Our neighbor Amelia had invited us (and Milton) to do a locals-only hike with her and some other friends on Sunday. Since it was a longer hike (9-13 miles, no one was sure) that would take most of the day, H opted to spend the day with his folks. Milton and I joined the crew and just after 8 a.m., eight people and four dogs headed off. But first, the three who had done the hike before swore the rest of us to secrecy. So I will be sharing photos and a description, but no pins/tags on social media and no directions.
This hike required a shuttle so we left a van at the empty Millcreek parking lot and took the other two trucks up to the start. We walked on a jeep road for a while, the dogs running and sniffing and getting used to each other; besides Milton we had Amelia's Moscow, Dave's Tank and Trooper, a chunky chocolate lab visiting from Colorado. When the road deadended, we dropped down into a wash. There wasn't any water flowing at that time but there had been recently, so both Milton and Trooper immediately plunged into the biggest pool they could find.
We continued down this wash for a while until it joined up with a branch of Millcreek, which was flowing nicely. This was great because it meant that there was plenty of water for the dogs. We stopped several times to check out petroglyphs and pictograms, and had lunch under the shade of an excellent arch.
Last summer's floods had changed the course of the creek quite a lot (apparently) and we had to bushwhack somewhat where the trail had been swept away. It was super pretty, though, and nice to walk in the creek. We stopped to soak our hats and shirts as the sun climbed higher; I put Milton's white (white-ish) t-shirt on him when he started looking hot.
For about eight miles we had this hike all to ourselves and when we finally heard voices of folks coming up from the left hand fork of Millcreek, it was a little startling. We came out above the plunge pool and slid down some rock to get into it. It was here that I slipped, rolled my right ankle and heard a POP. "Well, that can't be good," I thought. It was immediately sore and weak-feeling, and my Achilles tendon (which has been bothering me for a while now) was painful and stiff, but I could walk on it.
As we headed for the trailhead, weaving our way through the increasing crowds, I fell behind. Our neighbor Lauren slowed down for me and I told her what had happened. She stayed with me - Milton, himself quite tired, didn't mind the extremely slow pace I was setting - for the last mile, which unfortunately included lots of people, some rock scrambling and a couple of creek crossings. When we got to where the two Millcreek branches join, the water was much colder and more than twice as high and fast as it had been. Lauren and I got across but we had to call and coax Milton: he didn't like it and got carried by the current a little before he found a shallower crossing.
When we joined everyone at the van, someone in our crew was like, why didn't you say anything [about your ankle]? But what was there to say? I could walk on it, I needed to get back to the car, and it wasn't like we were going to call SAR for me. So they gave me a beer and made me sit down in the van, and, as locals, we pointedly ignoring everyone who wanted our parking spot, as we toasted a very excellent hike. The dogs would surely have agreed with the consensus except that they were all passed out, exhausted, under the van.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment