group is, there will be 70 people's worth of microtrash, kleenex, water bottle lids, and general mini debris that is so easy to lose track of.

We hiked down on Monday. With an early start we had shade until we reached the creek. I picked up a bag of trash, and upon entering the village, a woman took it from me to put in her trash can.

Once we left the village, it was horrendously hot with sun reflecting from the white sand in the road. It was lunch hour at school, and three kids stalked us. They tugged on our packs, giggled, and ran. They jumped out at us and yelled, "boo!". One little charmer trotted along in the shade from my umbrella, very pleased with herself indeed. The Havasupai are a mischievous people when they like you. Gosh knows what they do when they don't like you.

On a Monday, the campground wasn't too crowded. My favorite spot was available. It is pretty far from the campground entrance, and I know everyone was eying closer spots. There's one. There's a nice one. There's one in the shade! But my spot was better. There were two milk cartons full of trash in the site, so I picked them up and took them back to the ranger when I went for water. There was the lady who had taken the bag from me earlier in the day! She laughed, and said, "Is all you do is go around picking up trash?" Well, pretty much, yeah.


The second day we hiked up the West Rim. I had asked in the Tourist Office for permission to do so, and was told to ask the campground rangers. The first ranger I approached said, No. I was disappointed, and she looked at me closely. "Have you been there?" she demanded. "Yes," I lied. "Will you be careful?". "Very," I said sincerely. "Okay," she decided. When we started up in the morning, I told the ranger on duty that we had permission to climb the West Rim, and he sighed. "Will you be careful?". "We won't get into trouble," I promised. I think the climb is a lot easier than Mooney: I don't know what they are worried about.

The third day we climbed down Mooney (no one told us to be careful) and hiked to Beaver. The rope climb was harder because the water was higher, and we had to wade to the climbing spot. The climb on polished Temple Butte is hard enough when your shoes are dry. And the rope is getting pretty frayed. We had about an hour to ourselves before anyone else showed up.

Day four there was supposed to be an Indian Day parade, so we walked into the village, picked up another bag of trash, and bought a cold soda, but the parade was canceled. So we hiked up Carbonate to see some fossils and played in the water. I guess they have decided to call the new falls Rock Falls. There had been some discussion as to if they should be Sinyalla Falls, or Whatohomogie Falls, or Manajaka Falls, but I guess Rock Falls won't offend anyone.

Day five we hiked out early, passed the 70 people and various other groups, and I picked up five bags of trash. About a dozen people thanked me, and one Native gal asked me if I had an extra trash bag. She had meant to bring one, but it got taken down in the helicopter before she remembered.

It would be interesting to go back in a week and see how much trash has accumulated. I think it is a minority who throws trash, but it only takes a few groups of 5 or 70 to decide that it is cool to toss their water bottles and Gatorade bottles. 99 percent of the trash was for drinks: water bottles, gatorade, pop cans, a number of beer cans, three whiskey bottles, and a six pack of hard lemonade. Considering the Supai Nation is dry, and the stuff would have to be drunk warm instead of cold, that is a lot of work to bring in some booze.

Big vacation to southern Utah. We scored permits to ride the White Rim, but the road was closed at Potato Bottom because of high water on the Green, so we did an in-and-out. We still rode just as far: over 100 miles. and in that 100 miles there are probably three trees on the whole rim. NO shade.

Just the two of us, so we switched out bikes. Then we decided to both ride the same bike. I rode Brad's 29er for two days. It is faster on the flat, more stable on the downhill, and climbs more easily. So what's not to like?

Then Moab and Arches. Very crowded at Arches. We visited fiery furnace first thing in the morning all alone, but contended with hundreds of people in the Devil's Garden. Rode to some dinosaur tracks at Klondike Bluffs.

Went to Goblin Valley, then to Capitol Reef. We were wandering around the visitor's center, listening to a ranger talk, and thinking: boy, she sounds familiar. It was Andrea, a ranger we knew from Grand Canyon. She gave us some good tips for hiking. We climbed Navajo Knobs, Golden Dome, and walked through two of the "slot" canyons.

Consider a cup.

A cup is a roughly hemi-spherical container with a device attached for easy grasping with the hand. A cup can contain water, lemonade, tea, hot chocolate, cold pudding (or if you mix up the packages, cold chocolate and hot pudding), hot gelatin, solidified gelatin, noodles and cheese, petit fours, caviar, dirt, or African Violets. A cup can be made of plastic, metal, paper, waxed paper, bone china, stoneware, or chain link fence (for very fast drinkers). The sides may be striated with 1/4, 12/ and 3/4 cup marks. Then you can see graphically the small rations you must exist on. You can also measure accurately the ingredients for various dishes. However, since most of the time you do not bring the box with the directions written on the side, you end up doing things by guess and by golly anyway.

Plastic cups are advantageous because they do not break, no not get hot, and you can drill holes in the handle to tie the to your belt. You can scratch your name in the bottom (and if you scratch too deeply you can reduce your intake of liquid enormously) and if you heat food in them over the stove you can suddenly find yourself with one less thing to carry out.

Metal cups are nice because you can polish them and use them to signal Search and Rescue, you can drop them over a cliff with nothing but a few minor dents resulting, and you can heat things over the stove with them and permanently brand yourself when you try to pick up the cup by its hot handle.

Which leads us to that paragon of cups, the Sierra Cup. The Sierra cup is cleverly constructed so that the lip of the cup stays cool while the contents are boiling hot. This way you do not burn your lip when you drink from it. Instead the boiling liquid enters your mouth to burn your tongue, larynx, esophagus, and stomach lining.. Sierra cups are, above all, perfectly shaped for panning gold. Older Sierra Club members were allowed to carry a Sierra Cup with the proud embossing of “Sierra Club” on the bottom. However, if you have ever tried to clean a cup with the aforementioned legend so embossed, you may be tempted to pay dues to the Wilderness Society instead.

Cups can be used to get water out of a creek for transferal to a canteen, to catch pollywogs, to start an ant farm, to throw water at someone, as an emergency jai alai scoop, to plant an organically grown carrot in, as an emergency hat, as part of a first-aid kit to catch blood if you cut yourself, to dig an elephant trap, and to drink out of.

Why deprive yourself of this benefit to humankind any longer? Why deny yourself a position in the ranks of cup owners? Why drink scalding hot tea out of your cupped hands for another second? Run out now and get a cup.

Consider a sock.

Socks are worn on the foot. They are used to reduce friction, separate bare tootsies from hard leather, keep feet warm, dry, and full of lint. Socks are made of nylon, wool, or cotton. They can be half socks, ankle socks, knee socks, leotards, or body stockings. Socks can be pulled up on the leg so they will creep back into your boots, or folded over the top of the boot so rocks can get inside. They can be of subdued color or fluorescent green. The latter is preferred so if you get lost you can stand on your head and attract attention by waggling your feet.

Socks can be used for a wind stock, pulled over the head and used for a disguise, pulled over the hand and used for a mitten, or filled with rocks and used as a blackjack (could this be known as socking it to someone?) They can be unraveled and knitted into a dickey or crocheted into a doily. One sock can be used for a hat. They can be filled with water, placed in the refrigerator, and used as an ice tray. They can be nailed up on the mantle for Christmas. They can be filled with paperbacks and used for a book bag. They can be equipped with a drawstring and used for a purse. They can be cut into strips and woven into potholders. The toe can be cut off and used for a nose warmer. The heel can be cut off and used for an elbow warmer. The ankle can be cut off and used for a wrist warmer. If your feet are getting cold by this time, cut up an old glove and use it for a foot warmer.

With this wonderful world of new and exciting things to do with this fantastic product, how can you longer resist running out and buying 63 pairs of socks? Wonderful things can be done with 126 socks. If you ever find a 124 footed mastodon, you can outfit both it and yourself at a moment’s notice.

Consider a hiking hat.

A hiking hat is an object that covers the head, more or less. It keeps the sun out of your eyes and the hair out of your face. It keeps 5% of your body heat from escaping and protects your part from sunburn. It is also a good place to carry feathers, headbands, notes to your girlfriends, fleas, safety pins, and trail markers. It can be used to hit people, to scoop water up in, to hold rocks, as a table, to fan a campfire, to fan yourself, as a Frisbee, or to plant ivy in. It can be made of straw, plastic, felt, paisley corduroy, wool, canvas or old newspapers. It can be cowboy, mod, bush Australian, French, Swiss, Dutch or Cossack.

To keep a hat on you can tie on with string, keep it jammed down over your ears, pit in it your collar, glue it on, stick it in your pocket, or hike where there is no wind and/or people to snatch it. A hat can lead to jolly companionship and fun games like “see how long the hat will sit on the fire before it catches”, or “see how long the hat will stay in the river before it sinks”, or “see how long we can keep the hat before the owner decapitates us”. People have been known to become so attached to hats that they will scale cliffs to recover them, walk ten miles with both hands on their head to avoid losing them, and kick people in the Cheetos to keep them from being stolen.

If you happen to buy a new hat, you must first break it in before you take it on a hike, else it be broken in for you. To do this it is advisable that you step on it a few times, drag it for five miles behind your vehicle, soak it in a muddy river, bury it in the dirt, singe it in at least three places, knock it out of any shape it make have fool heartedly once held, and stick a feather in it. Shooting a few holes in it is acceptable, but must not be overdone lest you attract target practice while it still resides on your head.

A hat should ideally not be bought, but found in a ditch, at the side of the road, on top of the Peaks, or on someone else. In extreme cases one may be purchased at Goodwill.

Hats are useful for prestige, for keeping rain off your roof, for protecting your head in caves, for making people mistake you for a hippy, and for throwing into the air in moments of exultation. They can be thrown into a ring, eaten, tipped, or pulled down over your eyes so you can sleep during meetings. A hat can be love, beauty, and truth. A hat can be the ultimate trip. So don’t just sit there, let a hat be your guru. Discover the wonderful world of hats.

Consider hiking food.

It is broken down into several sub-sections: breakfast, mid-morning snack, lunch, mid-afternoon snack, dinner, after-dinner snack, and before bed cocoa and cookies. A pre-breakfast snack is optional.

Breakfast can be composed of gooey oatmeal, lumpy Instant Breakfast, stale doughnuts, burnt biscuit mix, rubbery pancakes, or quickly gobbled noodle dinners. If this does not appeal, one can always skip the hike and eat at IHOP. On second thought, what’s the difference?

Lunches are composed of stale bagels, peanut butter (either frozen or melted, depending on the locale) moldy cheese, strangely smelling bologna, liquid candy bars, lumpy instant pudding (and hearken unto thee, it is not the pudding lumps but the instant milk lumps which cause strong men to cry and strong women to quietly have hysterics) graham crackers, chocolates, raisins, rye krisp, and a dram of instant lemonade. Or the affluent may purchase at exorbitant prices a Trail Pak lunch from a major retailer comprised of graham crackers, chocolate, raisins, rye krisp, and a dram of instant lemonade.

Dinner may be composed of Lipton Noodle Main Dish Dinners (noodles, sauce, and meat), Betty Crocker Noodle Dinners (Noodles and sauce), poor but honest hiker dinners (noodles, butter, sausage, bologna, or mystery meat), or absent-mindedly-packing-for-the-hike-dinner-10-minutes-before-you-leave dinner (noodles). Or one may cave into the materialistic hiking store procurers and purchase freeze-dried repasts such as Turkey Tetrazini, Lasagna, Chicken-a-la-King, or Kung Pao Chicken, most of which taste a lot like noodles, sauce, and stringy mystery meat.

Meals can be cooked in a pot. In fact, it is highly recommended that noodle dinners be so cooked. A pot can consist of the saucepan section of a mess kit, a coffee can, an empty glass jar, a hallowed-out rock, or a bandana, if you cook really fast. An emergency pot can be constructed from a tube tent, cut up and folded into shape, in which you place hot rocks in it to boil the water. Such an emergency might occur when you use your pot for an open canteen, a hat, a daypack, or hung from your belt to conceal holes in your pants.

Snacks are inclusive of M&Ms, lemon candies, mints, nuts, lemonade, limeade, orangeade, apples, cookies, kippered herrings, petite fours, lobster Cantonese, and pheasant under grass (glass will break). Snacks are useful for resting, waiting for lost hikers to get un-lost, puzzling over topo maps, picking up rocks that you can’t carry out so you just take close-up pictures of, and luring yourself along the trail by promising your weary bod a rest and sustenance if it can only drag itself along to the top of the next butte.

Meals are good times to dispose of extra weight in your pack by consumption of food. They are also good for reviewing all the fantastic, beautiful, rare and wonderful things that everyone else saw along the trail, but you somehow missed.

As any hiker will tell you, after 14 miles on the trail, food is more valued than precious gems, exotic furs, cold cash (even before taxes), a Rolls Royce, or a 900-power down sleeping bag. Uncrushed potato chips are worth all these and your first-born child.

Alternatively you can skimp on food and when others find they brought too much and offer to share, produce a grasping hand and an eager happy-to-help-out smile. If they do not offer to share, adopt the classic Puppy Dog Eyes, and begin to drool discretely into your boots. In any case, food is rightly one of the ten essentials. One may live 30 days without food, but one becomes an undesirable and testy trail companion about 29 and a half days prior to this extreme. So do yourself and your hiking buds a favor and invest in trail substance.

It is not until some uninitiated tourist asks me, “why do I hike” that I realize how little I really know about hiking. I have equipment that satisfies me, almost, and I can get food that I like, usually, and I can amble along a trail without watching my feet, most of the time, and somewhere I have a journal full of details on most of the trails I’ve been on, except every time I go there I find things to add on the list.

But not only does memory sag and lag, and the mind conveniently blank out nastier portions of the adventure, and the trails change with every rainstorm, and the camps change with every passerby, and the seeps change with the snowmelt, but the hike itself depends on the weather, muscle cooperation, water, rocks, animals, wind, blisters, a knee that decides to conk out, mice that eat your apple, lemonade that leaks and sifts throughout the pack, and a thousand other variables.

Then I stare in perplexity at a place that I remembered as Xanadu, and now find to be part of Dante’s Inferno. Or a place that never really ranked outstanding in my mind suddenly grabs my attention with both hands. And then I hear the ghosts of the old explorers who came before me and laid down the path I walk on, laughing down the wind as they sit on some butte and watch us stumble through their old stomping grounds. The grandeur of wilderness reduces us back to our proper place in the perspective of things as that of busy little bugs scuttling about pushing things around.

The faded footprints of the first travelers remind us that we have a long way to walk before we really learn anything. The rolling majesty of clouds, of rocks, of canyon buttes, that were old before time started to mean anything to us, humbles our lives into bursts of music down an undisturbed street, and the ageless wisdom of delicate balance and endless cycles reduces any learning we may profess to have to its less than exhaulted portion of tiny crumbs of facts out of a world of knowledge.

If that is the case, then why frustrate ourselves by trying to find out anything about hiking, or anything about anything? The wisest man in the world knows very little of all there is to know, and if he is wise enough, he may realize this. Ill never climb K-2, or achieve the first decent of a river. I’ll never hike every route in the Grand Canyon. But I ‘m happy with my crumbs. I’m satisfied to just hike in a place for the first time in my life, if not for the first time in the ageless eons of time. I'm glad to know just one part of one trail for certain, if not every inch of every trail in the world. I’m glad to get one insight of myself, if I can’t know everything about people that anyone could know. And if I can so satisfy myself by hiking, then maybe that’s what I ought to tell that tourist.

What is a hiker?

Somewhere between tourist and explorer there occurs in human development a stage which is physically and psychosocially impossible. It is that unfathomable stage known as the hiker. A creature of undefined by psychologists, misunderstood by park rangers, either admired or doubted by tourists, and unheard of by the rest of society.

A hiker is a rare combination of doctor, lawyer, Indian and chief. She is a competent woods person with her copy of Desert Solitaire as proof. He is the example of manhood in worn-out hiking boots, a sweatshirt two sizes too large and a hat two sizes too small. She is a humorist in a crisis, a doctor in an emergency, a trailblazer, backpacking stove tender, and song leader. He is a comforter in a leaky tube tent on a cold night and a pal who has just loaned someone his last pair of dry socks.

A hiker dislikes 5:00 AM alarm clocks, waiting in line, taking the car to the mechanic (and being asked, “You drove it WHERE?”), and proofreading reports. She is fond of sunbathing in the Grand Canyon, exploring, rock climbing, a 1965 pick-up truck, and weekends. He is a dynamo on weekend hikes, exhausted the next Monday, but recuperated in time for the need weekend. She is good at finding lost trails, downhill hikes, and chasing scorpions out of sleeping bags. He is poor at crawling out of a sleeping bag on raining mornings, remembering salt, and getting to bed early. She is a lover of the out-of-doors, knee-deep in poison ivy.

Who but he can carry a wet sleeping bag, play sixteen games of Uno in succession, carry two packs, whistle “A Fistful of Dollars” through his fingers, speak pig Latin in Spanish, stand on his hands, sing 37 verses of Ging Gang Goolie, and eat four helpings of dinner.

She is expected to hike 25 miles in a weekend when during the week all the walking she does is from the car to the elevator. He is expected to take a 1989 VW over a jeep trail. He is expected to ride for 300 miles sharing the back of a panel truck with 16 other people and 23 packs. She is expected to hike energetically when all she has had to eat are pop tarts, rice and chicken soup, roll-ups made with stale tortillas and beef jerky, and 3 melted chocolate bars. He is expected to sleep warmly in the mountains in a sleeping bag so thin you can see the stars through it.

For all this, she gets blisters, a beat-up pack, sprained ankles, twisted knees, a sunburn on her nose, and a bad cold. All for the glory of seeing a place that the tourists never go. You wonder how he can stand the pace. You wonder why she doesn’t quit all the nonsense and press on to higher things. But on Saturday morning when the hiking group gathers in the parking lot to brandish road directions and trail maps, you know why.

Recently SUV (stupid useless vehicle) clubs have been complaining that there aren't enough off-road sites for them. Apparently the 2 percent of our public lands which are preserved as Wilderness are too much. Notwithstanding the fact that that is about the same amount of land under pavement.

Anyhow, the cry of the month is "access". Access for all who don't want to walk, primarily. And I just want to say that I couldn't agree more.

If hiking trails are too narrow for those poor 4X4'ers, then by all means they should be widened to accommodate those mistreated dusty little souls with their accompanying ice chests full of cold beer. Of course, not everyone can afford a 4X4, so then we'd have to smooth the road enough to accept a high clearance vehicle, like a VW bug. On the other hand, not everyone wants that kind of car, either, so we'd have to grade the roads to accept a passenger car.

Now we have a problem with car owners who don't have a powerful enough engine to chug up and down a steep grade, so bring on the bulldozers and blasters and keep those road grades to less than 10 percent. Then there are those who don't want to get the car dusty, a notable goal. So we have to pave the road.

Now we have those who don't want to spend that long of a time on the road, so we shall put in hotels and cafes for their convenience. And if they don't want to suffer that long of a drive, we'll sell the land to developers and they can put in their second houses and enjoy the Wilderness for as long as they want in comfort.

Of course by this time, the entire United States looks a lot like downtown Los Angeles. Not to worry: frustrated hikers can go north to Western Canada, where the mountains are really too rugged for a lot of road building. But then the poor SUV's are left out again, so we'll just have to widen those trails...

On the other hand, wouldn't it be cheaper and, in the long run, more accommodating for all to say that cars can drive on the pavement, SUVs can drive on the dirt roads, and hikers can hike everywhere else? And if any SUV person really, really wants to see the middle of a Wilderness area or a National park, they could lower their standards enough to walk.

They can even bring along a six pack of beer, if they promise to carry out the cans.

Don't ask of your friends what you yourself can do.
- Quintus Ennius

It is not fair to ask of others what you are not willing to do yourself.
- Eleanor Roosevelt

Clean up your own mess. Your mother doesn’t live here.
-Anonymous

The Brotherhood of the Rope demands that hikers and climbers take care of their own. Or themselves. When a fellow traveler is injured, dehydrated, blistered, burned or otherwise dehabilitated, they get them out without resorting to outside forces such as the Park Service or Search and Rescue.

The Brotherhood has frayed a bit in years past. With the advent of cell phones, GPS, and the nanny state too many hikers, climbers, and even mountaineers on the world’s most challenging peaks have begun stepping over their dying comrade to make the summit, then when they are safely back, placing a casual call to 911.

Add to that the increasing number of “ego climbers” who find themselves in challenging circumstances without the years of experience which one usually approaches such challenges. Many are the “independent” climbers who boast of their solo status while relying on larger parties’ fixed ropes, medical facilities, and radios. Then when something goes wrong, they berate these expeditions for not risking everything to save them.

In wilderness medicine classes we are taught to improvise for splints, bandages, padding, and whatnot from hiking equipment rather than first aid kits. We are further told to use the victim’s equipment. The reasoning being that, if I use up my clothes or pack or sleeping pad on the affected person, I may become affected myself in the fullness of time. And I shall have used up the equipment needed to keep me safe and sound. Rule number one is, “I’m number one”. Don’t make another victim.

I, of course, can picture someone bleeding profusely and protesting mightily when I cut up his/her $200 technical running shirt to bandage said bleeding. When, in fact, I play the part of victim for a learning scenario, I make myself as malevolent as possible (“Do you know how much I paid for these pants?”). Conversely, I can picture coming to the rescue of one of those minimalist hikers who pride themselves on the lightest pack. The lightest pack means no first aid kit, no spare clothing, no, in point of fact, spare anything. “I need an extra shirt to staunch that spurting artery: too bad you don’t have one”.

Oft am I approached by people who know me (and many who do not) asking for equipment which they require but did not fetch along themselves. “I don’t bring a first aid kit,” one such informed me, “because I know you’ll always have one”.

Often in the desert one espies hikers (usually male) dashing madly into the arid climes with a half-liter of water, a can of soda in one hand, or more often, nothing whatsoever in hand or non-existent pack. On one hike into the Grand Canyon one such scampered past me, a half-empty bottle clutched in one sweaty palm, no pack on his ample back. It was a warmish day: temperatures topped 100 in full sun.

In the course of time, I met a fellow traveler who queried, “I have a philosophical question. Did you see that male who rushed past in such a hurry”

“Oh, yes”.

“Do you think he had enough water?”

“I know he didn’t.”

“So my question is, when he collapses on the trail, do I have to give him some of my water?”

“I refer you to the National Outdoor Leadership School’s Outdoor Medicine curriculum: don’t make another victim”.

She nodded, and we were in accord. If said male collapsed due to testosterone poisoning, we were not going to dehydrate ourselves for his sake.

For the record, we last saw him hiking out. Totally out of water, during the hottest part of the day, but heading the opposite direction as we, so if he did collapse it would not be on our heads to provide hydration.

Self-reliance can be taken to extremes. A close friend on an off-trail route, which I have never and will certainly not now attempt, fell 40 feet when part of the route crumbled under her tenuous tread. Her compatriots hastened to treat her shattered legs (tee shirts and sticks for splints), and then discussed how to get her out. She was all for climbing out herself until her innate good sense reasserted itself. If she could not climb down with two good legs, how was she to climb out with none?

Two fast hikers were dispatched to fetch a helicopter, but once on the rim, it was dismissed. My friend was tossed unceremoniously into the back of a pick-up and driven willy-nilly (four-wheel drive road) back to the city and medical aid. “We don’t need Search and Rescue. We take care of our own”.

Said friend now decries this lack of trust in the powers-that-be, and both of us wonder if her 30-years-after-the-fact arthritis in both feet are at all related to the delay in proper medical care. Not to mention bouncing around in the back of a pick-up whilst navigating a Navajo Reservation dirt road.

Self-reliance requires that I carry in my pack a bottle of water and a bag of nuts, a small first-aid kit and enough clothing to be comfortable if I became injured and had to either haul myself out more slowly than I am accustomed or wait wearily for rescue. No wonder those denizens of the outdoors who dash by with half a can of energy drink come to me when they are injured, or hungry, or cold, or thirsty.

Sometimes I help them out. Sometimes, particularly if they let fly a less than charitable remark on their way past about people who burden themselves with a largish pack, I resort to a less than charitable response. “No hablo inglés”.

Be prepared.

Chance favors the prepared.

Pray to God but row for shore.

To be prepared is half the battle.

One of the things with which avid backpackers bore their couch potato acquaintances is the ability of backpackers to be self-reliant. We carry our food, our water, our house and hearth on our backs.

To be self-reliant requires a modicum of self-sustaining equipment. Food, water, warm clothes, and the rest of the Ten Essentials. Too many of the Ten, and the pack becomes so heavy as to lend an odious burden of its own. In Wilderness First Response classes they tell us that if we carry a first-aid kit that would handle everything that could go wrong, we wouldn’t be able to lift it.

The prudent hiker carries enough to muddle through the worst that can happen without burdening the self with excess baggage.

For most of my twenty-five year hiking career I have carried the heaviest pack in three counties due to the just-in-case syndrome. I'll have my pack neatly stuffed with a reasonable amount of weight and reconsider. Remember the Sangre de Cristos, when we ran completely out of food on the 9th day of an 11 day hike? Then I throw in another bag of dried fruit. Remember the rattlesnake-drowning rain on the Grandview Trail when I had a cold stream of water running down my neck and out each sleeve? I replace my light-weight rainsuit with the heavy-duty job. I stuff in the snake bite kit on my way out the door, and my down parka as I lock up the car. People amuse themselves by hefting my pack and pretending to suffer hernia. A park ranger once accused me of smuggling metates. And at the end of almost every hike I carry back a day's worth of extra food, a pint of extra fuel, and a sack of extra clothes which served only as pillow stuffing.

One year, the just-in-case syndrome saved the trip, my husband's toes, and quite possibly five people's lives.

Each Thanksgiving we celebrate Harvest Home by taking an extremely difficult, mostly off-trail route in the Grand Canyon that our first year surviving companions facetiously (I think) dubbed the Death March.

This year's hike had not begun auspiciously. When my husband, Brad, and our friend, Tim, arrived at the Grand Canyon back country office, the rangers said "We've been waiting for you", and hauled me into the back room. Stalwart no-impact camper that I am, I was nervous. My conscience isn't that clear.

Flanked by two armed rangers, I admitted that, yes, this was an organized club hike. I hadn't been able to find anyone willing to hike with us this year (I can't imagine why) and opened it up to a local hiking club.

Was I aware that hiking organizations had special regulations to follow when applying for a permit? Well, no, since I hadn't led an organized hike in five years. Most people would claim that my hikes prior to that time were somewhat less than organized. The gist of the matter was that the rangers were concerned that the dozen-odd hikes I take a year in the Canyon were all with organized groups, and I had neglected to follow the permit regulations. With earnest zeal I assured them otherwise, and they admitted that they had never had trouble from me before.

"You come up here several times a year," one ranger commented, "And we've never had to haul any of your people out of the Canyon. We appreciate that." I vowed to go straight henceforth and they turned me loose.

Because of this we started down into the depths of the Grand Canyon a good bit behind schedule. Beth and Rolf, whom we had not met before this trip, were strong enough going down the steep, loose, rocky route laughingly called the New Hance Trail, and I was confident that we would reach our proposed campsite before dark. On the second switchback, Brad slipped and landed hard on his knee. "Just a flesh wound," he grunted, and at intervals pointed out the blood stain spreading down his pant's leg with a martyred air. About a quarter mile down, the waist belt fell of Tim's pack. Nonplused (it takes a bit to plus Tim) he lashed it together with nylon cord. When it began to snow on the North Rim, I commented that maybe Someone was trying to tell us Something.

We set up camp in a drizzle, but the forecast was for clearing skies on the morrow, and clear but cold afterwards. When I looked out of the tent later that night and saw snow at the Colorado River level, 2,000 feet above sea level, I got a chill that had nothing to do with temperature. In the morning snow had fallen far into the depths, including over most of that day's route, and it was still snowing. I had rarely seen snow that far down into the Canyon, and I was not willing to take an untested group off-trail in fresh snow. Nor was I sure I could find most of the route under snow.
Brad and I made a leaders' decision to turn around and go back out the trail we had come in. We had to cover some off-trail mileage to reach the start of the New Hance Trail, and so we didn't start hiking out until mid-morning. However, Brad and I normally come out the seven-mile New Hance in four hours or so, and we figured we would make it out easily. We had come out of the Canyon in fresh snow before, and we had advised everyone in the group to bring instep crampons--small metal frames studded with spikes that lash to the boot. JUST IN CASE.

We hit snow about 1,000 feet above the River. After climbing another 1,000 feet, the snow was so deep that we could not see the trail markers.
When I had first started hiking in the Grand Canyon, there wasn't much of a New Hance Trail. In its stead was a series of "landmarks" that indicated key points on the route. To get out of the Canyon, the hiker had to hit each of the landmarks. Getting between them was mostly a matter of opinion. Nowadays hundreds of thousands of busy little feet have worn in sort of a trail, so the use of landmarks has fallen by the wayside. Now I flipped through my memory files to recall them.
It helped, of course, to know the formations in the Grand Canyon. The Canyon is there because the Colorado River cut through a number of rock formations that now form a series of cliffs and slopes. Veteran Canyon hikers memorize these formations so we can impress people, but also because it is easier to describe a route to someone who knows the difference between the Redwall and the Supai.

The first landmark to be hit on the way out of the New Hance was the Hakatai ledge where the route left the streambed. We were past that. The second landmark was a set of twin towers atop the Redwall Limestone. I managed to stay on trail climbing to these: a good place to stay on trail since the Redwall forms a nicely sheer cliff.
The next landmark was a long, steep wash cutting through the Supai Mudstone formation, which I call the Supai Chute. We had to contour through calf deep snow for a bit over a mile to reach the base of the Chute, and at one point I could only find the trail by aiming for a large boulder inscribed with graffiti.

Once in the Supai Chute, the snow deepened to knee level and the trail became most recalcitrant. Every time the trail crossed the wash, which it did with depressing regularity, we lost it and spent 15 to 30 minutes finding it again. It became apparent that we would not make it out by dark, and we did not want to risk the chancy business of following a trail less than a foot wide in deepening snow by flashlight, so we decided to camp. Five people crowded into two tents on a semi-flat spot we stamped out on a narrow ledge. I threw most of our gear into the tent to keep it from freezing, pulled on all the clothing I had brought, and zipped into my sleeping bag.
After a disastrous car-camp on the North Rim in a blizzard, I had replaced all my cotton hiking clothes with wicking, fast-dry fabrics JUST IN CASE. I now depended on polypropylene type fabrics and pile (I am allergic to wool, and I had not yet discovered the joys of Merino). The only cotton I carried was a bandanna. I replaced my lightweight, nylon rain gear at the last minute with my heavier, breathable rain gear JUST IN CASE, and it had kept me dry while pushing through deep snow and under snow covered trees that dumped their load as we passed beneath. I had an extra set of long underwear to replace the sweat-dampened set I hiked in. True to habit, on my way out the door I had stuffed in my heaviest down parka. I had lots of clothing, but I could not get warm.

I was shivering so hard I couldn't talk, classic symptoms of the first stage of hypothermia. Brad, huddled next to me in the fetal position trying to warm his feet, was no help.

I have read of people who died while climbing or hiking, and the article invariably said, "At least he went doing what he enjoyed most in the world." I always wondered if that thought was singularly comforting during the last moments when the brain began to mist over. My brain was close to misting right now, and the idea of doing what I enjoyed most in the process wasn't much comfort to me.

I thought of my five-year old, Robbie. He was bright and funny with a vocabulary larger than some adults'. If I was overdue from this hike, he would be frightened. If I was ultimately overdue, Robbie would be raised by his aunt and grandmothers. Sterling women all, but I hadn't suffered through 36 hours of labor to let someone else mold my kid's mind. The idea of getting back to Robbie seemed more important than saving the lives of everyone on the trip, even Brad's (sorry about that, dear).
I knew what to do about hypothermia: get the body out of the weather, put on dry clothing, and supply hot food and beverages. I had the first two covered, but in the mad rush to get the tent up, I had left the stove and pot in the pack.
My options then were: freeze where I was in relative comfort; stuff my dry socks into freezing, wet boots and get the stove; or put on my wet, frozen socks and stuff them into freezing, wet boots and get the stove.

I didn't like any of those, so I dug the extra plastic bags I carry JUST IN CASE, pulled them over my dry socks, and tucked them into the cuffs. Instant galoshes. I unzipped the tent and climbed over Brad, sending a shower of fine ice crystals onto his face. He protested weakly. I skidded over to the pack and produced stove, pot, and fuel bottle.

By now it was dark. It took about a century and a half to clean the stove orifice with a hair-thin wire, holding a flashlight in my teeth and balancing my glasses on my head. Finally the stove roared and I scooped a pot full of snow to melt. I reached for the pot lid--still in the pack. Every drop of fuel would be vital, so I donned my plastic bags again and retrieved the pot lid.

A quart of hot cocoa and a bag of freeze dried sherry beef restored the inner woman wonderfully. I offered the same to Brad, and, groaning piteously, he emerged from his cocoon. Warm at last, I could spare a thought for the hapless occupants of the other tent. I had plenty of fuel, JUST IN CASE, so I threw them a canteen of cocoa.
Since I had dry socks and down booties, JUST IN CASE, I gave the booties to Brad, and he gratefully stuffed his frozen feet therein. Later he was diagnosed with frostnip, and it is likely that the booties saved him from full-blown frostbite.
I snuggled down between Brad and most of our camping gear into a rapidly melting depression in the snow. We put our remaining water between us and the boots under us so nothing vital would freeze, and settled in.

I spent much of the long, cold night reviewing the trail ahead. I could manage the Supai formation: there hadn't been much of a trail there in the 60's when I first started hiking, and I could always fake it through the Supai. Above the Supai were the Coconino and Kaibab cliffs, formidable barriers that would take more care.

There was one spot in particular in the Coconino that I mentally climbed all night long. Near the top of the cliff there are two routes. One, a set of short, steep switchbacks, carries the hiker along a ledge overhung by the last of the Coconino formation. The other suckers the hiker out onto a flagstone-laid slope that ends in an impressive cliff. Every time I come down the New Hance Trail, I block off the flagstone route, and without fail when I hike back out I walk right out onto it anyway. The flagstone is precariously balanced, and I am sure one day a piece will cut loose and skid me over the edge on the ultimate wind surf ride. If I couldn't stay on the best route when the trail was clear, how was I going to find it in the snow?
The snow won't stick to the steepest parts of the trail, I decided. Besides, the wind is blowing, and it will clear some of the drifts away near the top. It was still snowing outside, and I even convinced myself that, deep as the snow was, another six inches wasn't going to make a difference.

We were alerted to dawn by Tim's "sun yell" which he reserves for the first day's sighting of that orb. The clouds had lifted, and we could see the colors of sunrise on their bellies.

We packed quickly, and the stove fizzled out of fuel as we melted the last two quarts of hot water for breakfast. I stomped off through the snow, ignoring plaintive cries behind me that we weren't on the trail, and we should stop and dig for rock cairns. I wasn't wasting any time looking for the trail: if the route worked, I'd do it, trail or not.

This attitude got me to the last landmark, a low pass between the rim and Coronado Butte that I call the Coconino saddle. We had stopped for a snack there on the way down, and I recognized the tree we sat on. I was, incredibly, right on the trail.
I lost it again trying to make the Coconino connection, but I found it where the route narrowed down between a cliff and a gully. There in the center of the gully the snow had blown away from a huge rock cairn, which was greeted by unbelieving cheers. Wind had scoured isolated areas nearly free of snow, but the snow thus eliminated had piled up in deeper drifts elsewhere. The average depth was mid-thigh. I found I could stay on trail, because there wasn't much choice. I could follow a faint depression in the snow, and I could "feel" whether the footing was relatively smooth trail or jumbled rocks. I could not, however, let someone else break trail. I tried pointing them in the right direction, but they couldn't stay on the route.

We found yet another mostly snow-free cairn on a ledge, and we paused to consider. Brad wanted to camp: he was sure we couldn't get out by dark. I figured we only one more mile to go, and we could handle it. Even if it had taken us an hour and a half to hike the first mile, and we were slowing down fast. We agreed that if we weren't out by 3:00 we would stop and camp.

I doubted we could make it through another night in decent shape: our fuel was gone and the sleeping bags had gotten wet the night before. There was no place for a rescuing helicopter to land, and the rangers had praised me for bringing my groups out intact. I was determined, and I was in the lead.

I got off the route a few times, and at one point stepped into a heart-stopping hole. My foot kept going down--and down--and down. I was sure I had stepped through a cornice and into open air when I came to a comforting stop waist deep in a drift.
I pushed through an over-friendly tree and spotted a cairn on a wind-cleared rock about 15 feet over my head. I looked around suspiciously. I was smack in the middle of the flagstone slope--again. Since the snow was hip deep, I wasn't worried about sliding off the edge. Unless the whole slope began to slide, and I wasn't going to think about that. I plowed my way straight up to where I knew the trail hid coyly beneath its ermine mantle.

We climbed a nasty boulder, traversed an even nastier ledge and were back on the main route. We had topped the Coconino cliff, and only the Kaibab cliff remained.
I pushed off resolutely, ignoring all complaints that I was completely off route, that we hadn't contoured this much coming down, that we were doomed, doomed! I recognized a spot where I had taken a photograph two years before. I crunched my knee on a large flat rock blocking the trail. We call it the "sit-down rock" because that is the only way a hiker with a pack can traverse it. I was still on the trail.
At one point, faced with shoulder deep snow that had blown over the edge of a cliff, I surrendered the lead to Brad. He promptly became stranded on a pile of jumbled rock. Wearily I took over again.

I couldn't walk; all I could do was plow and stomp. I tested the snow with my hiking stick to be sure there was solid ground beneath, plowed into it with my leg, and stomped down firmly with my crampons. Plow, stomp. Plow, stomp. Pull myself up by way of a friendly tree. Plow, stomp.

The snow seemed less deep, but I told myself it was a hallucination. I could see trees on the south rim, but that was a hallucination, too. When I fell over the wooden sign that marks the top of the New Hance Trail, I knew it was real and I was out.
The group erupted into weary cheers. I was declared "trail finder extraordinaire". I kissed the trail sign. I was on my way home to Robbie.

Consider a sock.

Socks are worn on the feet. They are used to reduce friction, separate bare tootsies from hard leather, keep feet warm, dry and full of lint. Socks are made of nylon, wool, cotton, or a variety of highly-priced and trademark-protected synthetics. They can be half socks, ankle socks, knee socks, leotards, or body stockings. Socks can be pulled up on the leg so they will creep back into the boot or folded over the top of the boot so rocks can get inside. They can be subdued colors or fluorescent green. The latter is preferred so if you get lost you can stand on your head and attract attention by waggling your feet.

Socks can be used for a wind sock, pulled over the head and used as a disguise, pulled over the hand and used as a mitten, or filled with rocks and used as a blackjack. They can be unraveled and knitted into a dicky or crocheted into a doily. They can be used as a hat. They can be filled with water, placed in an icebox, and used as an icetray. They can be nailed up on the mantle on Christmas They can be filled with paperbacks and used as a bookbag. They can be equiped with a drawstring and used as a purse. They can be cut into strips and woven into potholders. The toe can be cut off and used for a nose warmer. The heel can be cut off and used for an elbow warmer. The ankle can be cut off and used for a wrist warmer. If you feet are getting cold by now, cut up an old glove and use it for a foot warmer.

With this wonderful world of unusual and exciting things go do with this fantastic new product, how can you any longer resist running out to buy 63 pairs of socks? Wonderful things can be done with 126 socks. If you every find a 124 legged mastodon, you can outfit both it and yourself at a moment's notice.

Consider a topo map.

A topo map is not, as the uninitiated might conjecture, a layout of Topo, North Dakota. It is a map containing a series of lines which represent changes in elevation. They are very useful for telling you where you should be and why you didn’t end up there. If a trail is marked along said series of lines, you can spend many happy hours arguing about where the route is with such enlightening comments as, “That can’t be the butte, you dope, the lines go IN.”.

If no trail is marked, the lines can help you discover the easiest, safest, most surefire route, with the help of experienced woodspersons who are happy to inform you that if you insist on trying to climb out at a point where 16 topo lines all run into one, don’t be surprised if you end up trapped halfway up a cliff.

Topo maps are printed on paper. They can be stored rolled-up so that they last longer, and when you try to look at anything on them they can insist on compacting themselves back into their accustomed form. They can be stored and carried folded up, so that the fold lines will eventually rub out all trace of elevation lines and vital lettering. Or they can be framed and hung on the wall with the routes you have traversed traced out in indelible ink, impressing people no end and falling down at inconvenient times, such as when your roommate is gone for the weekend and you’re reading ghost stories at midnight.

Top maps can be used to start fires, to write home for money on the back of, to rough draft a scathing letter to the editor, to use as emergency TP, to wrap fish, to housebreak a puppy, to make a kite, to print an underground newspaper on, to make insoles for your boots, to fold into a boat to cross the Colorado river, and to write to Legal Aid to bail you out when they catch you crossing the Colorado River.

Topo maps are printed with soulful ink, with beauty and truth, with mystery and abandon, and with mistakes so that geologists can make money by correcting them.

So why sit there wondering where the heck the Boucher Trail is located? Run out immediately and buy a topo map so you can unerringly lead people onto a trail that you’ve never been over before. Just because after three years of topo reading I wound up on the Apache instead of the Bass by reading one…

So run out and buy all the Grand Canyon quadrangles from Apache Point to Vishnu. Then buy the large maps of the Western and Eastern sections. Then the geologic Western, Central, and Eastern ones. Then you can begin on the Superstitions. Buy, consume, grow…

Consider a bandana.

A bandana is a square of material in a varity of colors with various and sundry designs executed thereon. A square is someone who refuses to sign a petition for fear of unduly upsetting the Establishment, but we needn't go into politics just precisely now. A bandana can be made of cotton,nylon, wool, silk, cardboard or aluminum foil. It can be red, navy blue, yellow,magenta, or puce. some people may aspire to carry a bandana composed of lavender paisley delicately embroidered onto a chartreuse background, but they soon find it doesn't pay to aspire beyond one's human limits.

A bandana can be used as a muffler to keep your neck warm, a scarf to keep your head cool, a hat to keep your part from being sunburned, or a belt to keep your pants up. It can be utilized as a snare to catch animals (or, if you aspire to lavender and chartreuse, to scare them to death), a fishing line, a hammock for midgets, a net for filtering water, or a necktie for your next necktie party. Bandanas can be used to tie down your hat so it won't fly away in the wind, your canteen so it won't get washed down the rapids, or your neighbor so he won't decapitate you while you ransack his pack (which, incidentally, was tied up with a banadana so it wouldn't fall over while you were ransacking it).

Several bandanas can be tied together to make a tent, a ground cloth, an air mattress to be used with extreme haste, or a graduation cap and gown. They can be cut into pieces and used to play checkers. They can be folded up small and used to patch your jeans. They can be unraveled (or raveled) and woven into a macrame belt. They can be lined with foil and used to boil water. They can be tied together and used as sportswear accessory while your wet pants dry (which probably got wet when they fell down while crossing a creek because you were using a bandana as a belt). They can be used to hold your hair back while you hike, to hold your food while you day hike, or to hold over your face while you hold up the train. They can be used to secure your roommate's hands so she will stop typing while you study for your algebra exam, and they can be used to secure the instructor to the desk while you and your cohorts abscond with the exam that he had no right to give the second week of school.

All in all, a bandana is something no hiker should be without. A bandana is truth, beauty, and a little bit of Rit dye. Join the ranks of bandana lovers, and you too can join in Chicita Bandana's anthem, "Bandana, bandana, bandana is good enough for me".

I hate to hike. I get tired and dirty and hot and scared and blistered and my knee hurts going downhill, my feet hurt going level, and my body hurts going uphill. I worry about rain and get sweat in my eyes and sand in my noodles. I fall down or trip over rattlesnakes or beer cans and curse bitterly at graffiti on the rocks.

What, then, are my motives as ever week I appear, hat in hand and ace bandage on knee to further neglect my bod and state of mental health? I am not, as many claim, a masochist. As my sister claims, a wee bit dumb. As my mother claimed, going through a phase. As my shrink claims, seeking peer approval (at the bottom of the Grand Canyon?).

The analytical mind grappled with the problem and finally resulted in the essence of hiking filtering through my mind.

Waking up to the sounds of birds and breezes and a pink blush in the East. Startling a mule deer who stood three feet away from me for five minutes before we noticed each other. Walking for 14 miles and finding a spring bubbling with water at clear as sunlight. Washing dishes to the rhythm of the rapids. Lying awake at night tracing the course of the Big Dipper as it swings ponderously around Polaris. Standing on a peak where the silence is so complete that the sound of my heartbeat shatters it.

It is entirely removed from the dirt and pettiness of the towns. How can anything be petty in the Grand Canyon? Walking along the trail with grandeur ahead and wonder behind. Waking up to snow-soaked boots and socks and sweatshirts, and all the dry gear in the pack buried under six inches of snow.

Then the simple things like a ray of sun, a pair of dry socks, a clean bandana to whip all that mud off, a dry match, and a cactus frosted with ice begin to fit into the scheme of Things that Make the Hike Bearable. And of course, standing on Miner’s Summit to see Weaver’s Needle with a cap of snow was worth the whole windy, wet, icy, worried night.

I have learned the measure of a mile, the worth of the simple, soul cleansing at of walking, the simplicity of wilderness and a means to escape a worth where nothing makes sense.

This, then, was and always shall be the final reward for daring to step off the paved road into the unknown. May there always be an unknown to step off into.

Okay, so the mule affectionados say it is classically unfair that they are now limited to 10 Phantom mules a day.

Try getting a permit to hike the Corridor during rim-to-rim season. Or anywhere in the Canyon during Spring Break or Thanksgiving. Or during most of the spring and fall.

Try getting a permit for a private river trip. Even with the lottery system, it still takes most people ten years to be drawn.

I am constantly (well, not constantly but often enough) asked if visitors are allow to mountain bike, hang-glide, or BASE jump.

Let's say the Park Service sold the Grand Canyon to private concerns, and there would be unlimited mule rides, backpacking, and river running, not to mention downhill mountain biking (with an uphill shuttle provided) BASE jumping, Xtreme sports events -- everyone could visit anywhere and do anything. The Canyon would become a place that none of us would wish to visit.

And so far as not being able to ride a mule, over Martin Luther King weekend this year -- a three day weekend AND a fee free weekend, three persons rode down to the Ranch on Wednesday. Two rode down on Friday. No one on Saturday. No one on Sunday. So a rider might not be able to get a reservation for spring or fall, but then, neither can most hikers. Bundle up and go in the winter.

So I have hiked to Phantom Ranch, and as of last weekend, I have ridden the mule. I prefer to hike.
When I hike I can carry whatever I am willing to haul. On the mule, I am limited to two plastic bags. Since I had a layover day on which I wanted to hike, I needed some extra stuff.

When I hike I can carry as much water as I wish. On the mule I have a bota bag (I hate drinking out of those) that holds one liter.The wranglers carry extra water to refill, so more water is a possibility. Of course, if I drink enough to be hydrated I need to, not to put too fine a point on it, use the outhouses. There is only one stop on the mule ride, so if one is hydrated, one is in dire straits. Again, the wranglers will stop at the outhouses, but one has to ask, and the whole string has to stop, and the mules have to be restrained so they don't run off while I am using the facilities.

As for the much-vaunted education one gets on the mules, here are some of the things I learned:
The pictographs are painted with cochineal (not).

The resthouses were CCC kitchens until they were turned into resthouses. The CCC did not build the Bright Angel Trail. They did build the resthouses, but as resthouses, not kitchens.

Cedar Breaks is the only place that cedar grows. There is no true cedar in North America, and if they are talking about Juniper, it grows all over the place.

The Colorado River cut the Grand Canyon 80 million years ago. A good trick, since the Laramide Orogeny was only 65 million years ago.

Scientists have proven that the Colorado River used to flow north. This is one idea, but it does not enjoy common acceptance, and it has certainly not been proven by anyone.

There is petrified wood in the inner gorge. The ruins at the Boat Beach were habitated by Havasupai Indians. Brama Temple is called that because it looks like a bull. I could go on and on.

Riding the mules is not, as many have said, for the infirm. It hurts the knees, the back, and the ankles. One needs a strong body core to sit upright, and strong thighs to control the mule. If one has any problem with heights, parts of that trail are terrifying.