PCT Days 160 – Back to School

Janus Lake (mile 2474) to Sally Ann Lake (mile 2494)

There is a time when the tail begins to feel different. That time is right around four in the afternoon. The sun has fallen from it’s zenith and with the benefit of extra atmosphere shines a warm light across the world. Grey bottomed clouds begin to cluster in the sky. By the time the earth has gone dark for the day these clouds will have pulled up close together to form a thick blanket, obscuring the stars from view, muffling all sounds and ushering us to sleep. But for now they float benignly, casting shadows upon the ground and giving depth to the vast glacial valleys that stretch into the distance whereupon they become snow capped peaks.

This time of day, this aptly named golden hour, if called so more for it’s soothing light than the actual amount of time it weaves magic into the very being of everything it touches, has begun to creep earlier into the day. Where as previously we had to hike well into the evening hours to experience it, now we are treated to this light show shortly after lunch. Meaning much of our afternoon and time in camp is spent in a sort of real time nostalgia. For it is nearly impossible to feel anything but poignant sense of the passing of time. And on the light comes the wind of evening, bringing with it the biting chill of fall. It is the same wind that during my childhood signaled the end of summer and the impending start of school.

This hike, has in so many ways felt like an extended summer vacation. So alike my childhood when I would spend countless hours outside, exploring the trails and lakes near my home while my skin baked into a dark golden brown. And so too like my childhood, I have begun to look forward to fall. If not for the start of the school year but for the start of new things. When I was a child I always found myself looking forward to the start of school. Those long summer days which at first seemed full of endless promise had spooled out around me, filled with adventures great and small. Yet, by the last weeks I had grown accustomed to long bike rides and days spent jumping from makeshift roap swings into too-shallow lakes. As hard as we might try, it is nearly impossible to appreciate what we have all of the time. Summer is a delight because there is winter. Education, learning, challenge is enjoyable because of the freedom and boredom of the summer. I crave the contrast, the newness, the change. All of which are coming whether I want them or not. So for the time being I will revel in the long warm light of these last precious days of summer knowing that when they are gone I’ll feel foolish for ever wanting anything else.