With a shout, rustling tumbles,
and crashing, I turned quickly in the saddle to look behind me. The sight I saw was not what I ever expected
to see.
Mark’s pack horse was tumbling
over and over down the steep left slope.
Over and over she went through the rhodo and shrubs. She bounced off trees, stalling at some, only
to struggle to rise and tumble down further.
Confusion, fear, and shouting
followed.
My adrenaline immediately
sky-rocketed. My hands tightened on my
reins and my left spur crept into Will’s side to encourage him to not take any
foul steps in the down hill direction.
In heightened fear of him falling I recognized that I needed to calm
myself if I wanted to prevent him from becoming upset. I had no idea how he and the other animals
would react to one of their own taking such a huge fall – one that may be
ending in fatal injury.
Hov shouted for me to continue to
a place to better secure our animals. I
moved forward several hundred feet. The
trail didn’t improve. The best I could
do was a place with some large trees blocking a fall from the downhill
side. I dismounted and stood on the
uphill. Hov dismounted and secured his
animals and walked back to help. Missy
dismounted behind him and waited with me.
We could hear raised voices, the
rustle and cracking of vegetation and frightened whinnies from behind us around
a slight curve in the trail.
Missy and I talked quietly. Nonsensical small talk and sharing of stories
mostly to get our minds off what had happened, but inevitably we wondered what
was going on. Was the horse okay? What would this mean for the trip? Would these trails get any better?
I kept asking her questions as to
what was happening as her vantage point was a bit better than mine. It was 5 to 10 minutes before Tom came up the
trail within ear shot. I passed word
through Missy that I had injectible Banamine somewhere in my saddle bags that
Lucy had included in case of a fatal injury since firearms weren’t permitted in
the park.
Tom said he didn’t think the
horse needed it. I sighed in relief.
“How is she then?” I
queried. He said that she was standing
and was okay, but was cut up pretty bad in several places. There was a lot of blood. My heart quickened again. Tom walked back down the trail to continue
helping.
A few minutes more passed. Hov came back up the trail. He said the horse would be okay, but wouldn’t
be continuing. Mark would take her out
and get vet help. He advised the others
to turn around and go back to the drop point where a camp was and he and I
would continue to the top. He said he’d
have done it by himself, but he didn’t think his horse would go without Will
Black, his pasture mate.
So it was settled, he and I would
ride ahead, drop the stuff, tell the others waiting at the top what had
happened, and then turn around and come back to the drop point camp for the
night and leave tomorrow.
At this point I’m calm, but only
because I have to be for the horses.
Deep in the back of my mind my thoughts are racing with fear.
I mount back up and give Will all
cues to stay RIGHT and not get anywhere near that left hand side. I wasn’t worried about either of the mules
Hov and I were pulling. Mules are
sure-footed sons of bitches. If
anything, I was pondering why the hell I wasn’t riding a mule. A horse seemed so inferior at this point.
We continued on the trail upward
winding through several intermittent streams as we rose up. The condition of the trail didn’t improve at
all. While my reins were loose, my
stay-on-the-uphill-side cues were applied and my hands were gripped
white-knuckled around the reins. My body
was calm. All cues I could give to the
horse to upset him or worry him were as calm as I could feasibly get them, but
my mind was still racing.
:
: : : :
Hov and I had a quiet ride, each
of us lost in our own thoughts.
With time we made it to the
AT. I gave a whoop of excitement. We turned left and continued, now along a
heavily wooded ridgeline. This was a big
improvement in my mind and I started to settle down, but I was still very much
alert.
Pulling Ernest behind me; this was somewhere before Sierra tumbled down the mountain |
The weather was nicer up here
already. Not so humid and quite a bit
breezier. The vegetation had changed
from a primarily deciduous forest, to a more coniferous one. The scent of red spruce and other conifers
never ceases to calm me. Its one of my
favorite smells and brings about a wealth of positive memories.
The AT was steep and by large the
rockiest trail I’d ever ridden on. I
remarked to Hov, “Creek bed, trail, pff, same thing!” I fall back on my snarky nature in times of
stress. Its just what I do. I need to find reasons to laugh; it tricks my
head into calming down.
We continued onward without
incident other than slowness from the rough terrain. I enjoyed the views, kept my
keep-to-the-uphill cues going for Will in the narrow drop off sections, and
watched listened to the wealth of high elevation bird species and plant life(because
I’m a nature nerd like that).
:
: : : :
Finally, many miles and hours
later, we arrived at the drop point. It
was 6:30p.
Wag and Melinda were there
unloading. They were just as exhausted
as we were and not overly thrilled to hear that they would HAVE to go back down
now. They had planned to tell us when we
all arrived that they wouldn’t be going down, ain’t no way, ain’t no how.
Amidst joking at our misfortune,
we unloaded what we’d brought and loaded another pack our helpers had brought
for Vetice. The helpers took off ahead
of us on their fast gaited/racking horses and we followed a little ways after.
Hov and I were all about letting
our horses truck ahead full steam in the home ward direction as long as they
had the gusto to go. My mule wasn’t as
thrilled, but kept up better than he had during the first half. Wag and Melinda weren’t far behind. We covered in an hour what had taken us
1h:40m to do before.
Where the trail became very rocky
Hov and I both dismounted and decided to walk the rest of the trail. Wag had sprained his ankle a day or so prior
and didn’t have this option, and Melinda decided to ride, too.
I decided at this point, as I
hiked along skidding over rocks and doing all I could do not to twist my ankle
or fall (or let Will Black walk over top of me – bad manners!) that the Man from Snowy River ain’t got shit on
us.
:
: : : :
In sum, it took 1h:40m to get off
the AT and back onto the Big Creek section of trail. It was 8:43p by this point, and it would
become truly dark around 9:30-9:45p. We
probably hiked 4 or 5 miles of the Big Creek trail before it got truly dark.
By this point I was leading his
riding horse, Captain, because Will Black had nearly knocked me over a half
dozen times. Will and Ernest mule were
attached. The order was like this: me
leading Cap, Doc mule following loose behind, Hov leading Will and Ernest mule,
Melinda riding, Wag riding and pulling his two behind.
Once I had the flashlight I felt
a little better. Hiking in my cowboy
boots wasn’t ideal. I could feel
blisters beginning to form by the time we’d finished the AT section. It was funny how my thoughts of sitting
around eating and talking with friends when we made it to camp, changed to how
thirsty and hungry I was, changed to how ready I was to be done, changed to how
much my feet hurt, changed to fuck, my feet really hurt, changed to my feet are
killing me but I can’t stop must.get.to.camp.
Stumbling sight unseen on that
trail for the time I did without a flashlight was a big thing for me to
do. I was so nervous and scared through
each step of that narrow trail. Cap
wouldn’t get off my butt, but wasn’t being as bad as Will had been.
I was aware horses have very good
night vision compared to us, and that they would be just fine walking along,
but I was still rattled from watching Mark’s horse tumble down, down, down.
I was reliving the scene in my
mind as we came upon the place where she had gone over the edge. Hov had warned the trail was particularly
soft there. I didn’t yet have a
flashlight, but could sense that the trail had changed a bit. I became even more cautious than I already
was. Then Cap started blowing and
snorting.
I noticed the pack saddle and pad
lying ahead on the uphill side of the tiny trail. I called back to Hov to let him know. I then proceeded cautiously, talking as
calmly as I could to Cap to get him by.
I fell over twice, on the uphill side thankfully, but made it by without
major incident. Doc was very spooked
though and came speeding up on us startling Cap.
Doc rammed I into Cap’s butt,
almost pushing him off the trail, then went uphill and passed around us (how
the hell?!) and continued for a few feet down the trail before turning in
fright and running back at Cap and ramming into him from the front while I held
onto the lead in fright. Doc stopped –
miraculously – perched precariously on the downhill drop off. Damned mules and their suction cup traction,
it was incredible.
I managed to get Cap around Doc
and have Doc continue to follow behind.
We continued for a little more before Hov let me get out a flashlight,
with the warning to not shine it anywhere in the direction of the horses, only
in front of me to see as it would ruin the horse’s night vision. He cautioned me to turn it off if the horse
had an issue.
While the flashlight calmed me
some, it didn’t help me walk much better.
Cap was still kicking my ass in that department. I still continued to stumble as I tried my
damndest to remember pieces of the trail to judge how far from camp I was. At some point near the end, Captain gave up
on me being a pathetic little two-legged being and decided there was no rush
and it would be good to just stop and eat, randomly jerking the lead out of my
hand.
I was singing 4-H camp songs
aloud to myself at this point to distract my mind from my feet and the
distance. As I finished with the fast
ones I could recollect and started into a slow song, I saw lights.
To be continued…
Oh man... hiking in cowboy boots! And that poor horse! It sounds like despite the more difficult elements, you're having a wonderful time. :) I'm so happy you're getting an experience like this and I'm a little jealous of your adventure. Thinking of you, friend!
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