I should be in Venezuela right now, but the president/dictator Maduro, who lost the election on July 28th, refuses to give up office. Sounds familiar. To punish countries that have called for him to step down, he has closed Venezuelan airspace to those countries.
For me, flying through Panama meant my flight was canceled. I tried to find other options, but with short notice, it was not possible. I have not given up on Venezuela and have rescheduled my trip to November, flying through Bogotá.
Where am I now? While you read this, I am on a plane flying from the East Coast of the United States to Seattle, Washington. I think they call where I am right now "The Flyover States."
Why? I have always wanted to hike The Enchantments Traverse, and since I had these days blocked off for Venezuela, I thought, what a great time to do it.
What is The Enchantments Traverse? (https://www.wta.org/go-hiking/hikes/enchantment-lakes)
This is a 20-mile hike with about 5,000 feet of elevation gain. Most of that gain - 2,000 feet - all happens at mile 6.
Here is the official description:
"The Enchantments Traverse in Leavenworth, Washington, is a beautiful and challenging trail with blue crystal-clear lakes and breathtaking views. Recent reviews mention scrambling, technical terrain, climbing 2,000 feet in 1 mile, Asgard Pass being the hardest part, a duration of around 11 to 14 hours, and distances ranging from 21 to 27.5 miles. Conditions are typically difficult, with the need for physical and mental preparedness to endure the strenuous hike in August. Make sure to bring a water filter device and start early to finish in a reasonable time."
It is recommended that you take 2 or 3 days to do this hike. If you do overnight during the hike, you need a permit. These permits are very hard to come by. For this reason, I will be doing this hike in a single day. This is called a thru-hike.
While I am traveling by myself, I am hoping to run into others doing a thru-hike, as on any adventure like this, there is safety in numbers.
Once I land in Seattle, I have a three-hour drive east to Leavenworth, Washington. Once there, it will be prep time.
I have not trained for this hike, as I had not planned to do it at this point in time.
Tomorrow (Wednesday), I will do a practice hike to test out my stamina, equipment, and nutrition, which is primarily peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
Early Thursday morning, I will depart for The Enchantments Traverse, starting the hike well before sunrise and hoping to finish before sunset.
Friday, I have a flight out of Seattle, so I better finish the hike at a decent time, as I still have a three-hour drive back to Seattle.
The flight west was uneventful, which is all you can hope for when flying. I picked up my rental car. Wanting to feel like a local, I rented a pick-me-up truck.
There are two routes from Seattle Airport to Leavenworth, Washington: head south and then east on Interstate 90, or head north and then east on State Route 2. Both routes take about the same amount of time, give or take a few minutes. I decided to take State Route 2, as it passes through a few local towns such as Gold Bar, Index, and Coles Corner. If time permits, I might stop and check out what these towns are like.
Time to start driving. The drive, once away from Seattle, was breathtaking. I’m glad I chose the local road. I drove through what I believe are the Cascade Mountains. I stopped at a few overlooks on the way. I also stopped in Index to picked up supplies for the hike.
I reached Leavenworth, Washington, at about three. My first stop was the local sporting goods store. I needed to rent some hiking poles, get my parking permits for the trail, and see if I was missing any local information.
While at the shop, I ran into a father (Keith) with his adult son (Sam), his adult daughter (Mary), and Sam’s wife (Jen). They overheard me asking about The Enchantments Traverse hike. We all started chatting, and it turned out they were in town from Portland, Oregon, to do the exact same hike. They asked if I wanted to join their group.
Of course, I said yes. There was one issue: I didn’t realize they were doing the hike tomorrow (Wednesday) instead of Thursday. At this point, I couldn’t back out, so I figured I better hit the hay and get some shut-eye.
First, I need to get my nutrition together. I’m preparing peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with banana slices. I thought I should make plenty, as my new friends (whom I’ll call "the hikers") might want some.
Oh, did I mention that Sam, Jen, and Mary are ultra marathoners, and Keith has thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail? One saving grace is that Keith recently had double hip replacement surgery. This will be his first real hike on his “bionic” hips. Stay tuned.
Oh, I almost forgot to mention: Leavenworth is like stepping into Bavaria. Everything has a Bavarian theme, from the bratwurst to the beer gardens.
On Wednesday at 4:00 AM, I met the hikers at their hotel. This hike is a point-to-point route, so you need two cars: one at the starting point and one at the finishing point. Alternatively, you can take a shuttle. My original plan was to take a shuttle, but since the hikers had an extra car, the shuttle was no longer needed.
After leaving my pick-me-up truck at the finish, we drove the 30 minutes to the trailhead. It was just before 5:00 AM and pitch black outside. We all donned our headlamps, made sure our gear was in order, and set out on what I thought would be a 12-hour, 20.5-mile hike. I expected the first seven miles to be challenging, with the remaining miles being a walk in the park. WRONG!
The first two to three miles were easy and smooth sailing. Everyone was in good spirits, and Keith was leading us at a nice pace. I could hardly believe this guy had recently had a double hip replacement. Then we started climbing, and climbing, and climbing. The trail was still navigable, and we eventually reached the first lake, Colchuck Lake. The sun was up, and it was absolutely beautiful.
We stopped for our first nutrition break, and I think my sandwiches were much appreciated.
As I was getting to know my new friends, we chatted while we hiked, and time was flying by. We were right on pace until we hit a boulder field. Imagine giant granite boulders stretching as far as you can see. This field had to be crossed. Climbing from one boulder to the next, we made our way across about half a mile of boulders.
Once across the boulder field, we regrouped and found where the trail - if you could call it that - was. It was now time to climb Asgaard Pass. This is a mile-long climb, gaining 2,000 feet (a bit under half a mile) in elevation. To put it in perspective, that’s like climbing a 200-story building. The trail is marked with cairns (small piles of rocks). We crawled from cairn to cairn, slowly gaining elevation. At some points, the incline was over 60 degrees - 90 degrees being straight up.
We finally made it to the top. We had covered just over seven miles and climbed more than 4,500 feet from the trailhead. We had been out for about six hours. We refilled our water supplies, ate more sandwiches, enjoyed the scenery, and relished our accomplishment.
We knew the hike was all downhill from here. Although we had only covered about one-third of the distance, we thought we were halfway through the hike in terms of time—actually, we were a bit ahead of schedule. It should be smooth sailing from here. WRONG!
The rest of the hike was just as beautiful as what we had already covered. While it was true that we would lose about 7,000 feet of elevation, the finish was significantly lower than the start. Besides maybe half a mile of the trail, we were either climbing steep inclines, crossing glacier snow, navigating boulder fields, or traversing rapidly running water.
We did finish, though not in the 12 hours I had forecasted; it took closer to 18 hours. We started at 5:00 AM and reached the finish at 10:30 PM - starting and finishing in the dark.
I would say it was one of the more challenging things I have ever done. I’m happy I met the hikers; their navigation skills prevented me from getting lost more times than I can remember.
This video gives a good perspective of what we dealt with:
Video - The Enchantments.
Since I completed the hike a day early, I now get to enjoy a relaxing day in Leavenworth, Washington. Tomorrow, I head to Tucson to visit my dear friend Cherphart Yosh. Hopefully, the next time you hear from me will be in November when I’m enjoying a visit to Venezuela.
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