63bkpkr
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- Aug 9, 2007
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Prospecting Pictures Part 2 w/RESCUE
site before moving anything
site after moving rocks
boulder bra in use, these are for 15" tires and are heavy duty
I managed to loose the two pictures from this location to the very bottom of the post, sorry.
The gear in and around the tree is what I had for moving boulders.
The last picture of me with two packs is unsightly but everything made it to the Bronco
Rescue from here down:
Spot GPS Messenger – A Real Life Saver
In 09 (that’s 2009) in the August/September time frame, just before and through the Labor Day weekend, I decided to go for a little exploration hike with two goals in mind. Back in 89 I’d been in my favorite river canyon doing some rooting around in a few side canyons and came across a group of water worn boulders perched on a hillside and later found a small hill of clay that had collapsed. I was amazed when 20 years had passed and I’d done nothing about either. I must have been really busy to have stayed away from a section of ancient riverbed in a known placer mining canyon.
Before this trip my son encouraged me to purchase a GPS messaging system so that just incase I needed assistance that I could get it. Reluctantly I purchased the unit though I was uncertain of how useful it might be under a heavy forest canopy and anyway why would I need one as I’d already been able to hike out on a broken leg with a severely sprained ankle.
The appointed day arrived and I giddily loaded up the old Bronco and headed for the hills with my 85 pound pack setup for two weeks of adventure, prospecting, reading and generally communing with what all was out there, like squirrels, birds, rattlesnakes, bobcats, likely mountain lions, lots of deer and last but not least some of natures finest and orneriest bears that have been sucking down my food bags since late 78. I was on my way to "Heaven"!
Arriving at the mosquito infested turnaround point I threw on my hiking duds, hefted my generous pack onto my back, closed up the vehicle and headed off down the trail towards destiny. Part of destiny came during the 2 hour hike down the mountain as the pack settled into parts of my body that were now complaining but I’ve been here before so I just plowed on. Reaching the bottom of the canyon I turned up river and hiked for another three quarters of an hour and although my mind wanted to continue up the side canyon with ‘everything’ I had with me my body suggested we camp overnight and then continue on in the morning. I decided to take it up on this suggestion, found a nice little sandbar and gently unloaded myself. I was amazed to be my regular body mass and how springy it was to walk around without the pack, but enough of this frivolity get the camp ready as night is approaching and I’m hungry, tired, sweaty, dirty and I stank! Ah, the joy of a night time cold river dunk, eecchh!
In the morning I packed everything, shouldered all of it and into the dark depths of the side canyon we went, me and the pack that is as I was alone. Well I was kinda alone as I always hike with the six of us: me, myself and I, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. I knew where this rough trail was, picked it out from among the pinecones, fallen branches, fallen trees and other fallen stuff and continued up the ridge of the high bank above the little creek. It took about an hour and a half to reach the end of the trail and I was glad to get there. I noted a likely possible almost certain place I could turn into a Best Western with only a little bit of work, plunked my pack down and had at it. I settled for a Motel 6 but it was still mighty fine.
I will now leave out seven days of hiking back and forth up and down the riverbed, up the avalanche hillside, and up and up and up through hot dry country not to mention being sweaty, dirty and stinky. Then going over hill and dale in every possible direction and place save for the one location where the ancient riverbed lies. If of course an avalanche has not taken it out which it could have. So after a solid week of this I said ok enough is enough, on too the second quest the clay hill. And of course I’d taken some heavy equipment up to the high country that I now had to bring back down.
The next morning, 5Sept, I packed it all up and hiked back out to the main trail and back up river past the trail that had brought me in and up a cliff to reach the plateau above where the next old trail was. After about three hours of hiking from the first camp I approached the point where I needed to hike down through the woods to the main river and make camp for the night. The following day started out slowly with the start of the hike not taking place till 10 AM.
From camp I hiked over to this side canyon and proceeded up it with a day bag something anyone would carry on a day hike. It contained a lunch, water, my water filter pump, a gold pan, a small classifier, an empty fifty pound chicken feed sack, a lopping shear, a small hand saw, first aid kit, shovel w/carrying bag, head lamp and a few other simple things like my GPS unit and the new GPS Spot Messenger unit. This side canyon was not made for regular tourist travel in fact its what some people would refer to as a ‘bugger’ thus indicating it was not exactly easy to negotiate. It required scaling some steep loose sections, free climbing going nearly straight up in places and in general it was a test of endurance as well as it stretches ones abilities to the limit and beyond. Up, up, up was the call of the day so I did. I passed the spot where a tiny rivulet of water sprouted from the sidewall of the canyon and thought "I will stop here on my way down and fill up my water container". That, was a mistake and I learned the hard way to replenish my water whenever I could.
I climbed and climbed looking for the spot where I’d seen the hill of clay slumped over onto its side revealing this silver blue clay and I’d come to see what, if anything, had rotted out of the clay. At one point I looked into the higher reaches of the canyon in front of me and said to myself "self you’ve not been there before" I’d gone past "the clay spot". As I looked back down the mountain I’d been climbing up I thought to myself I don’t think I care to go down some of the stuff I’ve just climbed up. I took out my GPS and it told me I was a mere 1400’ from the top. I knew that once I reached the top that there was a trail in there. Also I knew where I could pick up my first, second, third and fourth water supply and that the fourth supply would be in my trusty Bronco along with a blanket and a few things I could make do with for one night and then I would hike back down to my camp. Heck, a little over a thousand feet why I can do that! Off I went only now up was distinctly steeper. I would stop every half hour and send out a SPOT message as I’d been doing all day long and I was looking forward to getting on my computer to look at all these location spots on Google Earth.
I was lucky in that I did not hit any sheer cliffs and fortunate that I could just meander up the mountain. Of course as I mentioned earlier this type of climbing stretches a person so I was actually going up steep cliffs though not sheer exactly. I began to notice that it was approaching evening. At one rest stop I took out my 8.5" x 11" map and realized from GPS locations just where I was going to be cresting this mountain. Then I realized "just where" I was going to be cresting the mountain, a Manzanita Jungle. I’d managed to play in this place but on the other side of it a few times and knew from experience that I was in for a rough time of it. As I got higher the evening winds began to blow over the tops of the ridges and the sun began to sink in the west. I arrived at the fringe of the jungle and managed to follow a few animal trails for a short while but then it was just it and I. I knew I had to cross the jungle and that there was no way through it so I climbed on top of it and began to cross the expanse of this mess in front of me. My hiking staff is a touch over six feet tall and most of the time it just made it up to my waist and my lower legs and feet were just a bit down from the tops of the large supportive Manzanita branches. I was a good distance off the ground.
Every now and then a branch would break and down I’d go. After the second of these descending adventures I looked at my 454 and thought that if that ever falls I will never find it. It took a few minutes balancing on top of branches to remove my pack and then take off the revolver in its shoulder holster and insert the unit into the safety of the pack. While I was at it I got out my headlamp as the sun was really starting to set. At the stopping point of one of these falls I thought it would be a good idea to choose a place to be going too. I got back on top looked around and chose one of the few pine trees that had managed to grow before the jungle really got started. IT was where I was going to. After another long period of time I reached the pine tree, lowered myself down to the ground dropped my pack off and sat leaning on the pack to relax. I turned off the headlamp to conserve the batteries and found myself in this twilight of filtered amber glow. I was tired, my clothes were soaked from sweat, night was coming, I could not have a fire under the pine tree or anywhere else "Under Here" as I would be at the epicenter of the forest fire if I tried a stunt like that but I needed to be active in preparing for the coming night. I looked out through the tangle of pine tree branches and manzanita to the opposite side of the pine tree I’d come in from and what I saw did not look right. I could not imagine what it could be but I knew I had to go find out. I made my way out there and found a clearing of roughly twenty feet in diameter of solid rock and rock does not burn. I loppered, sawed, drug, dug and prepared a camp for the night and built a small reflective fire pit. A fire on this ridge could not be big as the wind gusts would surely take embers into the sky and drop them on the tinder that surrounded me. I was home!
The night winds mostly came from my back. I would lay the pack across my lower legs and feet and then wrap the chicken feed sack around my left shoulder and lay down on it securing it in place and then held the rest of the bag over as much of my chest as it would cover. The little fire was a friend. After some time I broke my last sip of water into two smaller sips. That was the finest tasting liquid I’ve ever had! I had a tiny amount of lunch left but felt I could not eat it as I was afraid my throat would be to dry and I might choke on it. The pine boughs I’d cut to lay on were not very soft and in general were cold but they were still better than laying straight on the rock. After awhile my sweaty feet, still inside my boots, got cold and then they got colder. What to do? I took my boots and socks off and managed to get them a bit dryer by laying them close to the fire and I managed to NOT burn them. With the moisture wicked from my feet and the boots/socks a bit dryer I put them back on and I was better off. I had a small stack of wood ready to put on the coals when I awoke and I’d stacked small pieces of rock around the fire pit in an attempt to have warm rocks to put on myself when I awoke to help keep me warmer. Each time I became comfortable I fell asleep.
I do not know how long it would take for the fire to burn down and for me to wake up shaking from being cold but that was the timer that would wake me up. I would sit up, fold my legs in a circle, place the ‘warm’ rocks into the circle, cover my legs and the warm rocks, place the dry firewood onto the coals and get the fire going again. After the shaking stopped I would go out into the night to locate more firewood. This wood is nothing more than small branches, no logs and I was tired and could not take being up for very long. Getting back to the fire I would rewarm myself, cover over with the sack and the pack and fall asleep. This cycle was repeated over and over though at one point it changed as when I went for more firewood I could easily see my breath and I knew it was cold.
During the night I said many prayers and thought of my loved ones but I was still not ready to use the 911 button on the messenger unit. At one point of sitting up at the fire and getting warm I knew I was going to make it as the sky was different. How many of you have seen the movie "Jeremiah Johnson"? In one scene he and the ‘Old Timer’ that’s taken him on and is showing him the ropes of being a mountain man prepares his bed for the night. They are in the snow and have had a roaring fire, the old timer takes a crude shovel, scrapes the snow away and digs out a ditch. He then throws a goodly portion of embers into the ditch, covers the embers with dirt, puts his bedding on top of the pile and crawls in for the night never saying a word to the tenderfoot. Jeremiah copies what the old timer has just done and goes to sleep on his pile. BUT during the night Jeremiah is awakened by almost being steamed to death. He jumps up and is trying to cool his back side. The old timer merely says "yup, seen it right off, you did not put enough dirt on it". Lesson Learned! Well, was that just Hollywood bunk or was it real? I’d been thinking about this for some time, as there was some dirt on the rock area that might just be enough to try this little stunt. I was afraid that if I tried it in the middle of the night and if it did not work or work for long enough that I could worsen my condition so I waited till the rays of the morning sun were on me. I stoked up the fire, gathered the dirt and when I had a small pile of good coals I put the dirt right on top of it and slightly packed it. I then sat on top of it and it was as cold as ice. I waited and a few minutes more and then I had the warmest tush a person could ask for. It Works but be sure to not pack the dirt too much as that could smother the coals.
Okay suns up, I’m warm and ready to go, I could see better and put together a plan of how to finish crossing the jungle. I go for it and some forty-five minutes later I’m clear of the jungle and into the forest. I noted as I crossed from tree to tree in the jungle that the place I’d stopped at for the night was the only spot I could have had a safe fire at. One more blessing realized. I began hiking through the forest trying to maintain a direction that agreed with the GPS unit that told me where I was on my little map and continued to send out OK messages on the SPOT Messenger. I went around areas of dark woods and brush as I did not want to trap myself in another jungle and besides it was cold in there. I found myself in a small valley at the downhill end. A breeze sprang up and blew the cold night air from the valley onto me and immediately I began to shake. I had been hiking for only three hours and I was already exhausted and obviously still affected from my night of exposure. I’d been hiking but still not making it to the trail I new was there on the corner of my map. I’d been without water for about 14 hours. I knew that at some point my body chemistry would go bad taking rational thinking along with it. I was uncertain of how long I could keep this up without making a major mistake or taking a bad fall. I knew the country around me was rough, the forest and brush were thick and that I was shaking from a mere breeze at 11 O’clock in the late morning. I took out the SPOT messenger looked at it for awhile and pressed the 911 button. I broke down and cried as I’d been backpacking in this canyon system since 1964 and had always been able to get back out on my own including hiking out with a full pack on a broken leg with a severely sprained ankle. For a perfectionist it is tough to give up. I was still shaking but when I looked up I could see sunlight on the hillside to my left. Of course the warm sunlight had to be up a hill I had to climb. I got up there shut the SPOT messenger off and let it neutralize any energy left in the system, turned it back on and sent the second 911 message. After this I just left the unit on as the batteries last for one year with the unit turned on all the time. Also, possibly the blinking 911 light may have been comforting. No helicopter could land up here but I was warm and for the moment I was satisfied with the situation. It took me almost an hour before I could fall asleep which I thought was a bit odd.
I awoke to warmth and it felt good. I decided to find a spot for the night where I could have my back up against a fallen tree as it would deflect wind from that direction. I found the spot, laid down and reached out as far as I could and that was where the fire pit would be. It was now late afternoon and while I building the neatest looking reflective fire pit I noted noises out in the forest. The noises circled my little hill and sounded to me like something was turning over logs and rocks looking for I will say something to eat. I assumed this to be a bear and the thought was not comforting but I knew I could handle it if it came to that. I was still working on the pit when my brain alerted me to a sound that was new though not distinct, my brain said it was important enough to shake me out of thinking about how to set rocks for trapping the most heat. I sat up and listened and it was a faint sound nothing obvious but as I listened I could detect a thump in the sound. A chopper was somewhere out there! Note: This SPOT messenger sends out a helicopter to rescue its clients. I turned towards the sound that was now audible and recognizable and out a long distance away I saw the helo. It flew across the sky in a straight line and then turned directly towards me. I took off my watch and tried to use it to reflect the sunlight that was right in my eyes. The chopper continued to come directly at me. You know they should put windows in the floors of rescue helicopters so they can see this fool on the ground jumping up and down, waving crazily at them, I’d bet they’d at lest smile at the scene. But alas they did not see my reflected signals or me. Then their loudspeaker came on: "Herbert we can’t land we will send in the ground team" and away flew my ride, Darn. Okay I’m going to be saved but finish the fire pit, it is about 3:30 PM.
Around 5:30 I thought I heard a motorcycle but I know the trail coming in here and it is covered with Huge downed trees and no bike will make it all the way here. Sometime after six somebody yelled to Me so being polite I yelled back, their yell had been faint but I could hear "Herbert". I figured they would have a hard time hearing me so I thought of two things to do to let them know someone was out here. First I aligned myself with two 8" diameter pine trees and fired my 454 into the one in front of me. A small chunk came off of the front of that tree but I also detected something had happened in back of the tree. On inspection I found a hole in the back of the tree I’d fired into and an entry hole into the next tree but no exit hole in the second tree. Cool, I can drop a bear no problem with this Insurance Policy I carry. Next I got out this large oddly shaped orange/red emergency whistle I carry in my first aid kit and stuck the whistle in my mouth. Before I blew on it I plugged both ears, as it is loud. I blew on it for several blasts and then listened. Nothing! Every now and then someone would yell my name, I would yell back and then silence. This continued till about 9 PM and it was taking the team a long time to find me even though they had my exact location as that is among the info the SPOT Messenger sends out. It had been cold for some time and after trimming off the lower pine tree branches I had started a fire. The rocks I’d surrounded the pit with reminded me of amphitheater and as I sat there in front of it I was choked with smoke and was stunned and could not figure out what was wrong. But when I laid down I had clear air and all sorts of heat and realized I’d gotten what I had intended to cause a wall that reflected heat and the way I’d made it caused it to be a very directional reflector. I knew that if I spent the night here I would be comfortable, I felt safe.
I decided to do something else to help myself as my rescuers were having trouble getting to me. I took my headlamp and strapped it to the top of my hiking staff with the lamps elastic strap and turned the lamp to its strobe position. I securely planted the bottom of the staff in the ground and there it was my blinking beacon that surely would catch the eye of anyone out there. I lay down in front of the fire with my back to the log and became warm and comfortable and fell softly off to sleep. So lets check out this comfortable to sleep scene: out in the woods is a bear looking for food, I am laying literally on the forest floor where anything crawling by might stop to look at the sight, I need water but with all of this my mind is at peace as I believe all will be well. Then there was a noise and someone shouted to me "Herb is that you"? "Is that your light blinking"? I sat up and shouted back in the mighty wordy response of "YES"! I told them to keep coming as I could hear the branches cracking under the steps and hear them talking on their radios. I began to see glimpses of lights coming through the heavy forest towards me and then they stopped behind a giant Sugar Pine. The people began to shout questions at me like name and age so I responded with the answers. The last question was take off your hat! I removed the hat and the cloth shovel bag and one of them shouted, "That’s The Guy"! I mean how many lost guys could be out there with a bald head and pony tail?? Six guys stormed into my modest situation, the nurse type walked over to me and began to remove his equipment bags and was telling me he was going to roll up my sleeve. I said "sure you need to check my vital signs. Let me give you a heads up, no broken bones, no cuts or bruises and I’ve not had water for 25 hours". My pulse was somewhere around 82 and not where it should be and that was all he checked. He looked up at the other team members and said okay lets start giving him water and electrolytes and something to eat. For about an hour I slowly drank a half-gallon of water and sucked down a half dozen packets of "Goop" the electrolyte stuff. I could not eat the trail bar as my throat was still dry. Somewhere close to midnight with the seven of us huddled around my little fire I looked up at them and informed them "Gentlemen, I’m good to go"! My body is telling me I can hike but even though my pack is light I don’t think I can carry it. To demonstrate my condition I got up and quite solidly walked around without falling or having any balancing problems. The leader of the team called the rescue base station and shared my condition with them and requested a nighttime extraction. He was heavily questioned about this but his responses made the base commander comfortable enough to give him permission to come out. A cautionary statement was given to the leader to make certain to watch me as we were going through rough country with some steep cliffs.
The fire was uhh, put out as bet they could with dirt and ‘moisture’ but they did not want to knock the fireplace rocks down on top of it as it was such a cool fire pit. I had the final say in this and as I’d now had my second fire in a no fire zone I wanted to make certain the embers were smothered so the rocks came down on top of the pit. They fired up all six of their GPS tracking units and we started out by headlamps. They had no trouble keeping track of me or understanding how I was doing as I talked all the way out. They took a few breaks to make certain I was not tired out wrapping me in a space blanket and giving me more water and goop at each stop. We arrived at their motorcycles just as the ground pounders arrived. Lots of happy teasing and hand shakes were given out while the two nurses discussed "the patient". The motorcycle team said goodbye to me but that they would see me back at the command center and off they went into Their Dusty Night. We could hear them struggling to get up the hill and at one point I thought we might even catch up with them. The hiking team told me what supplies they had that I could choose from but when he said a pear I said a real pear not freeze dried. He pulled this perfect pear from his pack and I asked for it. No steak could ever taste as good as that pear. We began our uneventful hike out and at the top we were greeted by two drivers who shuffled us into their vehicles and we were off for the command center. On the hike out they asked me a couple of times how I’d hiked in from the road and I explained I had not come in from the road I’d come up the canyon wall from the river. To this day I still have the feeling they did not believe me.
As the vehicles approached the base camp I was amazed at all the vehicles at the command center and there must have been fifty or so volunteers there and all to help me. Then I saw this good sized hooded fella and I knew it was my son Justin. It was so good to see him and we hugged each other for a long time. I was given a cup of soup and it was so good. More water, was asked a few questions from the sheriff and then he told everyone to fold it up as they’d had a successful rescue. I got everyone’s attention and thanked all of them for being out there to help. After the crowd started to break up one of the command center members a woman came up to my son and I and put her hands on each of our shoulders and said "Sir you brought this young man into this world" and turning to Justin she said "and young man you have brought your father back to the world of the living". I’d already thought about this but having her say it out loud really brought it home and I thanked her for her comments. We tried to get back to the Bronco but when we arrived there I realized the keys were with my pack and that was in Justins car. So we headed back to Auburn and to Denny’s where we found most of the rescue team. More thank you’s and hand shaking then some food and off to sleep for a short while. A few hours later found Justin and I back at the command center location where we asked a kind hearted fellow to give us a ride down to the Bronco as he and his family were going to that exact spot anyway. We drove the Bronco out to my sons car where we transferred items between vehicles and we talked about what I was going to do next. I assured him I was feeling fine and that after I’d made a few phone calls I would hike back to my camp in the canyon and then hike out the following day. A few more hugs and a wave as he continued on and I stopped at my favorite switchback where I knew I had cell phone service and father and son were separated again each off on their own adventure. At the mosquito infested parking area again and after giving a fellow hikers handsome dog a good scratching and a few hugs I started hiking back into the canyon at 7:00 PM and did most of the hike by headlamp, good ole trusty headlamp. I hiked very carefully but unladen as I was, I reached the valley floor in way less than two hours. I mean there was very little in my pack: the SPOT Messenger, the first aid kit, water, some peanut butter trail bars my son gave to me and of course I had the 454 on me. I arrived at my unmolested camp about an hour later. Lowered gear from where I’d stashed it way up high on the end of my steel cable, made dinner, brushed my teeth, gave thanks for being safe and alive and fell quickly to sleep. The hike out in the morning was also uneventful and easy.
My son had encouraged me to purchase the SPOT Messenger. I doubted its usefulness in a thick forest but I followed my son’s insistence and purchased it. All it took was one use and I am a believer and carry it with me on every trip and every hike. I’ve attached a few pictures though they are not from this trip but they are of the exact places and area of this trip and show some of my safety items.
I hope this true story is helpful and reminds folks to be prepared for the unexpected. A signal mirror, a whistle, a first aid kit, a snakebite kit, fire starting materials, water, food, a safety shelter and being on good terms with life all help out there.
This rescue adventure takes place in the mountains to the right of picture
First nights camp with creek to the left of picture and main river is what I'm looking at, 2.75 hr hike to here
I spent seven days hiking this country looking for the ancient streambed
Bedrock of current creekbed, lovely spot, beautiful little canyon only problem avalanches from either side
Some of my survival gear: L to R Bivvy Sack, Spot Messenger w/very loud whistle on top of it, Petzel HeadLamp, two butane lighters
site before moving anything site after moving rocks boulder bra in use, these are for 15" tires and are heavy dutyI managed to loose the two pictures from this location to the very bottom of the post, sorry.
The gear in and around the tree is what I had for moving boulders.
The last picture of me with two packs is unsightly but everything made it to the Bronco
Rescue from here down:
Spot GPS Messenger – A Real Life Saver
In 09 (that’s 2009) in the August/September time frame, just before and through the Labor Day weekend, I decided to go for a little exploration hike with two goals in mind. Back in 89 I’d been in my favorite river canyon doing some rooting around in a few side canyons and came across a group of water worn boulders perched on a hillside and later found a small hill of clay that had collapsed. I was amazed when 20 years had passed and I’d done nothing about either. I must have been really busy to have stayed away from a section of ancient riverbed in a known placer mining canyon.
Before this trip my son encouraged me to purchase a GPS messaging system so that just incase I needed assistance that I could get it. Reluctantly I purchased the unit though I was uncertain of how useful it might be under a heavy forest canopy and anyway why would I need one as I’d already been able to hike out on a broken leg with a severely sprained ankle.
The appointed day arrived and I giddily loaded up the old Bronco and headed for the hills with my 85 pound pack setup for two weeks of adventure, prospecting, reading and generally communing with what all was out there, like squirrels, birds, rattlesnakes, bobcats, likely mountain lions, lots of deer and last but not least some of natures finest and orneriest bears that have been sucking down my food bags since late 78. I was on my way to "Heaven"!
Arriving at the mosquito infested turnaround point I threw on my hiking duds, hefted my generous pack onto my back, closed up the vehicle and headed off down the trail towards destiny. Part of destiny came during the 2 hour hike down the mountain as the pack settled into parts of my body that were now complaining but I’ve been here before so I just plowed on. Reaching the bottom of the canyon I turned up river and hiked for another three quarters of an hour and although my mind wanted to continue up the side canyon with ‘everything’ I had with me my body suggested we camp overnight and then continue on in the morning. I decided to take it up on this suggestion, found a nice little sandbar and gently unloaded myself. I was amazed to be my regular body mass and how springy it was to walk around without the pack, but enough of this frivolity get the camp ready as night is approaching and I’m hungry, tired, sweaty, dirty and I stank! Ah, the joy of a night time cold river dunk, eecchh!
In the morning I packed everything, shouldered all of it and into the dark depths of the side canyon we went, me and the pack that is as I was alone. Well I was kinda alone as I always hike with the six of us: me, myself and I, the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. I knew where this rough trail was, picked it out from among the pinecones, fallen branches, fallen trees and other fallen stuff and continued up the ridge of the high bank above the little creek. It took about an hour and a half to reach the end of the trail and I was glad to get there. I noted a likely possible almost certain place I could turn into a Best Western with only a little bit of work, plunked my pack down and had at it. I settled for a Motel 6 but it was still mighty fine.
I will now leave out seven days of hiking back and forth up and down the riverbed, up the avalanche hillside, and up and up and up through hot dry country not to mention being sweaty, dirty and stinky. Then going over hill and dale in every possible direction and place save for the one location where the ancient riverbed lies. If of course an avalanche has not taken it out which it could have. So after a solid week of this I said ok enough is enough, on too the second quest the clay hill. And of course I’d taken some heavy equipment up to the high country that I now had to bring back down.
The next morning, 5Sept, I packed it all up and hiked back out to the main trail and back up river past the trail that had brought me in and up a cliff to reach the plateau above where the next old trail was. After about three hours of hiking from the first camp I approached the point where I needed to hike down through the woods to the main river and make camp for the night. The following day started out slowly with the start of the hike not taking place till 10 AM.
From camp I hiked over to this side canyon and proceeded up it with a day bag something anyone would carry on a day hike. It contained a lunch, water, my water filter pump, a gold pan, a small classifier, an empty fifty pound chicken feed sack, a lopping shear, a small hand saw, first aid kit, shovel w/carrying bag, head lamp and a few other simple things like my GPS unit and the new GPS Spot Messenger unit. This side canyon was not made for regular tourist travel in fact its what some people would refer to as a ‘bugger’ thus indicating it was not exactly easy to negotiate. It required scaling some steep loose sections, free climbing going nearly straight up in places and in general it was a test of endurance as well as it stretches ones abilities to the limit and beyond. Up, up, up was the call of the day so I did. I passed the spot where a tiny rivulet of water sprouted from the sidewall of the canyon and thought "I will stop here on my way down and fill up my water container". That, was a mistake and I learned the hard way to replenish my water whenever I could.
I climbed and climbed looking for the spot where I’d seen the hill of clay slumped over onto its side revealing this silver blue clay and I’d come to see what, if anything, had rotted out of the clay. At one point I looked into the higher reaches of the canyon in front of me and said to myself "self you’ve not been there before" I’d gone past "the clay spot". As I looked back down the mountain I’d been climbing up I thought to myself I don’t think I care to go down some of the stuff I’ve just climbed up. I took out my GPS and it told me I was a mere 1400’ from the top. I knew that once I reached the top that there was a trail in there. Also I knew where I could pick up my first, second, third and fourth water supply and that the fourth supply would be in my trusty Bronco along with a blanket and a few things I could make do with for one night and then I would hike back down to my camp. Heck, a little over a thousand feet why I can do that! Off I went only now up was distinctly steeper. I would stop every half hour and send out a SPOT message as I’d been doing all day long and I was looking forward to getting on my computer to look at all these location spots on Google Earth.
I was lucky in that I did not hit any sheer cliffs and fortunate that I could just meander up the mountain. Of course as I mentioned earlier this type of climbing stretches a person so I was actually going up steep cliffs though not sheer exactly. I began to notice that it was approaching evening. At one rest stop I took out my 8.5" x 11" map and realized from GPS locations just where I was going to be cresting this mountain. Then I realized "just where" I was going to be cresting the mountain, a Manzanita Jungle. I’d managed to play in this place but on the other side of it a few times and knew from experience that I was in for a rough time of it. As I got higher the evening winds began to blow over the tops of the ridges and the sun began to sink in the west. I arrived at the fringe of the jungle and managed to follow a few animal trails for a short while but then it was just it and I. I knew I had to cross the jungle and that there was no way through it so I climbed on top of it and began to cross the expanse of this mess in front of me. My hiking staff is a touch over six feet tall and most of the time it just made it up to my waist and my lower legs and feet were just a bit down from the tops of the large supportive Manzanita branches. I was a good distance off the ground.
Every now and then a branch would break and down I’d go. After the second of these descending adventures I looked at my 454 and thought that if that ever falls I will never find it. It took a few minutes balancing on top of branches to remove my pack and then take off the revolver in its shoulder holster and insert the unit into the safety of the pack. While I was at it I got out my headlamp as the sun was really starting to set. At the stopping point of one of these falls I thought it would be a good idea to choose a place to be going too. I got back on top looked around and chose one of the few pine trees that had managed to grow before the jungle really got started. IT was where I was going to. After another long period of time I reached the pine tree, lowered myself down to the ground dropped my pack off and sat leaning on the pack to relax. I turned off the headlamp to conserve the batteries and found myself in this twilight of filtered amber glow. I was tired, my clothes were soaked from sweat, night was coming, I could not have a fire under the pine tree or anywhere else "Under Here" as I would be at the epicenter of the forest fire if I tried a stunt like that but I needed to be active in preparing for the coming night. I looked out through the tangle of pine tree branches and manzanita to the opposite side of the pine tree I’d come in from and what I saw did not look right. I could not imagine what it could be but I knew I had to go find out. I made my way out there and found a clearing of roughly twenty feet in diameter of solid rock and rock does not burn. I loppered, sawed, drug, dug and prepared a camp for the night and built a small reflective fire pit. A fire on this ridge could not be big as the wind gusts would surely take embers into the sky and drop them on the tinder that surrounded me. I was home!
The night winds mostly came from my back. I would lay the pack across my lower legs and feet and then wrap the chicken feed sack around my left shoulder and lay down on it securing it in place and then held the rest of the bag over as much of my chest as it would cover. The little fire was a friend. After some time I broke my last sip of water into two smaller sips. That was the finest tasting liquid I’ve ever had! I had a tiny amount of lunch left but felt I could not eat it as I was afraid my throat would be to dry and I might choke on it. The pine boughs I’d cut to lay on were not very soft and in general were cold but they were still better than laying straight on the rock. After awhile my sweaty feet, still inside my boots, got cold and then they got colder. What to do? I took my boots and socks off and managed to get them a bit dryer by laying them close to the fire and I managed to NOT burn them. With the moisture wicked from my feet and the boots/socks a bit dryer I put them back on and I was better off. I had a small stack of wood ready to put on the coals when I awoke and I’d stacked small pieces of rock around the fire pit in an attempt to have warm rocks to put on myself when I awoke to help keep me warmer. Each time I became comfortable I fell asleep.
I do not know how long it would take for the fire to burn down and for me to wake up shaking from being cold but that was the timer that would wake me up. I would sit up, fold my legs in a circle, place the ‘warm’ rocks into the circle, cover my legs and the warm rocks, place the dry firewood onto the coals and get the fire going again. After the shaking stopped I would go out into the night to locate more firewood. This wood is nothing more than small branches, no logs and I was tired and could not take being up for very long. Getting back to the fire I would rewarm myself, cover over with the sack and the pack and fall asleep. This cycle was repeated over and over though at one point it changed as when I went for more firewood I could easily see my breath and I knew it was cold.
During the night I said many prayers and thought of my loved ones but I was still not ready to use the 911 button on the messenger unit. At one point of sitting up at the fire and getting warm I knew I was going to make it as the sky was different. How many of you have seen the movie "Jeremiah Johnson"? In one scene he and the ‘Old Timer’ that’s taken him on and is showing him the ropes of being a mountain man prepares his bed for the night. They are in the snow and have had a roaring fire, the old timer takes a crude shovel, scrapes the snow away and digs out a ditch. He then throws a goodly portion of embers into the ditch, covers the embers with dirt, puts his bedding on top of the pile and crawls in for the night never saying a word to the tenderfoot. Jeremiah copies what the old timer has just done and goes to sleep on his pile. BUT during the night Jeremiah is awakened by almost being steamed to death. He jumps up and is trying to cool his back side. The old timer merely says "yup, seen it right off, you did not put enough dirt on it". Lesson Learned! Well, was that just Hollywood bunk or was it real? I’d been thinking about this for some time, as there was some dirt on the rock area that might just be enough to try this little stunt. I was afraid that if I tried it in the middle of the night and if it did not work or work for long enough that I could worsen my condition so I waited till the rays of the morning sun were on me. I stoked up the fire, gathered the dirt and when I had a small pile of good coals I put the dirt right on top of it and slightly packed it. I then sat on top of it and it was as cold as ice. I waited and a few minutes more and then I had the warmest tush a person could ask for. It Works but be sure to not pack the dirt too much as that could smother the coals.
Okay suns up, I’m warm and ready to go, I could see better and put together a plan of how to finish crossing the jungle. I go for it and some forty-five minutes later I’m clear of the jungle and into the forest. I noted as I crossed from tree to tree in the jungle that the place I’d stopped at for the night was the only spot I could have had a safe fire at. One more blessing realized. I began hiking through the forest trying to maintain a direction that agreed with the GPS unit that told me where I was on my little map and continued to send out OK messages on the SPOT Messenger. I went around areas of dark woods and brush as I did not want to trap myself in another jungle and besides it was cold in there. I found myself in a small valley at the downhill end. A breeze sprang up and blew the cold night air from the valley onto me and immediately I began to shake. I had been hiking for only three hours and I was already exhausted and obviously still affected from my night of exposure. I’d been hiking but still not making it to the trail I new was there on the corner of my map. I’d been without water for about 14 hours. I knew that at some point my body chemistry would go bad taking rational thinking along with it. I was uncertain of how long I could keep this up without making a major mistake or taking a bad fall. I knew the country around me was rough, the forest and brush were thick and that I was shaking from a mere breeze at 11 O’clock in the late morning. I took out the SPOT messenger looked at it for awhile and pressed the 911 button. I broke down and cried as I’d been backpacking in this canyon system since 1964 and had always been able to get back out on my own including hiking out with a full pack on a broken leg with a severely sprained ankle. For a perfectionist it is tough to give up. I was still shaking but when I looked up I could see sunlight on the hillside to my left. Of course the warm sunlight had to be up a hill I had to climb. I got up there shut the SPOT messenger off and let it neutralize any energy left in the system, turned it back on and sent the second 911 message. After this I just left the unit on as the batteries last for one year with the unit turned on all the time. Also, possibly the blinking 911 light may have been comforting. No helicopter could land up here but I was warm and for the moment I was satisfied with the situation. It took me almost an hour before I could fall asleep which I thought was a bit odd.
I awoke to warmth and it felt good. I decided to find a spot for the night where I could have my back up against a fallen tree as it would deflect wind from that direction. I found the spot, laid down and reached out as far as I could and that was where the fire pit would be. It was now late afternoon and while I building the neatest looking reflective fire pit I noted noises out in the forest. The noises circled my little hill and sounded to me like something was turning over logs and rocks looking for I will say something to eat. I assumed this to be a bear and the thought was not comforting but I knew I could handle it if it came to that. I was still working on the pit when my brain alerted me to a sound that was new though not distinct, my brain said it was important enough to shake me out of thinking about how to set rocks for trapping the most heat. I sat up and listened and it was a faint sound nothing obvious but as I listened I could detect a thump in the sound. A chopper was somewhere out there! Note: This SPOT messenger sends out a helicopter to rescue its clients. I turned towards the sound that was now audible and recognizable and out a long distance away I saw the helo. It flew across the sky in a straight line and then turned directly towards me. I took off my watch and tried to use it to reflect the sunlight that was right in my eyes. The chopper continued to come directly at me. You know they should put windows in the floors of rescue helicopters so they can see this fool on the ground jumping up and down, waving crazily at them, I’d bet they’d at lest smile at the scene. But alas they did not see my reflected signals or me. Then their loudspeaker came on: "Herbert we can’t land we will send in the ground team" and away flew my ride, Darn. Okay I’m going to be saved but finish the fire pit, it is about 3:30 PM.
Around 5:30 I thought I heard a motorcycle but I know the trail coming in here and it is covered with Huge downed trees and no bike will make it all the way here. Sometime after six somebody yelled to Me so being polite I yelled back, their yell had been faint but I could hear "Herbert". I figured they would have a hard time hearing me so I thought of two things to do to let them know someone was out here. First I aligned myself with two 8" diameter pine trees and fired my 454 into the one in front of me. A small chunk came off of the front of that tree but I also detected something had happened in back of the tree. On inspection I found a hole in the back of the tree I’d fired into and an entry hole into the next tree but no exit hole in the second tree. Cool, I can drop a bear no problem with this Insurance Policy I carry. Next I got out this large oddly shaped orange/red emergency whistle I carry in my first aid kit and stuck the whistle in my mouth. Before I blew on it I plugged both ears, as it is loud. I blew on it for several blasts and then listened. Nothing! Every now and then someone would yell my name, I would yell back and then silence. This continued till about 9 PM and it was taking the team a long time to find me even though they had my exact location as that is among the info the SPOT Messenger sends out. It had been cold for some time and after trimming off the lower pine tree branches I had started a fire. The rocks I’d surrounded the pit with reminded me of amphitheater and as I sat there in front of it I was choked with smoke and was stunned and could not figure out what was wrong. But when I laid down I had clear air and all sorts of heat and realized I’d gotten what I had intended to cause a wall that reflected heat and the way I’d made it caused it to be a very directional reflector. I knew that if I spent the night here I would be comfortable, I felt safe.
I decided to do something else to help myself as my rescuers were having trouble getting to me. I took my headlamp and strapped it to the top of my hiking staff with the lamps elastic strap and turned the lamp to its strobe position. I securely planted the bottom of the staff in the ground and there it was my blinking beacon that surely would catch the eye of anyone out there. I lay down in front of the fire with my back to the log and became warm and comfortable and fell softly off to sleep. So lets check out this comfortable to sleep scene: out in the woods is a bear looking for food, I am laying literally on the forest floor where anything crawling by might stop to look at the sight, I need water but with all of this my mind is at peace as I believe all will be well. Then there was a noise and someone shouted to me "Herb is that you"? "Is that your light blinking"? I sat up and shouted back in the mighty wordy response of "YES"! I told them to keep coming as I could hear the branches cracking under the steps and hear them talking on their radios. I began to see glimpses of lights coming through the heavy forest towards me and then they stopped behind a giant Sugar Pine. The people began to shout questions at me like name and age so I responded with the answers. The last question was take off your hat! I removed the hat and the cloth shovel bag and one of them shouted, "That’s The Guy"! I mean how many lost guys could be out there with a bald head and pony tail?? Six guys stormed into my modest situation, the nurse type walked over to me and began to remove his equipment bags and was telling me he was going to roll up my sleeve. I said "sure you need to check my vital signs. Let me give you a heads up, no broken bones, no cuts or bruises and I’ve not had water for 25 hours". My pulse was somewhere around 82 and not where it should be and that was all he checked. He looked up at the other team members and said okay lets start giving him water and electrolytes and something to eat. For about an hour I slowly drank a half-gallon of water and sucked down a half dozen packets of "Goop" the electrolyte stuff. I could not eat the trail bar as my throat was still dry. Somewhere close to midnight with the seven of us huddled around my little fire I looked up at them and informed them "Gentlemen, I’m good to go"! My body is telling me I can hike but even though my pack is light I don’t think I can carry it. To demonstrate my condition I got up and quite solidly walked around without falling or having any balancing problems. The leader of the team called the rescue base station and shared my condition with them and requested a nighttime extraction. He was heavily questioned about this but his responses made the base commander comfortable enough to give him permission to come out. A cautionary statement was given to the leader to make certain to watch me as we were going through rough country with some steep cliffs.
The fire was uhh, put out as bet they could with dirt and ‘moisture’ but they did not want to knock the fireplace rocks down on top of it as it was such a cool fire pit. I had the final say in this and as I’d now had my second fire in a no fire zone I wanted to make certain the embers were smothered so the rocks came down on top of the pit. They fired up all six of their GPS tracking units and we started out by headlamps. They had no trouble keeping track of me or understanding how I was doing as I talked all the way out. They took a few breaks to make certain I was not tired out wrapping me in a space blanket and giving me more water and goop at each stop. We arrived at their motorcycles just as the ground pounders arrived. Lots of happy teasing and hand shakes were given out while the two nurses discussed "the patient". The motorcycle team said goodbye to me but that they would see me back at the command center and off they went into Their Dusty Night. We could hear them struggling to get up the hill and at one point I thought we might even catch up with them. The hiking team told me what supplies they had that I could choose from but when he said a pear I said a real pear not freeze dried. He pulled this perfect pear from his pack and I asked for it. No steak could ever taste as good as that pear. We began our uneventful hike out and at the top we were greeted by two drivers who shuffled us into their vehicles and we were off for the command center. On the hike out they asked me a couple of times how I’d hiked in from the road and I explained I had not come in from the road I’d come up the canyon wall from the river. To this day I still have the feeling they did not believe me.
As the vehicles approached the base camp I was amazed at all the vehicles at the command center and there must have been fifty or so volunteers there and all to help me. Then I saw this good sized hooded fella and I knew it was my son Justin. It was so good to see him and we hugged each other for a long time. I was given a cup of soup and it was so good. More water, was asked a few questions from the sheriff and then he told everyone to fold it up as they’d had a successful rescue. I got everyone’s attention and thanked all of them for being out there to help. After the crowd started to break up one of the command center members a woman came up to my son and I and put her hands on each of our shoulders and said "Sir you brought this young man into this world" and turning to Justin she said "and young man you have brought your father back to the world of the living". I’d already thought about this but having her say it out loud really brought it home and I thanked her for her comments. We tried to get back to the Bronco but when we arrived there I realized the keys were with my pack and that was in Justins car. So we headed back to Auburn and to Denny’s where we found most of the rescue team. More thank you’s and hand shaking then some food and off to sleep for a short while. A few hours later found Justin and I back at the command center location where we asked a kind hearted fellow to give us a ride down to the Bronco as he and his family were going to that exact spot anyway. We drove the Bronco out to my sons car where we transferred items between vehicles and we talked about what I was going to do next. I assured him I was feeling fine and that after I’d made a few phone calls I would hike back to my camp in the canyon and then hike out the following day. A few more hugs and a wave as he continued on and I stopped at my favorite switchback where I knew I had cell phone service and father and son were separated again each off on their own adventure. At the mosquito infested parking area again and after giving a fellow hikers handsome dog a good scratching and a few hugs I started hiking back into the canyon at 7:00 PM and did most of the hike by headlamp, good ole trusty headlamp. I hiked very carefully but unladen as I was, I reached the valley floor in way less than two hours. I mean there was very little in my pack: the SPOT Messenger, the first aid kit, water, some peanut butter trail bars my son gave to me and of course I had the 454 on me. I arrived at my unmolested camp about an hour later. Lowered gear from where I’d stashed it way up high on the end of my steel cable, made dinner, brushed my teeth, gave thanks for being safe and alive and fell quickly to sleep. The hike out in the morning was also uneventful and easy.
My son had encouraged me to purchase the SPOT Messenger. I doubted its usefulness in a thick forest but I followed my son’s insistence and purchased it. All it took was one use and I am a believer and carry it with me on every trip and every hike. I’ve attached a few pictures though they are not from this trip but they are of the exact places and area of this trip and show some of my safety items.
I hope this true story is helpful and reminds folks to be prepared for the unexpected. A signal mirror, a whistle, a first aid kit, a snakebite kit, fire starting materials, water, food, a safety shelter and being on good terms with life all help out there.
This rescue adventure takes place in the mountains to the right of pictureFirst nights camp with creek to the left of picture and main river is what I'm looking at, 2.75 hr hike to hereI spent seven days hiking this country looking for the ancient streambedBedrock of current creekbed, lovely spot, beautiful little canyon only problem avalanches from either sideSome of my survival gear: L to R Bivvy Sack, Spot Messenger w/very loud whistle on top of it, Petzel HeadLamp, two butane lighters
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That boulder bra gets my "outlaw" mind to thinking what serious work could get done by adding the chainsaw type
Great story, thanks for posting.
