[West Coast, USA]
Solo backpacking delivers huge rewards. I spent a week alone in this remote area.
I’m quickly reminded again of what carrying a 50 pound pack is all about. I think of the enormous strength and endurance of athletes, of just what the human body can do. I consider the crushing physical hardships that so many endure around the world in their work and in their migrations. What a pampered life I lead, with its perfectly calibrated comforts.
So on this first hike up, I decide to just keep going and to observe myself moving out of the zone of physical and mental ease.
After an hour of hard walking up, the pack’s shoulder and waist belts are chaffing. I feel the elevation. I’m tired. But I keep going at as fast a pace as I can without winding myself. At two hours I’m really hot and thirsty, but confirm to myself that there’s a lot of margin by which I can handle more of this simple pain and tiredness. I drink some water as I walk.
I’m trying to focus on longer, deeper breaths, on the rhythm of these breaths, and on my heartbeat. I notice that I immediately lose steam when I start to day-dream. It’s only by being attentive that I can use the full capacity of my lungs.
The last hour is nasty. And when I stop, I feel both a sense of accomplishment and a reminder that I’d again forgotten about the nature of really hard physical work.
I wrote a long essay that tried to capture the magic of the broader wilderness experience.