Travel - Sequoia (Pear Lake)

I've always considered myself an outdoor person. Growing up, many of my weekends consisted of loading up in whatever sort of camping vehicle (tents, to tent-trailer, to trailer, etc.) we had at the time to head a few hours down the road to embrace the great outdoors. I like to think that I've done it all, and that my camping expertise is as good as the next adventurous person. Then I went backpacking.

Now, backpacking, different. fucking. animal. Even though we were only heading out on a 14 mile round trip for a day, planning was a nightmare. What should I bring? How much will I eat? How much does comfort matter? I'll simplify the answer to all of those questions by saying "roughly a metric fuckton". As you can imagine, I was pretty stressed figuring out all of these factors that I had previously thought I was an expert on. "Pfft, I've been to Burning Man and survived, it's just backpacking". Yeah, that statement was made...poorly.

After a night car-camping with Indi and our friend Jeff (an actual backpacking expert), we parked in the lot, I threw on my ill fitted and weighted pack, and we set out for Pear Lake. 10 minutes in, I fucking hurt. 10 damn minutes and I'm already thinking "10 minutes? Yeah that roughly translates to about 2 miles when backpacking, so we're almost there!". My guesses on distance travelled were starting to get a little depressing, so I stopped at where I thought was mile 55. One thing Jeff had warned us about, is that we're hiking at high altitude, and gaining 2k+ elevation on our way to our destination. He also warned us about something called "elevation shitiness" where pretty much everyone just starts to hate everyone else and everything around them. I didn't believe him, BUT I SHOULD HAVE LISTENED. Somewhere around the actual half-way point, this hit me. I had a headache, everyone was moving too quickly, and I kept getting left behind whenever I took a photo, and the realization finally hit me that Pear Lake was not just around the goddamn bend.

After a lot of swearing, pain, hunger, and dehydration, we finally arrive in Pear Lake. Oddly enough, I'm displeased that the damn hike was actually worth it. This is one of the most beautiful places I've ever hiked to in my entire life, and what's better, I'll have an opportunity to see sunset as well as rise since we're camping there. Now, I say displeased, because whenever I do an awful hike, I feel justified in my bitching if the end destination just isn't that great. (Un?)Fortunately, this destination was absolutely worth it.

Hello! I'm California's majesty! Look at me! LOOK AT ME!

Everyone's mood is immediately fixed once we got to Pear Lake, so we set up tents and even went for a dip in the hypothermia inducing lake (that swim didn't last long). Cue unbelievable hunger. Turns out, when you hike 7 miles through the mountains at 9k feet of elevation, your body requires a few more calories than sitting on your ass at home watching HBO GO. Cue ripping through nearly all the food we have. I've never been so hungry in my entire life. Taste didn't matter, I just needed calories. On top of our feeding frenzy it was now starting to get damn cold. Cue wearing most of the articles of clothing I brought.

My pride in my camping preparedness is now more than a little damaged right now, as it's 3AM, and the sky, after a bright and sunny day, opens up a and pours. Okay, I'm done, as soon as the sun comes up, we're getting the hell out of here. Everyone pretty much had the same sentiment in the morning. We packed up and got the hell out. The hike back was more pleasant and a lot faster. There's something about the return trip on a hike that makes your particularly smug, especially to the poor bastards going through the same outing that you just endured. There's nothing sweeter than getting back to the car and starting the long drive home.

Okay, so, maybe I'm not the expert I think I am. Even people who I though would be an expert (Jeff) struggled at certain points. While he was certainly more prepared, he wasn't exactly waltzing through the mountain meadows whistling tunes from The Sound of Music. Plenty of times in life, I've though I was an expert at a damn hefty handful of things, and what I've learned so far, over and over, is that no one is really an expert. There is always more to learn. Thinking you're an expert makes you overly comfortable, it can sometimes kill your ambition to strive to be better. Even if you are an expert, sometimes not everything works out perfectly, sometimes you aren't prepared. All you can do is learn and do a better job next time. You can always do a better job next time.