Lately as I’ve been in critical identity crisis, due to the fact that the wild around me is literally burnt to a blackened crisp, and will be for quite some time, I am spending some healing time through retrospection. I’m poring over old photos of myself in the wild, remembering those vibrant wilderness times when I thrived, sometimes even with knitting involved.
In the High Sierras, late 90’s, me, knitting in the wild even way back then, while relaxing in in the late afternoon with knitting, coffee, and wilderness. . . all together is just about as good as it gets , and a real defining concept for me. I discovered this photo of my first ever wild-knitted thing, a colorful hat, and in posting it here it is somehow brought back to life…
The old beloved hat I had knit probably 15 years earlier, was packed in my backpack every trip to the Sierras, for those very cold late afternoons when the sun has dropped enough to leave only shadow in the camp, and the chilly evenings and downright frigid mornings at altitude. I lost it on a ski slope somewhere in the Sierras, and can you imagine how sad that was! Ah, but to lose a hat on a mountain trail is a noble loss indeed. I am sure someone found it and took it home with them.
Knitting in the Canadian wilderness, perched over a wild stream, in 2005…
Well, anyway, I have been renewing my love for the wild lately, walking every day, though maybe not quite as I once was. But yes I was, then and now, a definite Knitter Of The Wild, and I suppose if ever there was one thing that would define me in a single sentence, well, that just may be it.
I so admire the man who found personal transformation and a sense of home deep in the wilderness of the High Sierra Nevada mountains, and fought to bring his experience of the territory into the lives of the general masses with his writing and activism. The masses who from a distance were readily destroying virgin wilderness with logging, mining, dam-building, and all manners of disregard in the turn of the last century. That man is John Muir, said to be the Father of Modern Environmentalism. That man is the man who made his home along the very lakes in the Sierra Nevada which I have camped, and who divided himself limb to limb to bring the High Sierra to the world, in attempt to protect it, its wildlife, the giant old-growth sequoias, and perfect beauty of the high mountain wilderness.
John Muir , born April 21, 1838 – died December 24, 1914, was a Scottish-American naturalist & author, environmental philosopher and early advocate of preservation of wilderness in the United States. His letters, essays, and books telling of his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada of California, have been read by millions. His activism helped to preserve the Yosemite Valley, Sequoia National Park, and other wilderness areas. The Sierra Club, which he founded, is a prominent American conservation organization. The 211-mile (340 km) John Muir Trail, a hiking trail in the Sierra Nevada was named in his honor. read more ….
Yosemite Valley, by Carleton Watkins, John Muir’s friend and photographer.
In case you didn’t know, I am an experienced hiker of John Muir territory, although it’s been a time since I’ve returned there. As a bit of proof, take photos below backpacking eight days along John Muir’s High Route, culminating on the peak of Mount Whitney in August of 2001.
Above photo is of our group, Jeff directly behind me, all of us tired but totally and completely gratified.
And that’s me at the Mount Whitney plaque , quite exhausted and glacier-burnt in the face, from the epic trip but also from the push up from Guitar Lake that morning. Mount Whitney was for that eight-day trek the end of the line, and of the John Muir High Country Route. I nearly am dumb-struck just to take in the scope of the majestic granite mountain, and to realize that I actually was at the top of it!
I could go on indefinitely about John Muir’s High Country, but let me not ramble too much on side-trails and back-story, and let me bring attention to this noble creature…
Wild mountain sheep! In fact, the very wild sheep ( subspecies of ovis montana ) which inhabit the High Sierra and who’s tufts of downy wool Muir found and mused him to write a pithy chapter entitled “Wild Wool” from his publication Steep Trails.
“…pure wildness is the one great want, both of men and of sheep.”
” Give to Nature every cultured apple — codling, pippin, russet — and every sheep so laboriously compounded — muffled Southdowns, hairy Cotswolds, wrinkled Merinos — and she would throw the one to her caterpillars, the other to her wolves.”
“…and our wild sheep, wading in snow, roaming through bushes, and leaping among jagged storm-beaten cliffs, wears a dress so exquisitely adapted to its mountain life that it is always found as unruffled and stainless as a bird.”
excerpts from “Wild Wool” by John Muir
Visit Sierra Club archives to read“ Wild Wool “from John Muir’s “Steep Trails”, 1918
This is part one of a two-part post about John Muir, the High Sierra, and a new design which has come out of it. ( Stay tuned for Part Two forthcoming !) In the meantime, I hope you really do read Wild Wool and acquaint yourself with some of John Muir’s writing of High Sierra Wilderness, and of the wild sheep.
Its already been almost three weeks since we were at 9000 ft elevation and I was knitting-in-the-wild beneath a lovely brewing storm on a huge granite rock. I had so thoroughly enjoyed the quick packing trek to Granite Lake, the sitting cross-legged on the granite in complete stitching meditation, one with the darkening sky and gathering storm, the quiet of everything before the outbreak, even the fish hunkering down. Yet I remember yet distinct intermittent sounds ~~ the wind whipping the tent about and water boiling to make trail coffee. And it just doesn’t get any better than that ( High Sierra trip posted here ).
So here my friends, are another pair of Penny Candy Socks. Just a simple, wild & maybe even frivolous (and very blue) pair of socks, made on that High Sierra excursion but I hadn’t gotten around to washing & blocking them until just now.
And they are added to the slowly growing pile of knitted socks designated for xmas gifts. . .
We three ~ Jeff, Emma, & me ~ went for a short & sweet trip to High Sierras over the weekend for our anniversary. There was a little hiking, cooking, tea & coffee drinking, fishing & knitting, sniffing around….
Restorative in many ways, as always, the alpine scenery soothed a yearning that only it can do. What is it about pitching a tent in the wilderness at high altitude to claim some spot in nature as our home for a few days?
Something about the fragile alpine flowers …
and gnarled trees.
fast and furious rain storms …
The granite everywhere and deep crystal clear blue lakes …
wide horizon of jagged ridges and expressive skies.
A storm is brewing!
Windy thunder & rain storms which suddenly take hold for a couple of hours in the afternoon,
sending us for cover in our cozy tent to wait it out.
Granite Lake in Mokelumne Wilderness was just what I craved. Bundled up quite puffy in down and wool layers, knitting in the cold & windy pause between storms …
Abandoned my knitting to go fire up the camp stove and make hot coffee!
Jeff got to fish a couple of times, though he didn’t get even one bite, too stormy.
Then it was time for trail coffee & tea !!!
We found that Emma was perfectly able to handle carrying a doggie pack and hike as she did once before, and it was as if her little arthritic limp of late almost disappeared completely.
She is in top form !
Most importantly, this trip to the Sierras was to celebrate a very important mark in our partnership,
We were so lucky to have Granite Lake all to ourselves, at near 9000′ elevation & less than three miles from the trail-head. It is my theory that the forecast dramatic thunderstorms cleared the lake for us. We were prepared to hike cross-country (off-trail) to another lake for privacy, but had no need, it was a total stroke of luck.
With only a little over 3 hour drive, we can be in the High Sierra, fishing & knitting at a granite bowl. It just doesn’t get any better than that ! Off we go back home, but we’ll be back . . .
The High Sierras beckon us this year on our anniversary. Last time we went, Jeff, Emma & I had a great time , it was in the Inyo National Forest of the High Sierras, on the McGee Pass trail, hovering around 10,000 – 12,000′ elevation. This (slightly blurry) photo was taken while walking along a meadow on the trail, and it was in fact the last backpack trip I was on. Emma was a two-year-old packing puppy and that was seven years ago. Ages !
I can’t believe how long it’s been, and astonished at the pace life just races by. Here is Emma waiting for me as we climbed over the pass, the rock in the trail so sharp she had to wear her boots.
And just beneath the pass, resting a poor exhausted puppy Emma in the snow with Jeff looking a little impatient . . .
That trip was a stunning one, a beauty for sure, but I’m not feeling very confident in my packing abilities at all now. Though Jeff has promised me that we will go slowly and not far, for if I am going to want to backpack regularly ~ again ~ it is important that Emma and I do not get whipped by the trek. Emma is already a little bit limpy with onset arthritis, and I’m not much better, worried about carrying a pack for any distance.
But hey , the altitude & elements I can handle ! How can I not crave to sit and knit for hours with camp coffee by high mountain lakes such as these . . .
So interesting that being in the really high mountains has been such a part of me for as long as I can remember. Jeff and I are making a vow of sorts, to go regularly again, and this is a bit of a kick-start trek. Well folks, its time for me to go pull out all of my packing gear and assemble things ~ knitting included ~ see you all on the flip-side. Sierra Nevada mountains, here we come.
