Weekend of Sept. 20, 2009
Sequoia National Park
I'm not actually sure I've even mentioned the living situation in CA, but basically me and Chris Hogan, a buddy of mine who went to Tufts and who I now work with, were sent to CA for 4 months for a field rep. assignment for work. We road tripped from Boston and were roommates during our stay in Hanford, CA, near the naval air station we were working at. It was a good deal, because we were both under the same mindset of "I'm in California. I'm going to do EVERYTHING THERE IS TO DO. Get out of my way, world." And we friggn did. Plus, the town we were living in was in the middle of NO WHERE, smelled like sulfur and cow shit (easily in the top ten worst smell combinations ever), and was an average of 103 degrees when we first arrived. But it's location was pretty centrally located in the state, so we could easily get anywhere in the state each weekend.
Becoming partially deaf from the jet engines is TOTALLY WORTH IT
After our first week of work, we were definitely ready to get out of that literal shit-hole. So Hogan, Jimmy (best friend from home who now lives in CA near San Francisco), and I decided to head over to Sequoia after work on Friday for some camping/hiking shenanigans. We got to the park after dark, so we quickly cooked some noms over a fire, pounded a few Tecates (the finest beer Mexico has to offer), and passed out.
The next morning, we got up, shoved some bagels in our faces, and started walking up mountains. Hard. It was actually pretty slow going at first, because this was our first time hiking over 7000 feet, and our circulatory system was NOT PREPARED for the thin air. Also, it was a fairly aggressive 14 mile hike up and over an 8000ish foot mountain. But we rocked it like a hurricane. And there were tons of cool views along the way.
FYI I didn't end up falling off that cliff
We ended up trailblazing down the opposite side of the mountain after the summit, which was fairly painful for the ole knees. But it was fun trying to scout out the best route down through all the gorges cut into the rocks. And are you kidding me? We're champions. We're not going to let blinding knee-pain slow us down! In fact, there were definitely moments where we triple-timed down the side of the mountain. This may have added to the severe leg irritation now that I think about it...
"My knee is going to explode." "Mine too. Let's run down the mountain."
We made it down the mountain and back to the trailhead before dark, which is good, because we did NOT think to bring flashlights. We then spent the next hour driving down the most intense switchbacks I've ever seen (people don't want to drive STRAIGHT DOWN a 3000 foot elevation change? what a bunch of babies) and devoured some baked beans and sausage cooked over the fire, and finished the rest of the sweet, sweet Tecate. Then we had a REAL treat. We decided to attend the campground "talk" or whatever it was, which ended up being the most insane stargazing session of my life. No joke. I have never seen so many stars, so bright, in my entire life. I'm a big fan of stargazing, and this was SO FRIGGN INTENSE. The only thing I had to compare it to were the tops of mountains- er... hills on the east coast. But there is so much light pollution in the east that it really doesn't compare. In the middle of CA there is no light pollution and you are higher, so there is less atmosphere for the light to travel through. It was mind blowing. I was looking at literally billions of stars and galaxies. We also saw a few really great shooting stars. Seriously, if you don't appreciate looking up and seeing stars like that, feel free to shoot yourself in the face.
The next morning we opted for some shorter hikes through the crazy Sequoia forest. Um, I'm not sure if you knew this, but Sequoias are the greatest. They are so effing big that you need to take a moment for your brain to calm down and say "eeeeeeeeeasy. This is still planet Earth. It's just a really big tree. Stop screaming and just settle down."
The most insane part is that this one wasn't even the biggest one we saw
After taking some time to clean up our "adrenaline vomit," we kept hiking through the forest of these monstrous trees. I collected an enormous, football-sized pinecone from one of these beasts (it was later used as an engagement gift for Michelle, and then hurled to the ground a few times). And then we saw a friggn BEAR. It was the first bear I had ever seen in the wild, and this is where I learned that I will probably end up fighting a bear one day: instead of that feeling of terror and caution that I assume most people get, the only thing going through my head was to run up to it. So I did. And I got pretty close before it saw me and ran off.
I forgot to lure it in with honey
I'll get him next time. But yeah, seeing one of the largest land predators was exciting. We did a bit more hiking after that, trees, mountains, blah blah blah, then went back to the apartment in Hanford. Great first weekend in California.
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