Hiker

“ From that earliest moment the Trail unrolls behind you like a thread so that never do you quite lose connection with your selves. There is something a little fearful to the imaginative in the insistence of it. You may camp, you may linger, but some time or another, sooner or later, you must go on, and when you do, then once again the Trail takes up its continuity without reference to the muddied place you have tramped out in your indecision or indolence or obstinacy or necessity. ”

“ The trail guides are an entirely different class of men. They belong to the west, have been trained there, and know its ways. Some of them have been trappers or traders, many are hunters, and not a few have been cowboys, or miners. All know the mountains and the mountain trails, and most of them are good companions either in camp or on the trail, quietly competent when work is to be done, resourceful in the innumerable emergencies of mountain travel, and a fountain of shrewd wisdom and anecdote around the camp fire. ”

“ Picking the trail route over forested ridges calls for every bit of the skill gained in our years of tramping. There is never time to go it slow, to explore every possibility. Usually there is one hasty day to lay out the line for a week’s work. For a basis there is the look of the region, from some distant point, from a summit climbed last year, perhaps. For a help, there is the compass, but in our hill country we use it little. ”

“ If, for example, the trail points in the direction of a mountain pass, or toward any other place which affords the only passage through a particular section of country, it would not be worth while to spend much time in hunting it, as it would probably be regained at the pass. ”

“ We climbed so high we could see valley after valley spread out below us, and the air was so clear one felt that it was possible to see halfway round the world if only the mountains did not block the way. There were two or three riders scattered over the trail below, tiny black figures like toys, although everything was so still we could hear their voices shouting to one another and could hear the plunge and splash of a waterfall a mile away. ”

“ The young man and woman started down the Old Trail like two school children, while the father and mother sat on the porch and heard their voices die away on the mountain side below.
The girl went first along the little path, moving with that light, sure step that belongs only to perfect health, the health of the woods and hills. The man followed, walking with the same sure, easy step; strength and power revealed in every movement of his body. ”

“ When you are new to the trail and must hurry, you are intent only on what is just before you—usually the feet of your guide—or if you raise your eyes to glance ahead, you notice objects simply as things to be reached and passed as quickly as possible. Unhurried trailing will repay you by showing you what the world of the wild contains.
Walking slowly you can realize the solemn stillness of the forest, can take in the effect of the gray light which enfolds all things like a veil of mystery. ”

“ Not daring to venture on any gait faster than a walk along this unknown and ill-defined mountain trail, we slowly and cautiously worked our way forward for more than an hour, meeting with no human obstacle to our progress, yet feeling that each step forward was surrounded by imminent peril. ”

“ Instead of climbing down over the rocks the party took what is known among mountaineers as a "tote trail," a narrow pathway generally used for packing stuff into the mountains on the backs of human beings. This "tote trail" was a winding trail full of twists and turns and surprises, now appearing to end at some high precipice, then creeping around the corner of a huge jutting rock, but ever dropping and dropping farther and farther away from the summit and nearer to the "Shelter," which was their destination on this occasion. ”

“ I should be interested to know whether others feel the same glamour that I do in the contemplation of such syllables as the Lo-Lo Trail, the Tunemah Trail, the Mono Trail, the Bright Angel Trail. A certain elasticity of application too leaves room for the more connotation. A trail may be almost anything. There are wagon-trails which East would rank as macadam roads; horse-trails that would compare favorably with our best bridle-paths; foot-trails in the fur country worn by constant use as smooth as so many garden-walks. ”

“ Up the road leading from the main thoroughfare which is more than a mile and a half away, come the casual visitors day by day; those who will scramble up the mountain by the main trail, rejoicing if they accomplish the ascent in record-time. But record-time and the Mountain Spirit have no common denominator. For most of these scrambling tourists the mountain is but a rough mass to be surmounted; stony paths to be trodden upon; a peak to be looked off from ”

“ The traveler who forgets or loses the trail will lose his way, or miss the best of life. The trail is the directest approach to the fountain of life, and this immortal way delays age and commands youth to linger. While you delay along the trail, Father Time pauses to lean upon his scythe. The trail wanders away from the fever and the fret, and leads to where the Red Gods call. ”

“ Climbing, with the help of guides, the steep and rugged path by which alone the mountains were then scaled, they at last reached the summit, and found, to their amazement and delight, a lovely country of hill and dale, pasture, woodland, and cultivated fields, spreading for miles before them. Invigorated by the cool air, and captivated with the scene, they reported the discovery in brilliant colours, and pioneered their countrymen to this truly charming retreat from the heat of the plains below. ”

“ About the hardest thing that we have set out to do yet has been to carry a secret message across the mountains, one hundred miles, from our town to another town, with our own pack outfit, and finding our own trail, and do it in fifteen days including Sundays. ”

“ We followed this bear trail, evidently one used for years. It made climbing easy for us. Trust a big, heavy, old grizzly to pick out the best traveling over rough country! This fellow, I concluded, had the eye of a surveyor. His trail led gradually toward a wonderful crag-crowned ridge that rolled and heaved down from the rim. It had a dip or saddle in the middle, and rose from that to the lofty mesa, and then on the lower side, rose to a bare, round point of gray rock, a landmark, a dome-shaped tower where the gods of that wild region might have kept their vigil. ”

“ The trail up the mountain of Self-discovery is not an easy one. One's unaccustomed feet get sore, and one's courage wavers when the trail sometimes creeps along precipices or shoots steeply up over rocks. ”

“ So if the tenderfoot forgets whether he turns to right or left at a certain half-remembered burnt stub, he is lost. But if at the same point the woodsman's memory fails him, he turns unhesitatingly to the left, because he knows by all the logic of nature's signboards that the way must be to the left. A good mountaineer follows the half-obliterated trails as much by his knowledge of where a trail must go, as by the sparse indications that men have passed that way. I have traveled all day in the Sierras over apparently virgin country. ”

“ The trail was steep and long and without water. During the descent we passed first and last probably twoscore of tourists, all on foot. A good half of them were delicate women,—young, middle-aged, a few gray-haired and evidently upwards of sixty. There were also old men, and fat men, and men otherwise out of condition. Probably nine out of ten, counting in the entire outfit, were utterly unaccustomed, when at home where grow street-cars and hansoms, to even the mildest sort of exercise. ”

“ If it comes from the west and you trail eastward, the wind will strike your back going away from camp and should strike your face returning, provided its direction does not change. Again, if you go east, your camp will lie west of you, and your homeward path must be westward. Consult your compass and know exactly which direction you take when leaving camp, and blaze your trail as you go, looking backward frequently to see how landmarks should appear as you face them returning. ”

“ When the trail was of this description, the guide generally strode along in company with one of the drivers.
As the greater part of my work was in the wild forest regions, there were many trips when the guide was always at the front. Marvellously gifted were some of these men. The reader must bear in mind the fact that there were no roads or vestiges of a path. Often the whole distance we wished to go was through the dense unbroken forest. The snow, some winters, was from two to four feet deep. ”

“ But the trail of the mountains means more than wonder; it means hard work. Unless you stick to the beaten path, where the freighters have lost so many mules that they have finally decided to fix things up a bit, you are due for lots of trouble. Bad places will come to be a nightmare with you and a topic of conversation with whomever you may meet. We once enjoyed the company of a prospector three days while he made up his mind to tackle a certain bit of trail we had just descended. ”

“ Blocks of white granite gleamed here and there in contrast with the general depth of shade. At last, descending a hill, there shone before us a red light; the horses plunged forward at a gallop, and in a moment we were in camp. After this ride we supped, relishing our mountain fare, and then lay down upon blankets before a camp-fire for the mountaineer’s short evening. One keeps awake under stimulus of the sparkling, frosty air for awhile, and then turns in for the night, sleeping till daybreak with a light, sound sleep. ”

“ The first route comprehends two final days of travel at an altitude of about ten thousand feet, where the snow lies in midsummer; where there is no feed, no comfort, and the way is strewn with the bones of horses. This is known as the "Basin Trail." After taking it, you prefer the others—until you try them.
The finish of the second route is directly over the summit of a mountain. You climb two thousand feet and then drop down five. The ascent is heart-breaking but safe. The descent is hair-raising and unsafe: no profanity can do justice to it. ”

“ If there are men in the party they light their pipes and then begin the stories of past experiences on the trail, which are of the keenest interest to all campers. [259] These stories, told while one gazes dreamily into the glowing coals of the fire or looks beyond the light into the mysterious blackness of the forest, have a charm that is wanting under different surroundings. The stories are not confined to the men, for in these days when girls and women are also on the trail, they too can relate things worth the telling. ”

“ In more than one place a great tree lay across the trail and they must either go around or push through the fallen branches. All this took time and effort, and the boys were tired when they reached a part of the trail that led outside the woods, where they found the going much easier.
Then they reached the river, along whose banks the trail led to within a mile of the county town, for to purchase some much needed stores in the village had been the object of this hike. ”

“ I have heard a mule-driver overwhelmed with skeptical derision because he claimed to have upset but six times in traversing a certain bit of trail not over five miles long; in charts of the mountains are marked many trails which are only "ways through,"—you will find few traces of predecessors; the same can be said of trails in the great forests where even an Indian is sometimes at fault. ”

“ It is true the mountains are not high—as heights go in these modern days—yet even the Abruzzis and the Bullock-Workmans, your Conways and your Collies would, in the times I write of, find tasks to test their endurance—or, at least, their perseverance—and to put a strain upon their commissariat sufficient to conduce to a gradual tightening of the belts of such as wear them. Into that land of beautiful forests and a strange bird-life, of deep canyons and high waterfalls, of lovely lakes and clear rivers, of dark precipices and unsullied glaciers, we were the first climbers to adventure. ”

“ But an excursion into this “forest primeval” is to be no holiday promenade. It is an arduous and difficult march over slippery rocks, through tangled thickets, or up the beds of mountain torrents. Hard fare and a harder bed of boughs finish the day, every hour of which has been a continued combat with fresh obstacles. At this price one may venture to encounter the virgin wilderness or, as the cant phrase is, “try roughing it.” It is a curious feeling to turn your back upon the last cart-path, then upon the last foot-path ”

“ To appreciate the mountains, you must come and see them at first hand, and to see them at their very best, you must take tent and pony and provisions, not forgetting tobacco if you are a normal man, and get well out on the trail, away from hotels and railways and every suggestion of the artificial life you have left behind you. ”

“ If you are a novice and accustomed to walking only over smooth and level ground, you must allow more time for covering the distance than an experienced person would require and must count upon the expenditure of more strength, because your feet are not trained to the wilderness paths with their pitfalls and traps for the unwary, and every nerve and muscle will be strained to secure a safe foothold amid the tangled roots, on the slippery, moss-covered logs, over precipitous rocks that lie in your path. ”

“ Our trail lay down the middle of this wide valley, flanked by the Providence Mountains on the south, and desert hills on the north. The colors were changing all the time and the air was so clear that we could see as far as--well, you could see as far as you could see. That is a safe statement and saves mileage, which every traveling man will appreciate. ”