Tahoe

Fall forward, 2019

April 18, 2020May 11, 2020 Alia S.Leave a comment

Genoa

This climb is pretty civilized, but it’s also 20 miles long. By the time we’re over it, I’m over it: I dump my bike unceremoniously on the rocks and stumble off to stuff my face and drink the view—Lake Tahoe in dreamy blue haze far below.

Sean’s moving my bike out of the way when he notices the headset is loose. After many years of watching my eyes glaze over at the first mention of mechanics, most of these guys would rather fix something for me than watch me make it worse, which suits my version of feminism just fine. Sean tightens the headset and, being both generous and thorough, starts checking the rest of the bike, too.

“Uh, you might to look at this, actually,” he says.

“Don’t care, do whatever,” I reply around the last of my sandwich.

“No, seriously. Do you have a 10?”

One of the pivot bolts has loosened to the point you can see daylight between pieces of the frame. To fix it takes a tool nobody’s carrying, so I face the prospect of a long, baby-head-strewn descent on a bike coming apart at the seams—or on foot.

I’m cry-laughing at my options when a pair of riders appears over the hill behind us—the only other people we’ve seen on the trail all day. After a suspenseful few moments of rummaging through his pack, one of them presents Sean with a 10 millimeter Allen wrench.

I will end the season with my trail karma deep in the red.

*At Mormon Station State Park, an unrelated ailment and an unrelated cure.*

Usal Hopper

I thought sea level might help, but—apart from dropping things out of my pockets—I’m having all the same problems I did at Lost and Found. It’s a beautiful day and the course is a treat, but with a number on I just want to get it over with.

Being not especially athletic, my best strategy for doing this involves spinning slowly up climbs, then riding the descents at a speed at which I can’t actually see anything and a wreck would end in the hospital. Every time I careen past someone fitter than me I hear echos of my former self watching the podiums for my first race, circa 2008.

“It’s not fair,” I’m hissing at my boyfriend, who’s (quite correctly) ignoring me. “She was behind me the whole time and then she just passed me going downhill! Does that even count? It’s just gravity!”

Twelve years, twenty pounds, a ponytail, and a literal awkward turtle ago …

I’m glad, truly, to be better now both at losing and descending. But I still miss those days—back when riding bikes wasn’t cool. From my sample size of two, it appears that organized gravel events are my petty, contrarian hell: something I want to do that the Popular Kids want to do, too.

In the evening the beach is awash in craft beer, peppered with Ibis and Thesis bikes (Ibises? Theses?) posed against driftwood and the sunset for Instagram. In the gentle surf, a pair of yoga-bodied blonde chicks splash naked arm in arm, while various indistinguishable bearded men mill around their string-lit Sprinter vans pretending not to watch. I’ve been trying to study pelicans through my binoculars and now I have to put them down so I don’t look like a creep. I do recall graduating middle school, but I’m so irritated with the whole scene I could spit.

They’re out here, too, though, my Freds, my people. They were the retirees trundling the 60+ miles on un-ironic hybrids; the red-faced couple on a tandem. We don’t speak apart from brief congratulations at the finish, but I decide they’ve dated since high school and met in marching band. I love them as fiercely and unjustifiably as I resent everybody else.

Big Chief

The much-hyped, new-to-us trail is too technical for me: I’m walking more than I’m riding. It’s also bitterly cold, occasionally raining, and, by the time we get back to the car after getting lost and riding in circles for an extra 45 minutes, almost dark.

And I am so, so happy.

Fire season 2018

December 31, 2019December 31, 2019 Alia S.Leave a comment

On the way to Quincy we lunch roadside at the Rock House on Yankee Hill. A wooden cutout of Bigfoot ambles across the gravel lot; there is one valiant, buoyant woman behind the counter.

These are my favorite places. I like some kitsch on the walls, some saran-wrapped muffins in a basket, a menu in Comic Sans—italic. “It’s perfect,” I announce, before the food has even arrived. “We’ll have to come here again.”

Back home two days later I’ll watch the incident map as the Camp Fire crawls inexorably toward this spot, hitting the refresh button every hour until there’s no denying the line has jumped the highway. A year later we’ll drive past the little restaurant’s namesake stone walls, all that’s left.

But today we sit on the back patio, hands and sandwiches striped in the shade of a new trellis roof.

Highway 70 after Yankee Hill has been plucked from a model railroad layout. Pylons perch above the road as it winds through rough-blasted tunnels, past power stations trimmed in fall color. Alongside us, the Feather River is by turns glassy bottle green and churning white, strewn with house-sized boulders as if by petulant gods.

When we arrive in Quincy there’s a small crowd of people standing in the median holding up signs and American flags. In the gathering dusk I can see only white skin and hair under red baseball caps and “TRUMP” scrawled on poster-board. My stomach lurches. They are hit and miss, these old mountain towns, after all. You can only guess how each will manifest its particular nostalgia for timber or mining or dinner on the table at six.

But as we get closer I can make out the small print. The sign says “TRUMP LIES MATTER.” The red caps are embroidered with the seal of the U.S. Marine Corps. The midterms are next week.

The house flips, but Paradise burns. I’m aware my N95 is too big and not sealing properly; I wear it anyway, imprinting it with lip gloss. The tightness in my chest might be from smoke or from first-world guilt—from knowing perfectly well that the apocalyptic yellow curtain hanging over my street would constitute a great day in Delhi.

Nevertheless I flee because I can, to midweek-rate motel rooms in South Lake. While waiting for the days to warm and my friends to arrive I watch, for some reason, the BBC rendition of Daniel Deronda—a sort of Victorian drawing room drama with a surprise dose of Jewish mysticism. One thing leads to another and there I am, not so much working on job applications as Wikipedia-ing Purim and shaking my fist in the name of Vashti, who also did not care to dance for the king.

Hiking alone above Fallen Leaf Lake I step aside for a couple going the other way. The woman has dropped a bandana from her pack, which I retrieve from the trail and offer back to her. “Hey, is this yours?”

“Oh,” she says. “Yeah.” She snatches it back without meeting my eyes or saying thank you, then turns on her heel and jogs back up the trail to where her partner is sniggering into his elbow. I’m puzzled and offended by the entire interaction until, months later, I read a Backpacker Magazine blurb espousing pee rags.

The best ride of the season begins with several hours of pushing my bike up Van Sickle, proceeds to a miserable interlude of backache and altitude-induced puking, and finishes, inexplicably, with my hands in the fur of three golden retrievers unattended at the end of the trail. The first two acts are as likely as the fires to be repeated; the last will presumably never happen again.

A close reader will notice I’m writing, in this case, more than a year after the fact—beginning on a backlog that forces awkward, ungrammatical contortions of temporality because I don’t like to write (read: live) in anything but the present tense. My clairvoyance is only hindsight, and even from one future, what do I know about the next? What does anyone know, of what will befall us, what wind may change?

So dum spiro, spero, I say, for more surprise dogs—through that red-kissed respirator mask or not.

Sierra summer

November 1, 2018January 4, 2019 Alia S.Leave a comment

Bear Valley, 6/16–6/17

I do a lot of walking here, to be honest, in deep duff and up silly-steep Jeep roads, sliding out of my shoes, down stair-step boulders too technical for me even on my new bike. But it doesn’t matter; Bear Valley is dreamland—Tahoe without the crowds. We find a walk-in campsite on a Saturday afternoon (?!) and encounter two other riders all weekend. That’s heavenly.

Emigrant Wilderness, 7/6–7/7

Three things I watch through binoculars, my new toy:

I’m looking down onto Relief Reservoir, puzzled. As well as the rippling scales of wind-driven water, the cobalt canvas breathes with strange plumes of swirling white. Shoal of fish? I spin the wheel into focus. No: pollen from the pines on the slopes above, invisible where it falls in their shade and sparkling where it finds the sun. The effect is that the lake reflects a phantom forest, moonlit clouds drifting behind shadowy trees. “What do you see?” asks a man on the trail behind me. “Pollen,” I announce, as this seems the more sensible answer. He’s still looking at me like I’m nuts.
The galaxy.
Something slinking and bounding across a ledge on the other side of the river. It’s long and nearly red, not a bear, not a fox, not a mountain lion or a bobcat. I’m resigning myself to a Loch Ness mystery when I remember the binoculars, fumble them frantically to my face (which way?) catch the creature just before it vanishes into a crevasse. Pine marten: rare treasure.

I’m reminded of the inscription over the door of Bass Pro Shops in Manteca, where I’d stopped for paracord and cultural tourism. “Welcome fishermen, hunters, and other liars,” it says.

But it was a marten, I swear! I saw his face!

Pinecrest, 7/7–7/8

This is the old-school cross-country we were promised, cliffside catwalks and boulder-strewn switchbacks, barely-there trail petering out into meadows and bogs. It’s a playground for my riding partner and a minefield for me: I crash all of 45 seconds into the descent on Sunday after catching a pedal on a log cut. (“I thought that might happen,” he says as he lifts my bike off me.) My knee balloons as the rest of me deflates proportionally; again I walk most things and again I don’t mind because this place is insane for flowers. There’s Washington and Mariposa lilies, blazing Indian paintbrush, drooping irises, neon fireweed … sunflowers as far as the eye can see.

Downieville, 7/13–7/15

Halfway down the Downieville Downhill, where the river runs turquoise beneath the oaks, I find a half-rotten box “RIGGED WITH EXPLOSIVES.” It contains leaves and a small pile of mismatched cycling shoes. I would very much like an explanation.

On the deck of the Mills Peak lookout the next day, one of us makes an innocuous comment about the view. “I’m made of views,” replies the ranger from behind the door, “and I’ll show you what I mean.” He returns with a notebook and recites a poem that starts somewhere in the Grand Canyon and ends on “the snowmelt of their birth.” I don’t know what you’re supposed to say to a man in a tower who reads you his poetry, I realize, especially when he retreats to his cot and starts playing harmonica.

Tahoe, 8/17–8/18

I stop in Sacramento on the way up to visit a friend with a yard and power tools and instruction for #vanlife-ing my RAV4. She’s eating keto and therefore so do I; by the time I arrive at Donner Lake the next evening I’m so ravenous for carbs I inhale an entire Mountain House meal for two and a bag of chips. Conceivably this is why riding the next day feels so hard. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Summer/fall 2017, reader’s digest

November 30, 2017February 10, 2018 Alia S.2 Comments

or: Can’t take me anywhere; I go anyway

Oakridge, 7/1–7/4

oakridgetrains

Here my sins against stoke included napping in the shuttle van instead of riding Hardesty and getting so pissed off at Middle Fork—the most miserable, deadfall-strewn, mosquito-ridden bushwack I have ever (barely) pedaled: 57 bites accumulated while sweating it out in a jacket—that I opted for a fire-road climb over a second singletrack descent. This did at least get me to the treeline, where Oregon finally starts to look good. Also on the bright side: Alpine, as always; a fun new stopover loop in Klamath; and great company.

Emigrant Wilderness, 8/12–8/13

Quick trip, the granite bright and the wildflowers extravagant. I would consider this my masterclass in third-wheeling but for the presence of Pickles the very helpful blue heeler, who made us four. At night we all watched the perseids smudge war-paint on the sky.

Tahoe, 8/19–8/20

On the Tahoe Rim Trail we found a dog, a beautiful blonde husky with fur like latte art and eyes like the center of a nebula—not sorry, both are true. It was hot and collarless and wandering in the woods. I was leaving my second voicemail at an animal shelter when its owners (we assume) pulled up in an F150 and snatched the animal back without a word. “You should fucking say thank you, assholes, go to hell!” I yelled after their rising dust as the boys cringed. On reflection, this outburst stemmed from an upbringing on both sides of the pond: I take manners seriously, like a Brit, but escalate like a red-blooded American.

At camp we found … a hailstorm. We fled to dinner in town and watched rainbows over the railroad tracks.

And on Donner Summit we found a giant bonsai garden and a geocache. In it, among other things, were letters to a couple—both dead, the wife just recently—whose friends had hiked to the peak to scatter their ashes. “Thank you for being part of my memory. Seven of us have made the trek this morning to pay our respects. … We uncorked a bottle of $5 wine that tasted like $50. We love you, my friend.” Point in my favor, I managed not cry about that one until I got home.

Ventana Wilderness, 9/2–9/4

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From a dirt road pullout high on the ridge, I watched the setting sun drop shafts of light onto the crinkled Pacific through holes in a lid of wildfire smoke. I saw my first tarantula, held my palm to peeling manzanita, and hid in the tent from black flies worse—honest—than anything I can remember from Africa. I revisited Cone Peak, under very different circumstances, and on the coast side of the mountains drove Highway 1 between the mudslides for a preview of the end of the world.

It will be alright, I decided, when it’s all over. This road, these cypress, California, will fall slowly into the sea. The whales will breach with no one watching out where the sky and the water meet, in the same blue haze. A warmer wind will stir the palms. They’ll get too tall to be true.

In the interim, driving home through Fort Hunter Liggett, every massive, moss-draped oak was the most beautiful one I’d ever seen.

Downieville, 9/8–9/10

Concisely: I live for elevation, die at altitude; cursed Mills Peak on the way up, sang its name all the way down; didn’t want to get in Packer Lake and then didn’t want to get out. The usual.

I mostly want to note this insane candy-corn fungus. How does this happen?

Tahoe, 9/16–9/17

Aside from the fact that its main event was mountain biking, the best part of this particular bachelorette party was that these girls were content to Let Me Do Me, no pressure. They toasted with wine and I with tea; they painted their nails while I fastidiously arranged all the polish in a spectrum. ROYGBIV.

Mendocino, 10/7–10/8

At first the trees were radiant, benevolent. I knelt in the needles at their feet and considered praying, probably did. But later on the wind picked up—so gradually I didn’t notice my own rising unease until I lost my GPS track, stopped to pull out a map and registered the muffled howl through the canopy and crack and groan of trunks disappearing into the dark. Small branches rained down around my head as I bolted out of the woods, and though I’d planned on staying for the night I was so relieved to find the car I fled home instead.

As I drove south watching the gale flatten the parched grass along the highway, there was a distinct moment I thought to myself, this would burn like a motherfucker. When the next morning I discovered that it in fact had, there was an infinitesimal and awful moment in which I imagined I had ignited Sonoma County with my mind.

Bend, 10/27–10/30

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I don’t know why I can’t accept that it is winter here, or that I’m too slow to ride with these guys any more, but on the strength of my denial I pushed my bike through snow and hauled it over and under an endless obstacle course of downed trees. I rode literally half of what everybody else did and still was so tired by the end of the weekend that I hyperventilated at Ten Barrel when the waitress informed me they’d run out of giant cast-iron cookies. They hadn’t, either; this was just the boys’ idea of a joke.

I shared anyway*.

IMG_7503 copy — * Possibly the motto for this blog.

Desolation Wilderness, 7/15-7/17

December 13, 2016 Alia S.1 Comment

I’d like to be caught up with my obsessive trip recaps by the end of the year as a matter of mental hygiene. But even given that I did nearly nothing in August or September—having decommissioned another shoulder by crashing, inexplicably, on butter-smooth singletrack two minutes into a ride at Wilder (tame!)—even given that, it’s a daunting backlog. So I will cheat with photos.

We begin with a Bay Area question: is it either Desolation or wilderness if you take Uber to the trailhead?

Below we have Xiu and Marc preparing the best stir-fry beef I’ve ever eaten … and Scott, sitting in a lake with a bag of wine. I love hiking with these guys because they’re strong enough to schlep in the good stuff, whereas all my trips are weight-weenie freeze-dried lentils and tuna.

desolation1 — Slap it like it owes you money.

From the top of Mt. Tallac the next day we could see the shape of the lakes, coves that are only water up close but Caribbean blue from 9,000 feet up. Probably the only one who did not appreciate the view was Beau, on a short leash and tormented cruelly by emboldened summit chipmunks.

Both Beau and I began the trip plowing ahead and chasing birds and finished it limping and whining. Unlike me, Beau is cute and little enough to get a ride out and then sleep under the table at dinner.

desolation — Beau would like you to know that he was in front the who-ole time and this was just the last quarter mile and he could have walked if he really felt like it, OK?

Related: “How could I forget my poles?” I asked myself as I lagged farther and farther behind on the descent.“I had everything all laid out on the floor and ready to go!” Yeah, well …

And I would like you to know that I’m a renter and didn’t choose this rug.

August, etc.

October 15, 2015October 16, 2015 Alia S.Leave a comment

The compulsive weekend recapping has suffered badly in the past few months from my Monday-Friday. Some remedial study:

Desolation Wilderness, 8/1–8/2

We encounter three stoked bros hiking with what appears to be a baby Bisson Friche. It’s puttering gamely along with its paws encased in duct tape. “She’s great!” the first guy tells us, beaming. “She’s totally doing it!”

We set up camp on the slabs and make tiramisu from instant custard and a packet of biscuits. We’re licking the chocolate from the pie tins as the sky bleeds sunset onto the surface of the lake. All this for barely five miles’ walk! My guilt is overridden by joy for being back in the mountains, possible on my busted foot only because the rest of the group carried all that food. I could kiss them, I think, I’m so grateful; I could kiss the ground. When no one’s watching I put my lips to the granite.

Tahoe, 8/22–8/23

Technically I met Matt and Cora on Craigslist, when they bought my first motorcycle—completely inoperable at the time. We’ve never mountain biked together before, so I have to appreciate that they’re willing to gamble on my word again in revising the trip itinerary from lakeside beers to several hours of climbing, no engine.

“I promise it ran fine before it was broken,” I said then, of the crippled Ninja. Of the trail now I’m making similarly dubious assertions. “It’s pretty terrible, to be honest. But trust me, it’s going to be great!”

Tuolumne, 8/29–8/30

This trip is an experiment to see if my foot works well enough to climb outside. It doesn’t, and so instead I walk a long way in order to recall, with the proper respect, that not so long ago I couldn’t manage even that.

When I see Ragged Peak I have to have it, yield to a covetous impulse I might direct to shoes or handbags if I had the budget. The ridgeline is striking but low and I can approach on scree, roll rather than snap if I fall. I’ve also got a clear line of sight and a GPS signal, but feel unreasonably anxious off-trail alone and can’t stop looking over my shoulder. At the top I’m dizzy at the long drop down to the glittering lakes and unnerved by the keen and moan of the wind. I consider and think better of the summit blocks, am dismayed to realize, then, that in fact the when and why and worth of risk is my sole preoccupation—that this calculus is constant whether I climb or not.

Trinity Alps, 9/5–9/6

Another trick of perspective and the dregs of Trinity “Lake.”

Related: in Weaverville I reject a campground as too meth-y. It’s hit or miss this far north, all Jefferson Free State stickers and 14-day stay limits. I try not to be fussy about it, but the gaunt couple whose black and bottomless eyes catch mine as we circle the dim woods are too much. They’re leaning motionless on the crooked grille or hungry maw of a terrifying old Dodge Charger with its windows blown out. “I can’t,” I announce. I have betrayed an uncool suburban weakness, but we move on.

In a friendlier location later that night, I watch the stars and then the fire. There’s a glass bottle resting on the side of the pit, reflecting two crisp miniatures of the wavering flame. They are mirror images of each other, and as the real light flares and fades they seem like a pair of dancers to back and advance on each other across a darkened stage. I attempt to explain this and am met with a long silence. One of the boys is asleep. “I think I get you now,” says the other, eventually. “You never do drugs because you’re always stoned.”

Return of the gimp

April 5, 2015April 29, 2015 Alia S.Leave a comment

By now, I’ve spent enough time disabling and rehabbing limbs that I have a good grasp on the injury gods’ peculiar humor—a potent and sophisticated blend of irony, caprice, and comic timing. So as the date of my return to weekend-warrior-ing approached, I grew wary. A long and challenging work project finished, a semi-frantic house-hunt happily resolved, all my bikes and knees working, and my very own trad rack: that only sounds like a setup for an excellent summer. In reality, it’s just asking for it.

Therefore on Thursday, as I test-rode my new motorcycle, I honored the speed limit and scanned the road for errant deer. I came home, did my PT exercises with the fervor of a rosary, and ate token salad. I packed my bags for Tahoe with every piece of mountain biking armor I own, making a solemn pledge to check my ego and walk any obstacle anywhere near the limit of my abilities. I brushed my teeth, popped some echinacea, slipped on the stairs like a goddamn grandma and broke my foot.

womp — Ah, Alta Bates. It had clearly been too long!

The emergency room never fails to entertain. The surgeon on duty, bald and mad-eyed, cruised the hallways in scrubs whistling “Ode to Joy” while a collection of strapped-down drunks raved at him from various parked stretchers. I chatted with a girl whose muggers had punched her—quite unnecessarily, I thought—in the nose. Around 4 a.m., the PA brought me some graham crackers and prepared a splint. “Is it possible to tape it at, like … maybe an angle that doesn’t hurt as much?” I inquired. “Sure,” she smiled, serene, “if you’d like for the doctor to have to re-break it later.”

“Never mind,” I said. The mugged girl made a sympathetic face.

Well, I did trie. — I even tried to Strava this little adventure, but I was moving so slowly it wouldn’t get off auto-pause. -_-

Since I can’t get a surgery verdict until later this week—and since Jack promised me cookies—I went to Tahoe anyway. One short-lived attempt at “hiking” on crutches was enough to put the fear of fractured wrists in me, so now I’m in the market for some other way to get out on trails, short of crawling. (Current front-runner: pony). Let me know if you’ve got ideas.

In the interim, I’m dusting off what I learned (or hope I learned) the last time around: perspective and patience, grace and gratitude and grit. And I ordered myself five pounds of pancake mix on Amazon Prime, just in case I get too tired to hop down the hill for food. So, you know. Pretty much invincible.

South Lake, 8/23-8/24

August 26, 2014 Alia S.Leave a comment

Ooooooh, altitude.

Freel Pass, alas, about 9,000 feet above my lowly lowland home. — Hurting at Freel Pass, alas, 9,000 feet above my lowly lowland home.

Deliberately made this ride shorter and e-e-ven slower than the first time I tried it and still barfed halfway up Star Lake Connector. Pretty charming, I know.

Sunday marked a minor milestone in my quest for multisport mediocrity because it was the first time I’ve ever mountain biked and climbed in the same day. Climbed, that is, a total of one 50-foot sport route, basically roadside … but I’ll take it on a technicality.

Also pretty sweet: Corral Trail’s new table-tops (that I almost got brave enough to try for real); miraculous last-minute reservations at Fallen Leaf so we didn’t have to sleep in a ditch; my trip buddy forgetting to bring a book and consequently getting bored enough in camp to swap my tires for me. Bwaha!

“Desolation”, 2/15-2/16

February 18, 2014April 26, 2014 Alia S.Leave a comment

Not especially desolate—never made it more than a few miles from the sled-strewn trailhead. For someone with more experience this would probably qualify as a bust, but as a novice I was still happy to be outside and learning. I now know the definition of postholing, for example, and what snow-pack at 32 percent of normal actually looks like: endless creek crossings, lots of bushwhacking, and ungainly tumbles into just-hidden pits of manzanita. Possibly this information could have been more efficiently gathered from the appropriate chapter of Freedom of the Hills (or, frankly, an additional five minutes’ consideration of the topo), but, uh … whatever. There are advantages to learning from experience.

Pleasant interlude of actual snowshoeing.

And anyway—the slow going always makes the best parts better.

October 28, 2013March 25, 2014 Alia S.Leave a comment

I am celebrating (read: icing) the most Type II fun I’ve had in a long time. Or as Matt puts it:

Somebody activate my Obamacare
< bro > Because that trip was si-i-ick < /bro >

On my tiptoes. The whole weekend was a reach.

These guys were saintly, per usual, providing shop-work and snacks and sweet little lies about the amount of time they spent waiting in the wind—a knife’s-edge promise of the next day’s snow—while I dragged myself up climbs hours longer than anything I’ve attempted in years. The altitude upped the ante from “this is tough” to “I tried to ride over a tree root and I yakked up breakfast.” Pffffttttt. I love the mountains, madly, honest, but it seem that love alone won’t turn the pedals: I did a lot of walking my bike and a lot of “deciding” to sell the damn thing at the first available opportunity.

Fortunately, Jacob and I have a long friendship based largely on dismissing each other’s dramatics. “Oh, please,” he said, around the seventh or eighth time I announced I couldn’t continue. “You know you’re going to do the whole ride.” Yeah, well … OK.

Star Lake. Exhaustion to wonderment ratio approaching parity.

Anyway. There was this—the end of the season, shining on the water—and Tahoe blazing blue on the horizon, the snow packed into my pedals on the thin traverses and the glowing aspen leaves’ addled spin to the tumbledown granite of the creekbed. Maybe it was only my eyes gone bleary with the effort, but I swear every last little thing looked lit and living from the inside out. Typical: I can’t breathe here but can only breathe here. And what can I ever do about that?