Thursday, August 25, 2016

Day 3, August 14 - part 2

Continued from Day 3, part 1

Okay let's face it. I took too many photos. And I'm not willing to give them up. Most of them anyway. 

Photo 8 shows the view from the breakfast rest stop. After 7 miles I stopped by a stream and replenished my water. I felt deeply at peace.

 

So much for my theory that these mountains aren't peaceful. I am struck by how much tiredness and lack of well-being interfere with a full soul-and-body-level response to beauty. 

It was absolutely clear that the same sharp peaks I found un-peaceful and dangerous yesterday seemed playful and friendly today. For example, in photo 9. 

 

I met a caravan of llamas and called ahead to the man leading them to ask if I should step aside on the up-slope or down-slope. He said the down-slope, if you can. I found a place, though I slipped a little - but caught myself. The first two (of five) llamas sniffed my face and gear. The last one seemed skittish and stepped off the path to keep as much distance as possible between us. I told the man tending them that I understood now why one steps to the down-slope. Yes, he said. If they are going to get spooked you want them to get spooked on the uphill side. But he also said one man who stepped aside slipped down the hill and he had to go help him up. Photo 10 shows the llamas after they passed me. 

 

Pretty cool experience, huh?

Just interrupted to get my socks off and massage some cream into my feet and thank them for their extraordinary day's work. I know (I hope) that 19 mile days will become routine for me if I really do attempt a one-year thru-hike (something I seem to be debating with myself in this walk. )

Not too long after the llamas I began to head downhill into an environment so different that I seemed to be another world. Photo 11 shows the area I called "Glacier valley."  I loved how different it was from the vast mountain vistas with the steep steep inclines and the deep deep views down, as well as the vast horizons all around. It was just as wonderful in its own singular way. 

 

Photo 12 shows Mt B again as I come around a corner in the place I have dubbed "glacier valley," and photo 13 shows a pool of snow that made me think of a Japanese garden, (the kind that has sand neatly raked around large carefully placed rocks. )

 

 

So okay I really did get carried away. To be continued in part 3. 

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