find but one other car at the Thompson Creek trailhead. It was a pickup parked by an older Alabama couple who was dayhiking. I passed them a little ways down the trail and my load got heavier when they commented on how much stuff I packed in ... I crossed White Oak Creek, which wasn't as high as I though it would be, and started looking for the flowers. The couple were on their way out ... and soon I would be alone in the Thompson Creek area of the Sipsey Wilderness ... doesn't get much better for an old backpacking introvert.
As soon as I got out of my car I noticed the purple violets in the woods. I had thought that I was too late for the wildflowers, but maybe I was going to catch them on the tail end of the season. I kept my camera up front and headed out when I got packed. (I don't think I've said in my other posts, but I drive a Miata that won't hold my packpack when it is loaded, except strapped in the passenger seat. Most of the time I just load up the little trunk and passenger seat with my loose gear and load my pack when I get to the trailhead. I'm less likely to forget something if I throw everything in the car.)
But I digress ... (well, DUH -- I'm an English major!) ... I wasn't far down the trail until I started to get into wildflowers. I found both the purple and white
varieties of the purple wakerobin, sometimes called Stink Willie, because of their smell. Both were abundant through the early part of the trail between White Oak Creek and Auburn Falls. I think these are trillium varieties in the lily family. I got some shots of a Longspur Violet (even in this picture you can see the long, slender spur that comes up from the back.) These delicate looking violets were growing along the trail, usually against some of the larger boulders.Because the weather was heading toward the watershed, I decided to camp under a bluff near Auburn Falls. I figured that I would be able to drag in some wood before the rain set in and thus have a good fire at night. The bluff is fairly large--as you can s
ee in the picture--and provides enough space to pitch a tent, build a fire, and cook, all out of the elements. There is even a small water trickle off the cliff above where one can catch water to cook with. I have camped under this bluff before, once arriving in the middle of the night; but today I would still have enough daylight to find some firewood for the night. The bluff is
n't easily seen from any of the trails, so not many have camped there ... meaning, there is more firewood than is found around the more popular sites. The area around Ship Rock is pretty well picked clean by this time of the year.Oh, and I might say that there must have been thousands in the Wilderness during spring break. All of the trails were worn more than I usually see them. Perhaps too many people are learning about the wonderful places to camp and hike in the
Sipsey Wilderness. Several trees had fallen since I was there in January, and new trails around the fallen trees had been well-worn, indicating the number of people who had hike there. I surmised that several of the spring break hikers had been women, because most of the logs crossing the trail were gone around instead of over, indicating shorter legs
.I tried something a little different this time as to my sleeping arrangements. Usually, I pack in my REI Quarter Dome and zip in secure from the critters that will bite and sting during the night. This time I took the footprint and the fly for my tent, but took my bivey sack and a lightweight sleeping bag. Although rain was predicted, the temperature would never get below 40 degrees. That arrangement worked well for comfort, but I came out of the woods with several bites on my arms from sleeping with my arms outside of the bivey sack and sleeping bag. The bloodsuckers evidently were looking for early season feasts -- and found some. No b
igness, though ...At 1:40 AM I was awakened with a huge clap of thunder ... evidently, I had slept through the coming storm, and it was now on top of the Wilderness with all its fury. I lay awake listening to the thunder and watching the lightening flashes for a while. The were loud and bright, but I was safe and dry up under the bluff ... pretty neat w
atching the lightening flashes and knowing I was safe from their lethal work. I drifted back to sleep and was awakened at about 3:00 AM with another, stronger storm. The lightening was closer and very, very bright through my tent fly. I fell back asleep listening to the rain coming down hard.When one gets in his 60s, one finds that he doesn't need as much sleep as he once did. I usually sleep about five and a half or six hours at home and I'm done ... wake up knowing that I won't get back to sleep. I guess when I'm in the woods, I'm overtaken by the peace and tranquility and I often sleep eight or nine hours. I had gotten in my bag about 9:00 PM that night and I slept until 7:00 the next morning. Unbe
lievable! ... and wonderful to wake up without an agenda.After breakfast of oatmeal and coffee, I decided to take a little hike around the neighborhood. It had stopped raining before daylight, so the sun was out and, though it was very humid, it was just right for an old man to take a hike. I decided to walk down to where FT209 crosses the Sipsey, which would take me by Ship Rock/Eye of the Needle, the west end of The Rock, and by the riffles where many I camped the first time I came to the Wilderness in the 90s.
I walked around the end of The Rock and came to the camping area by the riffles ... a very popular place to camp because of the soothing sounds of the water going across the rocks in the Sipsey. There were two tents in the sand ... two tents with clothes lines between every tree around the campsite. On these lines were everything--and I do mean EVERYthing--owned
by the campers. They had gotten soaked! I don't think they came in during the night, so they must have gotten soaked during the early morning storm. I immediately noticed why the campers in one of the tents had gotten soaked. They had put a polypropelene ground cloth under their tent with about six to twelve inches of ground cloth sticking out on the outside of the tent fly. In other words, every drop that had poured off of the fly had been caught by the poly sheet and channeled up under the tent ... and they were camped on very absorbent sand! Go figure!! I kind of felt sorry for them, and I kind of didn't ... nubie campers who had learned a hard lesson ... only maybe they hadn't learned it, because they hadn't tucked their poly sheet under the edges of their fly.Okay, this story is going on too long ... I returned to my dry campsite about 1:00 PM, ate lunch, sat in my chair under the bluff, and w
atched another storm blow through the Sipsey watershed. I wondered (not long, but a few minutes) about the folks down by the Sipsey ... were they getting soaked again? It got so dark during the storm that an owl thought it was dusk and began to fly up and down the canyon hunting for his/her supper. Sitting in the dry watching the pouring rain is very peaceful. The trees were beautiful as they swayed back and forth into each other. More water poured over my little falls, and I contempleated the fate of the earth.The last night was a good one ... a warm fire, a good meal, good company (remember, I'm an introvert, so the company of my thoughts is always good), and a warm, dry place to sleep. I did some reading in a Greg Isles book before turning out my light, but mostly I just lay there thinking about how much I love the Wilderness and the quiet.
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