The Wallowa’s
We landed a sick spot right on the shores of Lake Wallowa, granting us a sneak peak view of our next day’s backpacking adventure. Naturally, just as the rice started cooking, we ran out of propane for the coleman stove and had the pleasure of instead holding the pot just above the Jetboil.
The trailhead was nestled deep into the crotch of a valley, where it was invitingly moist and full of bacteria. The road leading there was littered with “swiss chalet” vacation rentals and disneyland-like amusements such as go karts, ice cream stands and horseback rides. As we were making our final backpack preparations and tweaks, a clattering procession of bachelorette-party-esque, looking women on horseback approached. The type of females overzealous with chocolate chip cookies, oversized sunglasses and TJ Max house decor, the kind that hung on their walls stating quotes like “home”, “thankful” and “grateful” written in that wispy font. Their prematurely exhausted guide pulled the group to a halt right before the trail began and took inventory, asked if anybody had any last words or had to make a pee pee.
The horses mane’s were already gleaming in sweat, glistening with various shades of mahogany and leather beneath the scorching sun. The big boned crew riding the horses were sweating also, arguably more that the horses themselves, exhibiting darker shades of fabric in wide lines down the back of their shirts and huge half circles under their armpits. They had flushed cheeks, plush and rosy, ready to pop like a blister, huffing and puffing from the effort it took to stay upright on a horse. Squealing and oinking with laughter like little piggies. As they began the ascent up the sharp slope, a loud squeal pierced the air as one of them tipped backwards and rolled off the horses back, bouncing off the ground like a flat basketball, squawking in distress.
We followed a trail that hugged the side of a sharp sided valley around 100 feet above the West Fork Wallowa River, a roaring blur of snowmelt crashing over boulders like a frigid, pulsing artery of the Wallowas. The river’s voice was always with us, threading through the trees like a low, relentless rumble.
Eventually the trail leveled out and brought us to a wide, green meadow, an unexpected feature nestled in the middle of the forest. The grass was thick and lush, day dreaming about when it would grow long enough to dance in the breeze. An army of trees guarded its edges, stoically watching over this little patch of green as if it was their baby. We paused there for lunch and sunbathed on a boulder set deep in the ground like an iceberg, surrounded by a quiet hush of wind and leaves.
After a quick cat nap, the trail crossed Adams creek, an ice cold and deceivingly fast tributary that felt like stabbing needles stabbing on our legs as we crossed.
Then began the steady climb toward Ice Lake, the alpine lake we planned to circumnavigate before continuing higher.
Being so early in the season, ice lake was true to its name, ICE. We tried to continue but were confronted with enough snow that every step was a piss-poor gamble between a knee high post hole or shin deep post hole. Logic (and bloody shins) won out and we decided to call it, making camp next to the lake.
It was an absolutely windless evening. The forest was magnificently still, every leaf unmoving, every branch frozen, leaving a silence so complete that each heartbeat felt like it might spurt blood from my ears.
As I lay there, eyes closed, fractals of white light shot across my field of vision with every heartbeat. In that silence, the forest vanished into nothingness and the idea of a world outside myself felt like a story I had once been told long ago.
We had gone to bed cold and woke up colder. With the tips of our noses stinging and our water bottles frozen, it was one hell of a battle unzipping our warm burrito sleeping bags. But a burning bladder and a tight sphincter are worthy opponents. By the time we hit the trail, the sun had already begun to warm the side of the valley we were descending and water from the melting snow ran in rivulets that snaked across the trail.
Near the meadow, we found one of the bachelorettes from yesterdays brigade laying on the ground with her pants around her ankles and hairy poontang getting some much needed fresh air. I prodded her with my foot, nothing
I prodded her again, this time with some gumption, enough to make her body giggle.
With the quick jerking motion of someone waking up to a loud noise, she rolled over, leaned on her elbow and stared at us with wide, feral eyes. Her hair a tingle of tangles and pine needles, and her jelly belly, exposed beneath a torn shirt, protruded from her torso. She scratched it absentmindedly like a fat redneck drinking a PBR.
“I was with the girls last night when i smelled it.” she said dryly, a fond, reminiscent look in her eye. “fermented fur, goat musk, molting leaves. The smell took me away from myself, as if my awareness had slipped through the air and into the scent itself—drawn inward through the narrow neck of an invisible bottle. Inside, the world was made of musk and heat, a thick, living fog of earth and sweat and wildness. It was the scent of fur and pine pitch, of wet soil trampled by hooves, of something old and male and restless—half god, half beast. The air thrummed with that raw pulse of the woods, heavy and electric, and I wasn’t breathing it anymore. I was it. I was the musk, the steam rising off the back of something that had just run through rain, the echo of a heartbeat under bark and moss. In that place, there was no thought—only scent, primal and sacred as the breath of the world itself.
Rank, sweaty gooch, overripe prunes. It was like smelling mother earths cooter after being creampied by Jupiter, Mars and Pluto.
divine.
It was as my nose hijacked my brain, my actions and it led me into the woods and there he was” she paused
“Big Foot”
We waited.
“I went to my knees and rubbed my face along his schlong, bare against my cheek. He looked at me, and told me to grab it without saying anything. Off we went, he led the way, i held his meat as if it were a leash and I an obedient dog. We climbed the side of the mountain without taking a step, he led me into a cave. There was another man there, half man half goat. He introduced himself as Pan. his cock hung limp from between his legs, swinging like the pendulum of eternity, hypnotizing me, drawing me closer. He embraced me in his hairy arms and i felt Pan’s big penis slide up my leg and press against my groin, lifting me to me toes, as if i was on a horses back. Then i felt big foot embrace me from the back, his cock still in my hand. and there i was, in between the bellies of the beasts, their heart beats thumped like ancient drums.” she finished, staring off vacantly, her eyes filled of remorse yet also reminiscent.
She sat upright and crawled toward us, stopping just close enough for us to smell the distant tang of fire smoke, and gut rot.
She looked off into the woods, smiling faintly, as if reliving a fond memory.
And then, without warning, she let out a guttural grunt, scratched her stomach one last time, and scampered off loudly into the thicket, crashing through the branches with the force of a wild boar. The forest swallowed her whole, leaving behind a pungnet smelling silence.
