Peace--Wheeler Peak 2010 (Days 28, 29, 30 and 31)

The one thing that UWC doesn't have much of is peace. Life here is often so busy, stressful, and crazy that it's easy to go 2, maybe even 3 weeks without any peace and quiet. I often have to force myself to read for 15 minutes--just to get some peace.The wonderful aspect of wilderness is that peace is forced upon you--lying in bed (or a sleeping bag), there's no screaming, shouting, banging, or any loud noises. Just peace. Wheeler Peak 2010 was one of the peaceful trips--an escape, if you will.

First, I'll sum up the remainder of the week. Basically, this week was pretty peaceful. Teachers gave me work, and I did said work. On Wednesday evening, we had matriculation night, which I discussed in my last post. As promised, below are photos from the event. (I'm signing the book, and sitting next to me is Lisa Darling, President of UWC-USA)

Signing the book

A slightly more photogenic shot

Thursday and Friday flew past in a blur. On Friday evening, after several nefarious activities, I got to bed around 1 AM. I had to get up at 5:45. Talk about a painful wake-up! It was alright, though, because we were off to Wheeler Peak!! Wheeler Peak is the tallest mountain in New Mexico. It's located wayyyy up in the north of the state, about a 2.5 hour drive from campus. We left UWC at 6:30, and arrived at the Trailhead around 9 AM. The trailhead is actually located next to the parking lot for Taos Ski Valley. For those of you who don't know, Taos is famed for it's incredible and challenging skiing (Yes, in New Mexico).

Taos!

Base Area.

Once we were organized, we set off. Who do I mean by we? On my team were Charlotte and Tad, our team leaders, and then me, Andreina, Kyoko, and Jane. We had a really small team, which was really nice, because we got to know each other a lot better than we would have if we had been in a big team. Ironically enough, our team was the only team chosen not to summit Wheeler Peak. Due to the high interest in the trip (we had over 50 people!!), there were too many teams going up for everyone to go to Wheeler Peak. Instead, our team went to Gold Hill. Hill is somewhat of a misnomer, given that this "hill" has its summit at a little under 13,000 ft. In actual fact, the summit of Gold Hill is only 400 ft below Wheeler Peak, so it's not bad at all!! We hiked for about 3.5 hours up through Aspen, then Pine Forest. It was incredibly beautiful, but also hard work. The trailhead for our hike was located at about 9,000 ft. We climbed about 3,000 ft to our camp--really, really hard work. The trail itself wasn't that steep, but just a long, gradual incline.

The trail up...

At about 3 PM, we reached the treeline. It was almost surreal to be walking in a thick pine forest, only to emerge seconds later into a bowl, with massive ridges all around (and no trees!). It was absolutely stunning! We had a quick lunch, and then set up our Megamids. Megamids are like a hybrid between a tent and a tarp. A tent would completely enclose you (including the floor). Megameds are identical to a tent, except they don't have a floor.

The view at the top

Megamid!

Once we'd set up our tents and rested a bit, we got ready to climb up to the ridge. I don't really have a photo that does it full justice, but the climb was intense. We probably climbed ~700 ft at about a 50-60 degree incline. Given the altitude (over 12,000 ft or 4,000 m), we were all panting heavily by the time we reached the top. The view from the top, though, was insane! The sheer beauty of the surrounding mountains was overwhelming. The ridge was covered in wild grass, which made for great photo material.

My favorite photo of the entire trip!

Our tents are so small (can you see them??)

The valley we hiked up...just beautiful!

Some context...

We hiked along the ridge for a while, just overwhelmed by the beauty of it all (at least, I was!!) We took a few more photos, and then headed down. Of course, we managed to choose one of the harder routes down. Picture this: A sheer slope, with rocks everywhere, and no grip. Welcome to our descent. In actual fact, it was a lot of fun, and we had a great time.

Looking up the ridge

Don't look down!!

Our fearless leader surveying the slope!

Once we were down, Charlotte and Jane cooked a delicious dinner (Curry!!), and then we headed to bed. While we were eating dinner, we were interrupted several times by a mysterious howling. We looked around, and Tad spotted a mysterious animal up on the ridge. By its stature and size, we deduced that it was either a) a feral dog, or b) a coyote. Either way, neither options seemed particularly pleasant. With that on our mind, we snuggled up for bed for a long sleep. Or at least, that was what we had planned. Fast forward to 4:30 AM, and our camp was awoken by a sharp noise. We all lay there, all pretending to be asleep, while we tried to figure out what on earth that sound was. Finally, when I heard Tad and Charlotte moving next to me, I asked them what the noise was. It was Elk. We're not quite sure what they were doing, but the options range from A) the elks mating to B) the elks scaring off the coyote. Either way, it sounded as though they were dying. This delightful noise continued for at least an hour, each time seeming closer and closer to camp. Needless to say, it was very difficult to go back to sleep with that racket going on outside. We actually ended up getting up around 6 AM. Boy, was it cold!!! It was not a pleasant feeling getting out of my sleeping bag and slipping on my cold jacket and shoes. While I shivered, Tad packed up the Megamids, and Charlotte and Jane prepared breakfast.

A rather cold breakfast...

It took us about 2 hours to have breakfast and pack up camp, throughout which I felt really, really cold. We rolled out of camp (we literally rolled, we were so stuffed after breakfast...) at around 8 AM. The descent was quite a lot easier than the ascent. About 20 minutes into the hike, we stopped at a mountain stream to gather water.

A beautiful, cold mountain stream!

Ultimately, it took us about an hour and a half to get down. That's right...we went twice as fast coming down. We arrived at the bus before everyone else (Yay!!), around 10 AM. The other teams slowly trickled in behind us, and we pulled out of the parking lot around 11:30. The ride home was uneventful, with nearly everyone (including me) sleeping. Once we arrived back at campus, however, we couldn't leave. (Oh, no...) We had to help clean-up! Wilderness cleanup is definitely my least favorite part of Wilderness. Even with roughly 50 people working, it took us about 2 hours to cleanup. I felt totally spent when I finally arrived back at my room around 4!

Ultimately, Wheeler Peak (or Gold Hill) was an amazing experience. I got to know some great people, and I learned a lot about myself and my limits. I'll definitely be doing more wilderness in the future! The unfortunate side-effect of Wilderness, however, is that I didn't have a weekend. That means I did no homework. Thus, this week is going to be difficult. I'll try to blog on Wednesday, but I hope that this post slightly makes up if I don't! In sum, my first proper Wilderness expedition was pretty cool, and the sky's the limit!