By John Racine

Friday, October 09, 2009

Telescope Peak – Day 1

Headed out from the house at about 5:30am. Chris stayed overnight and we made it to Joe’s at 6am. The house was dark with no signs of movement. I made a call to his cell and sent a text message. Five minutes later, I get a text saying, “I’ll be out in 5 minutes.” About 10 minutes later, we were on the road to the rendevous point at highway 101 & 152 – the Shell Station in Gilroy.

We arrived early and shortly later, we heard Dan and Stuart on the radio. Fifteen minutes later we heard Greg and Edric who said they would be there in 15 minutes. Still no sign of Cam. We made numerous attempts to contact Cameron on the HAM radio, but still nothing. Then about 10 minutes later, Cameron and Devon drove in about the same time as Greg and Edric…Cam was on the wrong channel.

Shortly later, we were on the road to Death Valley with four Jeeps and the Dodge (also known as W.T. – “White Trash”). Most of us have names for our rigs.

We made great time on the road and arrived at the first Death Valley Beer stop at about 3:30pm – The Ghost town of Ballerat. It was great to be back in the desert. It was a balmy 92 degrees, but this would soon change.  We posed for the customary group picture.

We decided  to take highway 190 instead of the dirt trail through the canyon to try to make better time. Then about 30 miles later, we were “off road” and ascending fast up the mountain. We made it to Mahogany Camp at about 4:30pm and decided to stay at the lower camp grounds to avoid the other campers. There were just enough camp spots to house all of our rigs and persons…so we owned it that night (and the next).

Everyone got busy working, setting up their tents; then Stuart started making dinner. The tacos were awesome!

After dinner, we got the instruments out and the Death Valley Dogs jam session began…with Greg on acoustic base, Dan, Cam and sometimes Devon on acoustic guitar, Edric on drums (or rubbermaid container) and me on harmonica. We sounded pretty damn good.

We played for several hours while we huddled around the fire. It was about 35 degrees as we were at about 7000 feet in elevation.

Some of the dogs eventually started trickling away to bed as the fire grew weaker and weaker. I finally crashed as well and slept pretty good and even was TOO warm at times.

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Telescope Peak – Day 2

We all woke up at different times to a very chilly morning; making preparations for the days 14 mile round trip hike.

Breakfast was being prepared as I wrote.

We left for the hike at about 10:30am and since we were at the lower camp ground, we decided to walk / hike / trek up the hill to the  entrance to the upper camp site and the official entrance of the hikes starting point. This turned out to be a baaaad idea. The road to the entrance point was long and steep and many of us were burnt out before we even got started. However, we took a break before starting the “real” hike and the beginning of the route had only a slight incline, which was a nice break.

The route, which had a well established trail, was steadily changing in levels of incline; mostly increasing, which was difficult at times and the cause for many rest breaks.

After about a half a mile, the trail revealed the opening view of Bad Water Basin, Death Valley…the lowest point in North America at 282 feet below see level. The view got more and more spectacular as we climbed higher and higher.

We stopped the hike at about noon for lunch at a point where we could see the Panamint Valley floor. After lunch, we continued on and soon got to a point where we could see Death Valley on one side and Panamint Valley on the other. This was a surreal sight and we were at abut 9600 feet in elevation at this point.

We stopped shortly later for another notible rest break. This is the point where Chris developed a cramp in his leg and could not continue on. We gave Chris a HAM radio handheld unit, where he stayed and rested and the rest of us pushed on.

The trip was taking its tole on me, as well as the elevation. I was having some pretty good chest pains that was causing a little concern, but I was able to control it quite a bit by slowing down my pace and getting in the zone. Soon we would make it to the switchbacks and would traverse about 15 of them before reaching the final 100 yards to the summit.

As the majority of the group rounded the final bend, we saw Edric sitting on top. This gave me a second wind and I increased my pace to almost a run and made it to the summit as well. What a tremendous feeling of accomplishment.  

The rest of the Death Valley Dogs made it to the top within minutes. We could see for miles…It was an amazing site.

We all posed for pictures with the “Telescope Peak – 11043 Ft” sign and enjoyed the moment.

After about 10 minutes or so of taking individual glory shots, Dan pulled out the bag of Jackdog’s ashes.I immediately started to get teary eyed. And as we all gathered and remembered the purpose of the trip, all eyes became red with tears.

We gathered around Dan and Jackdog as Dan struggled through his tears to try to speak. “I got no words” Dan said as he grabbed a handful of JackDog’s ashes and tossed them in the air toward the Death Valley side of the ridge. Dan then held the ashes toward Greg, and he took a handful; then Cam, then me; until all the guys were holding a piece of Jackdog in his hand.

Dan then emptied the bag of ashes on the side of the ridge, and all of us following suit and tossed their handful of ashes over the ridge. I felt the need to say something and for lack of better words, I simply said, “To Jack,” realizing the moment I said it that it seemed stupid and wanted to change it to “Welcome Home, Jack.”

No one else said anything as the moment overwhelmed us all. Even Joe was taken by the moment and he had only met Jackdog once before. But Jackdog was that kind of dog. You instantly loved him the moment you saw him. He always greeted you with a wagging tail and a smile.

We gathered ourselves and set up the tripod for a group picture; then picked up our packs and started the descent.

For me the descent was much easier that the climb, although for some of the guys, it was harder on the knees and quads. The last of us started down the mountain and the group almost immediately split up between the fast, medium and slower hikers (at least for the downhill part).

As we got to the lower part of the switchback, right before we picked up Chris, I saw a huge buck on the trail about 25 yards in front of Greg. I tried to get Greg’s attentions without spooking the deer and he eventually turned around and saw the buck take off up the mountain. It was at least a 6 to 8 pointer. It seemed strange to see a deer that big at that elevation, mostly because there were not many level spots for him to bed down.

Dan was feeling sick from the altitude and had a bad headache, which got better as he got further down. Joe was bothered by the decend which caused his quads to tire quickly, but was able to push forward as it sometimes got easiers as the incline leveled out on occasion.

As we reached near the bottom the mountain, moving closer to camp; dusk brought a beautiful sunset, which was a nice ending to the hike.

After the last of us got back to camp, everyone was fried. But we started to make our steak dinner…we earned it.

The regulator on Dan’s grill was not working properly so we threw the steaks on the grill attached to the firepit. The steaks came out great and everyone gobbled them up since we worked up quite an appetite on the hike.

After dinner, we just sat around the fire and talked and joked. We started dropping out one by one to go to bed until eventually, it was all quiet.

I couldn’t get to sleep that night for some reason. I was extremely warm despite the 35 degree temperature outside. My new zero degree sleeping bag really keeps you toasty.

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Telescope Peak – Day 3 – Final

As morning came, I got up about 6:30am and begain gathering my supplies and packing up. I had everything packed up pretty early and Chris did too. The guys all eventually got up and made themselves oatmeal for breakfast and then we started to clean up to get ready to go. We made good time and got started out about 9:30am with the planned stop to the Charcoal Kilns about a mile down the road.

The guys convinced me to dig out my harmonica case to play with Dan & guitar in the kilns. We arrived and got out the instruments and walkin in. I could immediately hear the reverberating sound off the round walls.

I got out a harmonica and just made up a song from scratch and Dan picked up the tune and played with me. It really sounded great. We played a few more songs with Dan, Cam and Devon, then took some pictures and got back on the road.

On the way out of Death Valley, I got on the radio and thanked the guys for another great trip. And as we looked left out of the drivers door window at 9:00, we saw the tip of Telescope Peak where Jackdog made his final hike and will lay to rest forever.

We all said one final goodbye to Jack-dog as we left the valley to our journey home. It was another great trip…with tremendous meaning.