BY GABE BRAVEHEART
Special to the Record-Eagle
January 02, 2008 04:00 am Standing in a garage at the equipment issuing building in Lander, Wyoming, I am excited about the 30 days ahead in the wilderness with National Outdoor Leadership School. I talk with my newfound friends that I will be living with for the next month. These people, 15 of us, are from all over the U.S. and are outdoor enthusiasts with varying backcountry skills. I try to learn as many names as I can that first day as I pack my stuff, not really thinking about what is to come. Finally our bus arrives and we are ready to leave, bound for Union Pass in the Fitzpatrick Wilderness quadrant on the U.S. Geological Survey map. After a two-hour ride, we are left at the end of a dirt road. We will not see another motorized vehicle for 30 days. It is too late to start hiking, so we settle down at the trailhead and set up tents and make camp for the first time. We all wonder that night, with excitement, what will happen the next day. The next morning I wake up earlier than anybody. As I walk around enjoying the early morning sun, alone in a quiet world, a fighter jet zooms overhead -- quite low. That's because we are at 10,000 feet. Yet we have not even hiked a mile. For the next four days, we make our way deeper and deeper into the backcountry until we reach a beautiful lake below a magnificent mountain. We settle here for two nights for rock climbing and fly fishing in the wilds of Wyoming. On the third morning, we leave camp and hike up a steep, grassy mountainside to the Continental Divide. It is amazing to see so far, and feel so small. Sitting on top, feeling the cold wind against our faces, planning our route, it looks so easy to get from here to where we are going. But it proves to be four more hours to reach our final destination. We arrive at a small lake surrounded by majestic peaks, where we rest and prepare for a short, fast walk down to another lake. Here we pick up food and ice-climbing gear for the days to come. The next day we ship out, this time with much heavier packs. We climb up into the cold, windy, barren and beautiful rock and ice zone. Eventually we ascend a 13,000-foot glacier called False Peak. Breathing is a bit harder, but on top of this mountain we have a great time. We climb up a snow face across from our camp and practice self-arrests -- stopping ourselves with an ice axe if we fall on a steep, snowy slope. After a few hours sliding around in the snow, we return to camp and enjoy the windy, cold breeze at 13,000 feet. After descending to a picture-perfect camp in the Wind River Mountain range, we pack up and hike over a huge gray glacier to a windy, rocky camp above an icy, majestic lake. From there we scale ice and snow and steep rocks to reach our next camp, located under the highest mountain in Wyoming, Gannett Peak. After dinner, we arrange our gear and go to bed for an early wake-up: 1:30 a.m., so everyone can get up and down the mountain before the weather moves in. It's 2 a.m. We work our way up the snow and ice in the cold, pitch-black morning. In a few hours, we hit the summit -- 13,800 feet -- and watch the sun come up over the surrounding mountains, feeling its warm rays strike our cold faces. We spend about 20 minutes looking down over Wyoming, then begin the long trudge down the mountain. Back at camp, I spend the rest of the day curled under a rock to protect myself from the sun and get some sleep. We are nearing the end of our trip -- time to start the independent student travel. Until this point our instructors have been traveling with us, although giving only minimal advice. But now we're on our own, traveling in groups of four with only a map to guide us. We will meet at the parking lot in four days. These last days are wonderful, hiking along beautiful streams and lakes, fishing for brook trout and cooking in the evenings. On our last hiking day, we travel eight miles on a trail and lose two miles in elevation. Our group is feeling pretty good, and we are moving quickly, jogging at times with 70-pound packs. Finally we reach the end of the trail, very close to civilization. We drop our packs and swim while waiting for the other groups to arrive. It is hard to believe our time in this paradise is coming to an end. The next thing I know we are back in Lander, cleaning and packing our gear for the trip back home. A trek into the backcountry, whether it is four days or 40, always makes me appreciate the natural world. My first night out of the wilderness, I begin to miss the mountains. After 24 hours, I want to go back to the wild and beautiful Wind River mountain range and take in another 30 days. Gabe Braveheart is in the 11th grade at Benzie Central High School.
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Photos
Gabe Braveheart