Challenging Myself

When Ann went away to be a grandmother for a time, I knew that I would be spending time alone.   I challenged myself to keep busy and accomplish some tasks that I had been putting off, but also, to do accomplish some things that were best accomplished without her being at home.  Such was my decision to hike a nearby mountain.

                Ann likes hiking more than I do.  I accompany her, and occasionally I will really enjoy doing it, such as our hike on a shore excursion in Juneau, Alaska during our cruise last year.  But for the most part, I don’t enjoy putting my body through the rigors of hiking, preferring much more to sit in front of a screen or driving somewhere.   I force myself to go because I know that the exercise is good for me and my heart, because I enjoy nature in its splendor, but more importantly because I want to spend time with her.

                So the decision to climb a mountain on a trail in the middle of summer that had a 2800 foot elevation increase was definitely NOT because I wanted to.   I really didn’t particularly want to.  But since I had told people that I was going to do it, on the 4^th of July no less, and because of wanting to challenge myself, I woke up and parked my car at the trail head at 6:30am, wanting to take advantage of some cooler temperatures and some early morning fog.

                I had made a peanut butter and jam sandwich the night before.  I likewise had filled my water bottle and belt, had prepared a bag of cherries, found some sunscreen (which I regretfully only applied to my face and part of my neck), and went to sleep determined to conquer Mt. Lukens the next morning.

                I started out with great determination and at a good clip.  I had made an announcement in the men’s meeting of my church congregation the previous Sunday with the hope of engaging a hiking companion.  But when a prospect had asked what pace I was going to keep, I informed him that I was going to keep a brisk pace, and I’m sure that scared away his wife and him.  In fact, not only did I want to walk briskly, I wanted to not take many “breathing” breaks that Ann feels obligated to take when we hike together.

                After about a half hour, I had gotten to the beginning of the true ascent, a series of switchbacks, a point in the hike that had taken Ann and me some 45 minutes or so to reach on a previous hike earlier in the spring.  And after about 50 minutes, I had gotten to a place where we had turned around on another hike earlier in the spring.  I was quite pleased with my speed and that I had not stopped to rest.  I hadn’t even stopped to drink, and when I finally did access the water bottle a little later, I barely slowed down.  I even took out my sandwich a little farther up and kept walking while I ate.

                Until the trail took me to the south to where I could overlook the town of La Crescenta, the path was quite boring.  There are no conifers, only chaparral, and the prolific flowers that had graced the trail a couple of months previously had all wilted and died.  The higher I got, the greater the mountain vistas were, but it really is a rather unexciting hike—at least at this time of year.  Still I kept the steady pace on the trail that had plenty of rocks under foot and that never had more than a few twenty-foot stretches of level ground.  The problem was that when the fog burned away, it was because the sun was out in a cloudless sky, and the temperature rose.

                I occasionally caught glimpses of the towers at the top which served to animate and motivate me to keep the pace.  However, the warmth and the relentless uphill nature of the trail began to take their toll.  The last mile or so is constantly uphill and I realized that I was beginning to tire.  Some 300 yards from the summit I ran into hikers descending from the top, and when they asked me how I was doing, my response was, “I’m tired,” to which they replied, “you’re just about there.”  I only saw five other crazy hikers the entire time I was on the trail.

                Some two hours and twenty-five minutes after I began this endeavor I reached the top.  I learned that Mt. Lukens is not a specific point or geological outcropping.  Rather, it’s just a flattened top of a mountain (I wonder if originally it was flat before the towers were erected and the helicopter pad placed).  I felt satisfaction that I had accomplished this goal that I had set for myself.  I found a shady place to sit, interestingly on the wheel well of a trailer upon which a rather large compressor had been placed.  I took a picture of the towers.   I explored the summit, sat for a total of twenty minutes, and then decided to begin my descent.

Towers Atop Mt. Lukens

                As I stated down from the top, I realized just how tired I was but noticed that I still had energy.  I found a rock from the top to commemorate the hike to place in my collection of other rocks from other hikes, and found another quite spectacular one another couple of hundred feet down the trail.  I carried them in my hands all the way to the bottom.  About that time, I took a picture of what lies north of where I was.  It is a rugged, foreboding, chaparral-covered series of mediocre peaks and canyons, and actually quite beautiful in its starkness.  I took a picture of this vista to help me remember it.  At the base of these minor peaks was Big Tujunga Canyon Road upon which I have walked and which eventually merges with the Angeles Crest Highway, which can barely be seen in the picture.

Looking Down Upon the Big Tujunga Canyon Road

                By this time, it was starting to get warm—it was about 9:30.  I hoped that my ball cap would help keep my face and neck in shade.  As I would walk away and towards the sun I would turn the hat’s beak to face the sun.  I must have changed it a couple of dozen times, but I still got sunburned a bit.  

                As I descended, I noticed just how unrelenting the downhill of the trail was.  As difficult as it was to hike up, it was likewise difficult to hike down, especially as I realized just how many smaller rocks littered the trail and would occasionally cause me to stumble. 

                Because I am kind of analytic and because I hear about old people purposefully trying to walk 10,000 steps a day to maintain good health , I decided to approximate how many steps this hike was going to take for this middle-aged guy.  I counted the steps in a five minute period—440—and calculated that I was going to take over 20,000 steps.  I guess that if I measured the approximate length of my stride, I could calculate just how far I was hiking (I couldn't calculate that in my head.)  An online map of the hike I took shows that the round trip was about 11 miles.  I guess I'm trying to avoid the transition to old age!

                I purposefully did not stop but just plowed on, turning the beak of my ball cap back and forth and eating the last of the cherries I had brought.  I noticed that my feet and calves and hips were starting to ache, and realized that I was really feeling tired.  In a shady place some 1-1¼ miles from the car, I stopped for a couple of minutes, but then trudged on.  That last little bit was not so downhill but had numerous rocks on the trail, and one time I stumbled and almost fell.  I realized just how tired I was.  I imagine that my foot path kind of meandered a bit there at the end, but because I knew this part of the trail fairly well having taken it a few times with Ann, I knew that I was getting close to my car.

                I finally reached the pavement and walked resolutely the last 100 or so yards to my car.  I took off my fanny pack and water bottle belt, threw them on the floor in the back along with the two rocks I had brought as souvenirs, and sat my tired butt in my car seat.  Ahhhhhhh.  A short five minute drive and I was home. 

                I look with pride at Mt. Lukens as I drive by it on the freeway and look up to the towers.  I set out to do something hard, and in five hours total, and I did both.  Yay for me!