King's Peak Trip

Otherwise known as "I Fought the Boots and the Boots Won".

First off, I want to say that I had fun, and the rest of it doesn't matter. Much. I didn't get to the top of King's Peak, but not because of the problems I expected (weather, fear of falling, etc...). It was my boots, lovingly referred to in earlier blog entries as my "Instruments of Torture". They had given me hot spots when I took them out on short hikes, and I figured I might get a blister, but I had no idea. There are blisters and there are blisters. Those are the kind I got. Oh, well.


We hiked up through the Henry's Fork drainage to the Henry Lake Basin, then crossed Gunsight Pass and camped in the area beyond, called Painter Basin. Ccamp was 10 miles from the trailhead, and I knew by the time we got there that my feet were messed up. Next day, I had to stay behind in camp while Simon climbed King's Peak, resting my feet for the hike out. The hike out on the third day was the only part of the trip that wasn't awesome. There's a picture of one of my feet near the end. If you squint a little when you get to that picture, you won't get grossed out.
This is the Quasimodo look. Si can say what he wants about my big poncho, but it covered my whole load. It rained, like, five times a day; hiking in on the firsst day was particularly wet. That's just how it is in the Uintas.

Does anything else matter if you have good trail mix? Those are DARK chocolate M&Ms.

Elkhorn Crossing, about halfway in to our destination.

This was the first view I had of King's Peak (center) and its surrounding range. By this time, we were up at the top end of the Henry Basin, in the Boy Scout zone. Loads of exhausted-looking scouts coming down from the climb, talking about how much they wanted to go to Papa John's for a pizza. About the time we started the serious climb to Gunsight Pass, the sun sort of came out.

By the time we got to the pass, the weather was really cooperating. This is looking back into the Henry Basin...

...and this is looking forward into the Painter Basin. A beautiful view. But I have to say I was privately a little bummed. By this time (the 8-mile mark or so), my feet were seriously screwed, and I had been thinking about getting into camp and putting on my Tevas. We looked down into the Painter Basin and realized that, if we were going to have any where to hang up food, we were going to have to walk down to the tree-line. See that smudge of green waaaay out there? It took what seemed like three lifetimes to get out there. We were like those people you see in cartoons, crawling through the desert, moaning, "Water!" The tree line was like a mirage, always in the distance, never coming closer... "The trees! Look at them! They're so beautiful..."

Major reward when we got there, though. This was camp in the Painter Basin. We never saw another person the whole time we were camped there. Gunsight Pass is that dip to the right side of the picture, and King's Peak is the mountain furthest to the left. Not very dramatic, is it? The Uintas are not very picturesque, at least in comparison with the Tetons, for example. God's gravel pit, really.

Trying out our new water filter in the creek.

Loads of deer. We were camped by their route to the creek, so they were always everywhere. Also saw 5 bull moose hanging out together for a little while longer before the fall rut starts and they have to beat each other up. Also tons of coyotes. No bears. That's OK.

We were ready, though, with this deluxe bear-hang.

John, if you're out there, this is my precious, outdated stove.

The kitchen.

When we were younger, we ate Rice-a-Roni and Tuna Helper. Now that we are more prosperous, we thought we'd try some of these elegant pre-made freeze-dried wonders. Just add boiling water and stir. No need to even get the pot dirty. This one was Thai Beef Satay. If you like Minute Rice and kind of chewy veggies, this was pretty good.

Yuuuumyyyyy. Well, he had just climbed King's Peak. Anything was bound to taste good.

In spite of the rain, we were able to find some reasonable sort-of-dry wood, which I coddled under my (did someone call is too big?) poncho...

...so we were able to have a fire both nights we were out.

OK. King's Peak. I stayed behind. This was a big disappointment for me, but if I did indulge in a little pity party about it, I waited until Si was gone for the day. He left at 9:00 AM and was back down by 3:00 PM. There was lightning, but he was already off the summit by that time. This is a picture of how the talus/boulder field looked from the bottom. Frankly, I would have probably peed my pants from terror. Even Simon was scared. Now that he's done it, he said, he has no desire to try it again.

Here's the summit. At least my daypack and my water bottle got to the top. I have a cup that made to the top of the Grand Teton, too. A friend borrowed it. A separate blog entry - Kate's gear that has gone where she hasn't.

Now, about my boots. These are Asolos. Top of the line boots. Simon (wierdly) met a guy on the summit who is a boot-fitter for REI. They got talking and this guy thinks all I need are special insole inserts, and the rubbing that blistered my feet will cease. I'll try it as soon as I recover enough to put the boots back on. Right now, they rouse feelings of terror and loathing. All I want to do with them just now is throw them against the garage door. At any rate, in this picture, I was showing the boots who's boss. The boots were being outwardly obedient and doing their job. But,

this is the better of my two heels, before I started the hike out yesterday. By the time I finished the 10 miles, they looked twice as bad as this. I marched along without complaining the whole way, but when we had driven as far as Evanston and I got up the nerve to look at my right heel, I cried. It was (is) truly disgusting. I'm going to have to do something about the damn boots. Because, in spite of the blisters, it was a great trip and if I ever recover and can walk like a normal person again, I'll be right back out there.

In the meantime, it's a good thing I have a lot of shoes with nothing across the heel.