Over the River and Through the Woods

I can’t believe it: after all these weeks of anticipation, Lulu’s and my short trip is already a memory. Let me tell you about the rest of it.

Saturday morning we sat around and drank lots of tea and coffee. When Molly attempted to capture a documentary snapshot of the inside of our AirBnB, I leapt into the frame to photobomb her.

Despite all that caffeine, the two of us couldn’t come to a decision about our day’s options: take an easy, short hike nearby, or drive 1.25 hours to a more interesting, longer one. In the end, we did the rational thing. We flipped a coin. Except we didn’t have a coin, so Molly said, “Hey, Siri. Flip a coin.” Heads was for the longer hike. We got tails.

Naturally we opted for the longer hike.

We made our way to the Cougar Rock trailhead near Arnold (passing a giant “Thank you, Brandon” sign on the highway), parked, donned our hiking boots and set off—in the wrong direction. We’d have been oblivious were it not for the AllTrails app on my phone, which beeps whenever I go astray. This turned out to be a three-beep journey.

Once on the right path, we immediately began a half-mile descent. Never a good way to start, since what goes down must come up. Along the route we scrambled over huge fallen logs and crossed a handful of little creeks, Molly with more grace and confidence than I.

We frequently came to intersections with other trails and old logging roads. Just like John Muir before us, we kept consulting the phone app to help us make good choices.

For much of our walk I was in the lead, for no particular reason. This gave Molly an opportunity she couldn’t resist. Invisible to me, at intervals she would pick up a stick or a pine bough with clusters of needles at the end, or even a whole branch (proof below), and gently poke the back of me from a distance as I labored up slopes and down hills.

At last we reached the turnoff for the short ascent to Cougar Rock. What a vista!

And what a playground for Molly. Ever since she was small, she’s had this unnerving propensity: given the opportunity, she climbs to the highest and scariest places she can. When she was little I’d look away for a minute and up she’d go. Most memorable was the time she’d scampered some fifty feet up a pine tree before I found her. Steep rock faces were another attraction.

Meanwhile, heights petrify me. It wasn’t always that way. Until shortly after Eleni was born, they never gave me pause. I remember the exact moment of my metamorphosis. I was leaning against a fence at an overlook above Horseshoe Bend [I think] in northern Arizona, holding infant Eleni in my arms and gazing without fear at the river a thousand feet below. And then in a flash of horror I realized how easy it would be for one or both of us to topple over the edge. I had a vivid image of my helpless baby flying out of my arms and into the Colorado River canyon. I’ve been terrified of such things ever since.

Anyway, as Lulu and I set off on our hike, I couldn’t help but wonder what fun she might make at the rocky summit. Ten or so years ago she prohibited me from expressing my concern or otherwise trying to redirect her to a different activity, so my survival skill now is to look away.

It’s important to note that she is exceptionally sensible and competent, and I’m certain her activities are nowhere near as dangerous as they appear to her anxious mother.

In this photo, I’m well back from the edge, and even still I was a bit nervous.

By late afternoon, we panted (well, I did, anyhow) our way back up that final uphill stretch toward the starting point. All told we went 4.7 miles with just under 1,000 feet in elevation gain. It was a lovely walk.

With perfect timing we arrived back at our AirBnB minutes before dark. The evening went well—dinner and hanging out by the wood fire—until around 11:30. As I was preparing for bed I walked into the living room and glimpsed something out of place high on a wall: a 1.5-inch blemish that hadn’t been there five minutes earlier. I froze, considering my options. Instead of getting up on a tall stool to take care of matters on my own, I decided to call to Molly, who was in the other room. She knew just from my tone of voice what was up. It’s that familiar panicked whimpering quaver that always indicates the presence of an arachnid.

My general approach in such dire circumstances is to squish, while she’s a catch-and-release sort of person. But as she climbed onto a tall chair and approached with the glass, the beast hurled itself dramatically off the wall and disappeared onto a floor of the exact same shade of brown. There would be no sleep for me that night unless and until the fiend was accounted for and removed to the next county.

But the spider was nowhere to be seen. “It’s in my backpack!” I opined. “I’ll bet it jumped into my backpack.” Sure enough, when Molly lifted the thing, there it was. For some reason it didn’t flee this time and she succeeded in capturing it. The second it realized it was trapped, it went crazy, racing up and down the tall glass and rocketing around the base so insanely fast that the human eye couldn’t track it. It was just a blur. Thus, you can’t see it here, but believe me: it’s there and it’s a monster. Even Molly, who is less spider-reactive than I, agrees.

In the end, she carried the vicious creature into the moonlit night. I kept asking her to take it just a bit further away from the house, and then a bit further. If I could’ve, I’d have suggested she keep going till she was a mile down the road.

For the rest of my waking hours I kept imagining spiders everywhere.

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Despite the crisis of the night before, I awoke refreshed on Sunday morning. Once packed and ready to go, I was delighted and surprised to learn of Molly’s willingness to indulge me in one last little adventure: a wee 1.5-mile walk on Mt. Zion near Pine Grove. The day was cool and sunny and perfect for a walk.

As before, while chugging along I felt the strangest sensation from behind. Lulu was at it again.

At the halfway point we came upon a huge metal structure that I’m guessing is a cell phone tower, and an adjacent one that’s a fire lookout. Here is the latter in the summer of 1928 when it was first established at that site, and now.

When the hike-lette was over, I was sad that we had to part ways and aim ourselves toward our respective destinations. The time passed too quickly.

Well, there will be other trips ahead, I hope. Yesterday Molly suggested a three-girl getaway: Eleni, me and her. Wouldn’t that be grand! Think about it, Yo-Nenny. Possible? If not you solo, maybe with Ruby?