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shades of smoke

Breath rasps in and out of our lungs. One step, then another, hiking boots slipping slightly on loose tan rocks and dust. Another corner, turn, another switchback. Harsh wind blasts us as we round the face of the peak, threatening to throw us off, tilt us just enough to send us sliding back down the two thousand feet we had already traversed. Another corner, turn, another switchback. Rounding the dry peak back to shelter from the aggressive wind. The scraping sound of our breath like dry sandpaper against the otherwise serene landscape before us, grating against solitude and silence, wheezing lungs disrupting wistfulness. Another corner, turn, another switchback. The wind strikes at us again, ripping calm from our ears to replace with howling, screaming, anger to pull us down. Dust pelts our legs, tiny needles of pain and irritation as we push against the whipping wind. Another corner, turn, another switchback.

We see-saw up the peak this way, occasional exclamations of majesty and ‘you’ve got this’ motivators floating on the air between us. Smoke from the fires hangs heavy around us, thickening throughout the valley, a dense ominous cloud of ash and burning. The sky is truly orange, rippling as if in constant sunset, only wavering to darken its sour hue. Staring through the mustard lens before us, we are constantly reminded that we are indeed not wearing sunglasses, that there is no glass layer causing light distortion, that this is the world right now: glowing, blazing, burning.

As we near the top the wind intensifies, but we seem to summit above the smokey cloud layers. Blissful blue sky peaks through, air comes easier despite our high elevation, light filters clearly through to us, an unencumbered sun warms our limbs against the cool air. Even as the bellowing wind pelts us with sand and dust, we relish in the normalcy at this peak. We successfully persevered, climbed through a cloak of smoke, on top of normal adverse conditions of elevation gain and mileage, never-ending switchbacks and vertigo. Summiting is sweet, as sweet as the chocolate we share in celebration and the water we drink down as we catch our breath.

The time to descend comes and while gravity helps along our trundle downhill, we quickly reenter an ocean of smoke, tinting our vision once more and slowing our breath. Views become a haze, a smokey mirage in the distance, masks become mild protection from smoke, not disease. Purple flowers shine rebelliously in the yellow air, holding tightly to the mountain’s edges. Green pines wave quietly by – they have weathered far worse.

Chatter flows quickly, freely, a necessary distraction from the darkening world around us, ominous oranges covering the sky and our eyes once more. The air is cool, kissing our skin gently, nudging us to savor its refreshing feel before we venture further. Like on our ascent, the wind returns to its frenzied lashing, but now we take its invisible attacks as further fuel to push us down this mountain.

As we near the bottom, the car park flitting in and out of view between trees and around corners, expressions of awe, excitement, wonder, and pride slip through our lips. Did we really climb that?, we ask ourselves, looking back up the sheer mountain face, ever imposing from our position below. And in these conditions? Smoke continues to nibble at our lungs, our voices becoming raspier by the second, as if the gravel beneath our boots had jumped into our throats, threatening to drown us with nature’s might. The recklessness of our endeavor is not lost on us, the resounding impulse of responsibility and the lack thereof we showed by climbing this peak in a world smothered in fire and smoke thrums unspoken between us. Apart from swallowing gallons of poisonous air, we have been lucky.

With that thought, we gather ourselves in our car, yanking off layers and gulping at the smoke-free air that has been locked away since our departure hours earlier. Muscles are stretched, already feeling the tension of lactic acid buildup and tomorrow’s impending soreness. Bodies relax into pleather seats, eyes momentarily closed, small smiles creeping across cheeks, satisfaction and accomplishment leaking from glistening skin. 

Our drive home brings the weight of the present world crashing back. After winding slowly through the park, marveling at the beauty of green forests and crystalline blue lakes even amidst the rusty shade of the air, savoring the tranquility and calm of this mountain oasis, we reconnect with main highways, an intensity of cars rushing one way or another, running away from or running towards and infinity of unknowns. One certainty quickly reveals itself though: since our departure earlier that morning, the wildfires have grown to unimaginable sizes, moving from potential threat to real and present danger.

Our blissful ease and relaxation is frantically replaced with emergency plans, back-up ideas, and worst-case-scenarios muttered quietly as our car speeds along highway stretches. Our main passage home is closed by fire, so detours are drawn up, excessive extra-long paths home are assessed, ignoring the extra driving hours it may take if safety is guaranteed. The radio continues in the background, garbled by distance and smokey air but volume cranked high on the traffic report nonetheless. The announcer’s voice is strained, suppressing panic, fear, urgency.

At the last minute, our road home reopens and we decide to risk it, imagining the safety of our beds, the comfort of home. Cutting across lanes to our exit, we join the highway, still sparse with cars from its recent reopening. The sky around us has settled definitively into night, dark skies that hide the shades of smoke that still swim around us and press down with a pervading, if dramatic, sense of doom. What hides within this night, hinted at only by radio voices and news reports and lingering wafts of burning.

The road lulls us into a sense of safety. No ominous glow, no orange hue. Only seventeen miles to survive and the first ten have felt almost like any other night. Stillness sits heavy in the car, our voices quiet, trepidous, waiting, even as our car continues at highway speeds. Twelve miles in. Familiar sights are recognized, shops from past visits pointed out. Fourteen miles in. Still no sirens, no flashing lights, no indication that this is anything other than a normal nighttime drive. We continue along another highway bend.

Oh god.

The words slip from my mother’s mouth in the passenger seat but we’ve all seen it. The ominous orange dome that suddenly blooms out in all directions, left, right, dead ahead. Traffic slows but does not stop as every driver pauses in momentary awe and rising fear. I stare straight ahead at the dashed white highway lines, whispering to myself, Just follow the lines, just stay in your lane.

Smoke has begun to seep into the car despite closed air vents and internal circulation. Visibility is reduced to white out conditions, even as a frantic tapping in the back of my skull reminds me it must be ash, soot, burning, not snow. Can I feel heat? Is that my imagination? We round another highway bend.

Treacherous brilliant orange claws scrape at the black night, wildly scrambling to gain purchase and envelope the sky. They lunge and dance on either side of the road, twisting in a chaotic craze, uncontrolled and untamed. Tiny blue and red lights flash from emergency vehicles nearby, like a child’s toys compared to the raging inferno they are attempting to contain. We continue along the road, heat now baking us in the car, blasting on both sides as if we were trying to warm up for winter. Tires can’t melt in this sort of heat right? I glance away from the white highway lines to the center divider. Crumbs of the fire swirl there too, snacking on the tiny weeds and grasses beside the metal barrier. Flames run like liquid along the center divider, tiny waves lapping up air and burning until only charred earth remains. 

Just follow the lines, just stay in your lane.

The air in the car is tense, stressed, straining to stay calm. Breath is held, limbs are still, blood pumps in our ears. We round another bend in the road and just as soon as we came upon it, we are beyond it, the orange glow fading only to the rearview. I relax my white-knuckled grip on the wheel and a collective exhale fills the car. Smoke remains ever present, following us the remainder of our drive home. The fires may be behind us, but they remain vivid in our mind’s eye.

We are lucky. Safe passage, a home to return to, a home still not threatened by fire, our worst complaint being smoke in the skies. Not all are so lucky. With wildfires continuing to roar across the West coast, people, animals, homes, environments, entire ecosystems are burning to the ground. There are many things I could say – vote, believe in climate change, listen to indigenous tribes, 2020 really is a doozy – but for now, just stay safe friends.

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worth the chance

Water tupelos. American beech. Bald cypresses. Loblollies. To a blind eye, they look the same. But even to my own medically deficient eyesight, each sapling is unique, independent, prepared to spread its leaves against the sun. There is bark that is thick, perfectly pieced together like a puzzle to form an invincible suit of armor, and bark that is wispy, thin, preparing to peel away in the sun, and trunks that stand rod-straight and tall as a soldier ready to be knighted, and trunks that lean heavy, the weight of clouds pushing them down, and trunks that sprawl like spidery legs as if waiting for the perfect moment to stand up and scatter away to a new forest, a new land. Each leaf has its own fingerprint, veins and vascular tissue winding together into a maze, a labyrinth that itself supports life, collecting light and water and air, earth’s purest nutrients.

Have you ever heard of Congaree National Park before? Nope, neither had I. Not until a work trip sent me to Charlotte, North Carolina, and, scrolling around Google Maps collecting ideas for a weekend of exploration before my work conference, there the National Park appeared. Armed with my National Park pass, a simple pair of running shoes, and my ever-constant restlessness, off I went.

Having never heard anything about Congaree National Park before, I did not expect much when we planned our mini-roadtrip in the Carolinas. As compared to Yosemite and Zion, with their sweeping vistas and dramatic rock faces, Congaree has rarely graced the hyped feeds of Instagram and barely makes the cut as “influential” according to social media.

But if they made it a National Park, there must be a reason.

We landed in Charlotte, North Carolina early Saturday morning after a grueling sleep-deprived red-eye from California (let’s just say, I will never recommend red-eyes). Bumping Lizzo and Queen to keep ourselves awake, we drove the easy two hour route down south. A quick stop for breakfast sandwiches and some of the best (and largest) cinnamon rolls we’ve ever had (Devine Cinnamon Roll Deli – check em out!), and we entered Congaree National Park, the early morning sun just peeking between the trees.

First stop: Visitor Center. As eager as I always am to jump straight into the outdoors, my best park visits begin with a stop at the visitor center, watching the educational video and chatting to the park rangers there, the people who truly know best. (And yes, for my park aficionados, even though the park is as young as 2003, the park video still looks like it’s from the 80s.) Sure enough, a park loaded with so much biodiversity, unique geography, and relevant history needed the right start. Cue Park Ranger Riske:

Congaree National Park is one of the last old growth bottomland hardwood forests in the United States. Where did all the others go, you ask? Where decades ago, hardwood forests were plentiful across the Southeastern US, logging and other industries decimated the prolific forests until almost nothing was left. For decades, the area of Congaree National Park was a home to Native Americans and a refuge for African-Americans before and after emancipation, even using the creek for baptisms. Although the park may no longer host permanent human dwellings, its trees will always remain a sanctuary to those who need it. Today, the park is home to over 75 species of trees, including the tallest trees in the world of 15 different species. As a bottomland forest, the park exists in a floodplain which regularly washes away topsoil and brings new nutrients to support its biologically diverse wildlife and dynamic ecosystem. From above, the winding river and oxbow lakes that emerge between dense forest appear like something from a postcard, reminiscent of striking destinations like the Amazon.

After a quick enthusiastic chat with Park Ranger Ray and armed with seven different nature brochures, we finally hit the trail! Since we were only clad in simple running shoes instead of our normal heavy duty hikers, we headed out to the most popular and accessible trail in the park: the 2.5 mile Boardwalk Loop Trail. This trail uses a self-guided brochure to educate hikers via 22 spaced markers about the history, ecology, and significance of various park features. While some hikers are resistant to the stop-and-start nature of self-guided trails, we truly embraced the nuggets of information as we progressively made our way along the Boardwalk.

Eventually, we approached Weston Lake, an oxbow lake created by erosion and changing river patterns in the park, and were inspired to break from the Boardwalk Trail and attempt part of Weston Lake Trail. In our runners, we were quickly slipping and sliding through the mud, but not before we’d walked far enough away from the main trail to find ourselves immersed in the true quiet and natural isolation of the park.

Away from the boy scouts and other tourists, we were able to really listen: birds bouncing melodies to each other across the great green network of towering trees, deep vibrating calls and high sweet shrills pinging like electricity through the environmental grid. Even the trees seemed to speak, their gentle swaying in the breeze creating an endless whisper: a careful shhh…

Tiny animal tracks left fresh fossils in the thickening mud. Moss crawled along the forest floor, draping itself across the sleeping earth. Logs lay peacefully by, sheltering the smallest of critters, while fungi branched outward from it’s wooden foundation. Subtle colors danced along the vascular veins of forest vegetation, sprouting burnt reds and crisp yellows where none were expected.

As we wound back toward the main trail, we suddenly felt more in tune with the forest, paying attention to the various animal prints spied in the mud and the pungent scents that tickled our noses. It was easy to imagine how this space could be called home to so many, be it critters and birds, or the humans who sought shelter here as well.

Rejoining the Boardwalk, we jumped back into our educational groove. Soon, we were arguing over tree identifications and ecological formations as we tried to harness our newfound knowledge and put it to action. By far, our largest discussion centered around the most fascinating part of this park: knees.

Yep, you heard me right: knees. Not your average musculoskeletal joint, however. These knees were tree knees! Tiny wooden pillars, poking upward from the sodden soil, scraggly, uneven, reaching for… what?

It’s as if someone playing a very far-reaching practical joke took leftover bark and stubby tree branches and stuck them back in the ground exclusively around bald cypress trees. Tens of these short “knees” covered the forest floor, looking both at home and just plain odd. And what are they for, you might ask? That’s the best part: no one knows! Theories exist that the knees are used for balance against the flooding forest floor, or to capture more oxygen from the air. Even as I was crouched on the Boardwalk, peering as close as my reach would allow to a nearby knee, staring at it’s unusually rounded top and mentally screaming the question, Why? How? What are you? Reveal your secrets!, a park ranger strolled by and confounded us even more by adding the theory of food and nutrient storage to the mix.

My personal theory? Tree sentience. You want to question the existence of a tree communication network that secretly connects the roots of all trees into one global thinking entity? Be my guest. But I like the idea.

Mentally fatigued, we finished our Boardwalk hike and returned to our car to snack on leftover cinnamon rolls (Devine Deli, I’m serious), before rolling out for the day, a kaleidoscope of colored leaves dancing in the rearview mirror. The road stretched out beneath our tires, tying us back to the forest, while still leading us on to our next adventure.

Congaree National Park might not grace your social media feeds like the behemoths of the Grand Canyon and Yellowstone, but it should be appreciated no less for its rare and unique ecological and historical significance. We agreed this park deserved more than a brief one-day visit and truly deserved a chance to showcase its worthiness to the world.

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taking the road less travelled

Thunk. Ping. Krsshh. Crunch. Gravel compressed under our tires and ricocheted off the undercarriage as we inched our way farther down the remote road. Before us, endless speckled grey and brown dirt stretched to the horizon, but flanking it, jagged windblown desert peaks rose into the hanging clouds, enveloping us with their protection and trapping us in their valley. Periwinkle, primrose, mauve – the colors surrounded us in a pastel ocean, the sandy floor sweeping out in every direction, cacti climbing up like coral. Yet we were left driving through dry, still air, instead of water.

We pulled to the side to ease our bodies from the rhythmic bump and grind of the road and take in the vast landscape. Stretching, we scrunched our toes into the crumbly crimson dirt, cool and uneven. Next to us, tiny cholla and chin cacti reached toward the cloud covered sky, dusty spines arching up to catch any stray drop of rain. A moment of admiration more, then we rejoined the cozy interior of the car and carried on.

The car continued it’s rat-a-tat ramble to descend into another valley, opaque fog floating within to obscure the distance from view. We trundled to our next turn, passing our first fellow backroad rider, who waved, smiled, and drove on. Into the unknown, as they say, and we turned toward the fog bank and our hidden destination.

What felt like days, but was only an hour as we slowly traversed the washboard road, quickly turned to forgotten history as we approached the steep golden dunes. Almost like a mirage, the pyramids of sand arched and curved, fine edges at their peaks disappearing and reappearing through the shifting mist. And then, it began to rain.

Rain! In the desert! Only miles away from the hottest and lowest points in North America, yet here nonetheless. Fat drops bathed us as we donned raincoats and emerged from our four-wheeled shelter, quickly soaking our sun-dried skin and unwashed hair. We were swimming through water and air, slipping and sliding as we scrambled up the uneven slopes of the desert dunes. Wind kicked at us, pushing us side to side, and up, up, up, until we stood, half sunk in sand, at the precipice, peering beyond the first dune into a forest of similarly ferocious sand-made mountains.

These sculptures of sand, steep formations of the wind’s power to mold the desert to its will, stood solid, stoic, despite the howling, whirlpool of rain. Our raincoats snapped at us, begging to fly away with the temptatious wind, while we, tears and rain mingling on our cheeks, raw excitement and nibbling anxiety in our hearts, planted our feet firmly in the sand. Without the weather, we might have stayed there all day, blending in with the desert plants who recognized the value and beauty of this landscape long ago and had instructed their roots to reach deep and take a more permanent hold on this ground than we could ever dream of. With one final look at the collective of dunes snaking away toward the horizon, we yanked our hoods back down once more and slipped and slid our way back to the car.

Inside, we stripped layers, tossing soaking shirts and sand-filled socks onto floor mats, pressing numb fingers and legs against hot air vents, giggling and gasping at what we had just experienced. The windshield remained opaque with water, but we knew what lay beyond its surface – steeples of sand, blanketed with a desert rain like nothing we could have ever imagined. 

This was not an experience that could ever be remade or manufactured to a tourist’s taste. This was nature, in its most raw, powerful, and unpredictable form, revealing its character in what some would call a temper or anger, but what we perceived as cathartic release. Only in these remote, wild, desolate landscapes could nature be herself – free and untamed. She was a fierce reminder for ourselves, as our wet hair dripped down our necks, cheeks glowed pink with newfound warmth, and laugh lines cemented themselves at the corners of our eyes. She was wild, and as were we. She existed everywhere, and so could we.

We carried that wildness, that windswept, powerful fierceness with us as we began our slow crawl back along washboarded roads. Hands stuck out of car windows to feel the wind tug at us, tempt us, as we rejoined highways. Sand leaving breadcrumb reminders as we stepped into showers and soft sheets at home. And the hum of the earth and vibrations of the road taking us to dreams of the wild beyond.

While this may be a reflection of my time adventuring to Eureka Dunes in Death Valley National Park, it is also a greater tale of the worth in taking that extra detour, venturing out just a little bit farther, and in general, taking the roads less travelled.

The road less travelled may take hours. It may mean crawling at slow speed, your foot twitching to flatten the accelerator just an inch more. It might be washboarded roads and swerving to avoid an abundance of potholes and roads that don’t even look like roads. It could even be engine lights and flat tires and enough stress to question whether it’s all worth it. But if it can lead to unimaginable landscapes, unforgettable experiences, once-in-a-lifetime moments that you will never forget, then it will always be worth it. 

A road will always lead you somewhere as long as you’re willing to take it.


Looking for more? Check out A (Road) Trip Down Memory Lane, a podcast episode by Women on the Road. Women on the Road is a collective of stories of life on the road from the women who’ve lived them firsthand.