The Mountain

I realize that up until now my posts about Peru have been more about themes from the trip and not single stories or what we did day-by-day, as I'd originally intended. Turns out it's easier for me to organize my thoughts going with this new format, but in this post I am just going to give one story: the day I climbed the mountain (with Dad).

When we first arrived at the children's home (5 bloomin' AM), I was so groggy I couldn't sort out conversations on the bus from my own half-asleep hallucinations. I seem to recall that it was as we were pulling up in front of the home that someone made a comment about climbing a mountain. 

It was a generally accepted idea that our first full day would be spent relaxing, sleeping in, having brunch, and hydrating to avoid getting sick. However, most of us were up and functioning (at least basically) by 10:00. We were all warned to take it slow, but some silly person revisited the notion of going hiking, and the majority of the group adopted this notion.

The home is set uphill at the edge of a decently-sized mountain which leading into the higher peaks of the surrounding range. Before lunch more than half of our group was scrambling up this mountain.

I really wanted to go, but I was feeling cautious, not sure how I would handle a climb after so little sleep following an exhausting and thirsty day. (They do not give you enough water on planes.) I had a bit of a headache and deep down knew I was still tired, so I curled up on my top bunk with a journal and dozed in the sunlight. As I didn't see much real sunshine for the remainder of the trip, I later appreciated this.

However, I still wanted to try that mountain one day or another. A couple of the guys in the group hiked it together some of the mornings before breakfast, and I asked Dad if we could do the same. We were going to go Saturday, but plans got changed when so local officials started yelling at us and we didn't know what they were saying, and then Sunday was church day, obviously. So Monday it was.

I will say that on Saturday we went to visit some ruins and I did a little practice climbing. That was very neat, and good experience for me. I was unusually brave on this trip, and pushed myself farther than I normally do. Good thing, too.

I set my alarm on my watch for 7:00 on Monday. Breakfast was served at 9:00, and I figured 2 hours was plenty of time. I forgot, however, that I had never switched my watch to the correct timezone (never could figure out how). So at 6:15 local time I was knocking on the door to Mom and Dad's bedroom. Dad was up pretty quickly, and we set out into the pouring mist.

"You know it's just after 6:00, right?" Dad asked.

"Is it? That explains somethings...." Like how the sun was barely up.

I went armed with a bottle full of water, a Clif bar, and some crackers, all of which I stuffed into Dad's backpack. I had on some denim capris, some cheap Wal-Mart sneakers, layered shirts, and a sweatshirt, my hair in a ponytail.

The adventure before us was nothing like we were expecting, and it provided some excellent character building exercises and also some father/daughter bonding time. The early hour, the altitude, the adrenaline, the exhilaration, and the fear messed with my head and made me feel particularly philosophical and poetic. Thankfully I kept my mouth shut most of the time.

We had been told by the previous hikers in our group that the easiest way to get down was to go all the way to the top and take the trail there back down and around. I had no idea what the definition of "the top" was, and pretty soon we couldn't see very far for the fog. We could hear pretty well: chickens, dogs, some vehicles, the occasional goose, perhaps a sheep, and sometimes the falling rocks we kicked or tossed down.

10 or 15 minutes in, we sat down to catch our breath, and I nibbled my bar. Dad made some comment about how he wondered what the path down was like, because he certainly wouldn't be coming back this way. I wholeheartedly agreed.

The terrain changed from thin dusty sand over brown rock to rough, craggy granite with patches of moss. I wished aloud for a pair of decent climbing gloves. Earlier I had recalled Heather mentioning a spot where it got kind of scary, and I think we found it when the trail narrowly snaked along the edge. It was probably a good thing we couldn't see very far.

I think we took another short break somewhere around there, when we found a relatively level area. My hands smelled moldy, but that was the worst of my complaints. However, I learned that, at least mentally, it is significantly more difficult to stand back up after sitting down on steep, rocky ground.

From that point we pressed on. About an hour into our little trek, we started wondering about when we would find the trail down. We knew - or guessed - that it was near one of the peaks; which one remained to be seen, quite literally. Every time a peak rose out of the fog, I wondered if it was the right one, but then I'd see another one appear when we reached the previous.

At last we came to a point where the trail seemed to disappear. Sometimes before that point we could see marks where other people had gone before, but here there was nothing to be seen. I looked up, Dad went back down and around: zilch. Was this it? There was no obvious trail down.

After some debate, we figured we might as well start down. Perhaps we'd meet the correct trail on the way. There was no way we would be going back the way we'd come.

Dad took the lead. He had started that way, and at one point we switched for a little while. I was happy to follow his lead now. As soon as we stepped over the crest of the mountain, the sounds of the city below disappeared. The only sounds now were ours, though we made plenty of them.

Trusty solid ground became a memory, and every foot- and hand-hold was tested to ensure integrity. All the fun was gone, and now we just had to focus on the next move.

About that point, Dad and I made an agreement: there were some things Mom never needed to know.

In short, I learned how to control a free slide when no other option was available; my favorite phrase was "oops, sorry" when I kicked loose rocks that hit Dad's hands and feet, but thankfully not (to my knowledge) his head; I stuck to the four-point rule: three limbs and my face in contact with the mountain at all times. Sometimes we crabbed along an edge, hugging the sides and testing the reach of our arms and legs. A few times our only trail was the course of a previous landslide; once, near the end, it was a footpath for dogs. We came across a lost shoe, and a couple hundred feet later we found its mate. For a very long 3-4 seconds I had no foot- or hand-holds and was not in a controlled slide: some of the most terrifying seconds of my life.

Near the end, Dad reminded me of the possible danger of scorpions. Good thing he hadn't mentioned it earlier, because from then on I scrutinized every nook and cranny.

The aforementioned dog path took us back to the upward trail. Around the same time, the hum of the city returned. A path we had earlier determined was much too tough and dangerous to take down became a laughing matter, a breeze, a stroll. Suddenly we had our pick of paths to take, we could move vertically, and we could trust where we put our feet.

We took one final break, sitting down and enjoying the view, now that the fog had cleared. We saw my youth pastor jogging on a soccer field. Some dogs, indignant that we were on their turf, barked at us from a nearby backyard.

Finally, we started on the home stretch. One of the men from the group had come out of the dormitory at the home, coffee in hand, and watched us.

Dad and I resumed our conversation we had abandoned during the last tense hour. We were almost back.

Then I got too

confident. Conquering a mountain will do that to you. Literally two minutes from the bottom, I lost my balance and slipped.
I caught myself hard on my hands. Our coffee-drinking friend confirmed that my "Ow!" echoed. Dad paused to check on me; I'd slipped and automatically mumbled "ow" a number of times before, but that "ow" was usually out of surprise.
This was a real "ow".
The heel of my left hand was scraped and already red from blood that had welled up, though it didn't gush. Dad launched into a first-aid lecture as we finished our decent.
Looking back, I should have made up some heart-lurching story about how I got that "battle wound". Of course, I told the boring truth. And then cried in agony while some hand sanitizer did it's terrible job and said wound was properly cleaned. I seriously think I almost passed out.
We arrived, clean and on time for breakfast, and people said, "Oh, you climbed the mountain?" Ha! Did we ever. They were casual about it because they...well, they did it the right way. "But I, I took the road less traveled by." We had our own unique mountain experience, even if no one ever learns the details.
It was determined that we didn't follow the path far enough. Yeah, we'd worked that out on our own. No one was very clear on where the actual path could be found, though it sounded like we'd gone a little too far up that last cliff and missed the path that led around.

Looking back, I can't believe I managed that little adventure. At the time, there was no other option, so I guess my brain went into survival mode or something; I certainly wasn't thinking normally.

As we were making our way down, right before I fell, Dad made a comment about how I was even more like Bilbo Baggins. I'm assuming he meant something about mountain climbing in general, though it might have been an allusion to an Unexpected Journey. Certainly it didn't involve dragons, dwarves, or treasure hunting.

I don't regret doing it. The experience of trail-blazing and putting my rock-climbing abilities to the test is one I'll remember for a while (considering my indoor rock climbing attempts never amounted to much).

Unfortunately, I won't have a decent scar to commemorate it. Mom and Dad kept checking the status of my wound, worried about tetanus and blood poisoning and severe scarring, but a few days of antibiotic ointment and band-aids and then letting it sit in the open air and it healed disappointingly well. In the end, I might have some boring discoloration.

(I did have one of the girls scrutinize it on the bus ride. She grabbed my hands and I winced, and she noticed the scrape. She poked and prodded and muttered "ow" over and over until the nanny next to me told her to leave it alone.)

And that was my and Dad's mountain hiking adventure!