Roads End; Trips end

Group at Roads End (Cliff, Karen, Jo - Frenchie, Lumpy, Bob). Rose was being mollested and couldn't make the picture.

We finish our walk through the sand and make Roads End. Our jeep is still there, and we're pretty happy about that; sometimes the bears break into them looking for food, and totally trash them. We saw pictures of cars with their roofs and trunks torn right off.

As we make the trailhead, we come across the runner chicks lying prostate on the ranger cabin. They were totally exhausted from their run (what a bunch of skirts...25 miles at 100 degrees and they're tired...), and their ride hasn't shown up to pick them up. We offer to have them hang with us, but they decide to wait for their ride a bit longer.

Then, down the trail comes Rose. She'd lagged as the bear wanted to mollest her, and then 6 other hikers, and then God had come down from heaven, and...you get the story. She wants to camp with us tonite, but Bob had a video calculus class he had to take so was busy, and the rest of us were sane so wanted nothing more to do with her.

We drive down the hill a bit to a formal "campsite" where we indulged in $200 worth of burgers and fries at the camp snack bar. Cliff alone eats (I swear) about a tray full of french fries alone. Then, we ran into the runner chicks again, who had finally given up on their ride and we going to walk down the hill to Fresno; that's about 60 miles, down 5k feet, and it's pitch black, with bears, switchbacks, and drunk campers all the way there. We talk them into camping with us; just as we're leaving to setup, there ride shows up, announces that they "got lost" DUH.... and that they should camp there. So, they do that, setting up a small camp adjacent to us, and sleeping like pigs in a blanket side-by-side. The bears are going to be happy about this one, they don't even have to open the tents for the crunchy treats inside the sleeping bags. Rose wants to join us also, but we defer as the campsite is getting pretty full, and besides, none of us have any more mollesting left in us.

Asleep about 20 minutes (under another incredible starfield!), and the bears start. As in, bear raids into the campground about every 20 minutes, all night long. A bear would come into camp, start turning over garbage cans, ripping open coolers that dopey campers had left out on their picnic tables, banging on the bearproof vaults trying to open them, and ripping up cars. Now, this an experience definitely to be undertaken by everyone. The bear makes all the noise, then everyone in the camp wakes up. They release their dogs, who all attack the bear, who then makes even more noise and chases the dogs around camp knocking over stuff everywhere. Then, the campers all come out and start RUNNING AT THE BEAR, banging garbage can lids to try to scare it off (yup, this goes down as probably the stupidest thing I've ever seen in my life). We have about 10 bear raids throughout the night, and I finally end up sleeping in the jeep, with the keys in the ignition, and my trusty swiss army knife in my hang. I'm ready for that bear...

Anyhow, we get through the night, go visit the giant sequoia trees the next morning (they are REALLY big, go see them before you die), and roll down the hill back to Fresno. Margaritas and steaks are the order of the day, and we spend a great afternoon reminescing about the trip, planning our next great adventure, and discussing how Jo can keep her weight down so she can return to her ice dancing career. Bob tells us about his plans to take a video astrology course, Frenchie tells us about her plans to own her first house (in a couple of weeks)...this from the women who can't own shoes that have soles on them...and Karen tells us more stories about "Growing up Anderson".

All in all, a fantastic trip, with an incredible group of people. We persevered in the face of adversity, bonded for life as a group, and even got in a cheap mollestation of Rose. What more can anyone ask for?

Next up: Switching gears to kayak trips..

Lumpy out