Highway 138 (mile 1948) to Windigo Road (mile 1878)
I’m pretending I’m walking on another planet. Dark droopy trees reced in all directions, their high branches cover much of the grey-white sky, their long grey trunks plunging towards the ground like Greek columns. Shafts of slanting light tell me the sun is less than a hands width above the tree tops, colored a violent neon red from the smoke so thick that it creates bands across the sun. I could be looking at Jupiter instead of our familiar yellow ball, or maybe another red giant in another solar system with another set of planets, one where they just happen to have long hiking trails and pine forests.
My feet hurt so so bad.
We’ve been on trail for nearly eleven hours including breaks and we’re about to hike our longest day yet. 30 miles with 4,000 feet of both gain and loss. I known we’re almost there but I won’t celebrate yet. Finally, I can’t take it any longer, my patience snaps and I pull out my phone to check how far we are from camp. 0.8 miles from Windigo Road. I sag with relief, I’m almost there and then I can sit down and nothing will feel as good as sitting down.
We hit the road at 8pm and we’ve done it. There is a message board with only one note on a tiny piece of green lined notebook paper, on which someone has scrawled “welcome humanoids.” That feels about as good a welcome as any, I suppose.