On May 10th, I went on an exploratory hike at Hood Mountain in Santa Rosa with my wonderful Wanderwomen buddies Anja, Nancy and Annie. This was supposed to be an easy two hour loop with lovely views in an idyllic setting on a beautiful day. Okay, that was the plan. I liked it. It sounded perfect. Oh, and for the record, I have to give you this disclaimer that this is just one reporter's opinion of our "easy loop" hike. This may not be the opinions of my cohorts.
It started out well. All went according to plan. We found our trail head off the parking lot and started out on our Great Adventure. We even had a map of the loop we planned to do. Everything was looking good.
Well, we got really, really lost! (I seem to do that a lot lately.) Now, if you ask Anja, she says we were never really lost... we just didn't know how to get back to the car. Now I call that lost or, to use the Yiddish expression "farblondjhet," translated as meaning "to wander blindly." I guess it's all a state of mind.
So, this is what happened...after hiking for about an hour and a half, the trail ended abruptly, which our trusty little map failed to tell us. We figured this out when we saw a little sign that read, "end of trail." After some debate and discussion about what to do, we decided to go off-trail, cross-country back to the car instead of retracing our steps from whence we came. Annie, Anja and Nancy thought it would be a short cut back to the car and decided that was the best way to go... I thought this was the beginning of the end.
Anyway, after clomping through this unknown territory for what seemed like an interminable amount of time, we somehow got turned around out in the middle of nowhere (which was actually somewhere, but the "where" part was questionable) and couldn't figure out how to get from point A (where we were) to Point B (where the car was parked). So, we wandered endlessly (or so it seemed) across hills and dales and rivers and meadows (which were probably loaded with pirana tics and rattle snakes galore!) After about an hour of our "farblondjhetness," I was trying to call for a helicopter and rescue team, but my darn cheapo cell phone didn't get any reception! I was already planning my "survival" kit for the next wilderness outing: waterproof matches, a blanket, a GPS, a compass, flares, bandaids, a flashlight, Q-tips, a little sewing kit, a tic removal kit, a pair of tweezers, an extra pair of socks, walkie-talkies, a bow and arrow, a better cell phone, a blow up mattress, a gallon of water, a towel, a washcloth, a fleece jacket, an umbrella, a pillow, food for at least three days, a pot-up tent, my jammies, and my teddy bear... and, if I can swing it, a forest ranger.)
We climbed over a barbed wire "private property" fence (actually, I slid under because I didn't want to get any barbs in my butt), snuck by a herd of giant, woman-eating mad-cows (or at least that's what they looked like to me from my city-girl perspective), waded through a river in water up to our knees (I was a little annoyed about getting my relatively new shoes all wet, but I shouldn't complain because Annie slipped in the river and realized later that she had broken her little toe!), climbed up steep slopes and then back down again when we realized there was a sheer drop-off at the top.
At one point, Annie, Anja and Nancy were even using Annie's necklace as a pendulum over the map and were asking it which way we should go to get back to the car... traversing IN the river (Anja calls it a "creek" when I thought it was more akin to the Amazon or Mississippi Rivers), trekking over the hills, retracing our steps, or going through the middle of the cow field. I felt like we were really in trouble at this point... we were now talking to a necklace. Oy! As it turned out, the pendulum was even better than a compass because it told us that the river was probably the best bet. Believe it or not, the pendulum was right because we FINALLY found our way back to the car by walking IN the river to where we recognized a beaver dam that we had crossed earlier and found the trail we were originally on!
This easy two hour hike took four hours! Yes, we were tired and wet, but we got back safe and sound. (Hmmm, what does that mean exactly... "sound"? When someone asks me how I am, I never say, "I'm feeling really sound today, how are you?" Oh well, you get the drift.)
When we were driving back to civilization, Nancy, Anja and Annie said afterwards that they had fun! Can you believe that?? Fun?? I said I thought "fun" was too strong a word. I thought we were going to die out there, but I didn't want to worry them, so I kept these thoughts to myself.
On a positive note... I have to say that the views, the wild flowers, the meadows, the mountains, the weather and my fellow hikers were all beautiful. And, I couldn't have picked more capable, fun, delightful, calm women to be lost with. I put my life in their hands and they saved the day! For that, I am most thankful to Anja, Annie and Nancy and they have my undying (for not letting me die out there in the wilderness) gratitude!
