Last Trampas Regional Wilderness

Las Trampas Regional Wilderness is a place to pray, to push past my limits and get my ass kicked, a place to quietly pad along and startle coyotes. It's a place to hear new sounds and see new animals, like today's thousand teenchy red water mites forming their own ecosystem in a cow's hoofprints. It's the Henry Coe of the East Bay - larger than life, not suited for a quick hike, but for confronting my fear and my physical limits.

Can you tell I'm in love?

I've been going to Las Trampas almost every weekend for a few months now, and as I get tougher from navigating her hills and steep trails, she pulls me in, and deeper in.

Today I thought I was bad-azz; hiking in my Carhartts left over from field work days, full of energy and long strides. Even after I settled in to my normal quiet padding, I felt so pleased to feel so safe, a small woman, in the wilderness, alone. But Las Trampas doesn't let me leave until she's marked me.

I planned for too long a hike, as I often do, get to the point where I should turn back in order to not get caught out after dark, say "f*ck it", and keep going forward. For a time, I thought I was lost, and as one sometimes does, assumed I was almost back to the staging area. Ha!

I finally saw a sign - not lost then, but still three miles in. I trudged on; water done, food gone, knees hurting. The light was fading fast, and I was teaching myself to slow down, take a deep breath, and move through the mud on my feet and not my bottom.

Hiking is learning. I learn to push past my fears to find the next fear on the horizon. I learn to be stronger, quieter, stay longer, disturb less. I learn my friend's faces - black oak, blue oak, valley oak, coast; deer print, cow print, 'coon print, coyote.

Are you with me? Do you picture me? Good, so go here: http://www.soundboard.com/sb/Bobcat_sounds_audio.aspx, and click on the fifth item, Bobcat Sound 3. Now come back to Last Trampas with me.

I heard that sound far off, and was caught in a moment of awe. "Someone is killing his dinner", I thought. "And someone else is dying." Predation, that sacred scariness, about 300 feet to my left. I wondered what animal it was- I've never heard the sound before. I felt deeply moved. After a moment, I kept walking.

Another half hour went by. I could no longer even pretend there was any light left, but I was exhausted and happy, safe in my beloved hills. I hove into the final descent. Now go back here: http://www.soundboard.com/sb/Bobcat_sounds_audio.aspx, and listen to number 12, bobcat sound 4. I heard this right behind me and nearly jumped out of my skin. Then I heard a similar sound in front of me and about 100 feet to the right. My legs started shaking. If I had remembered I was human, I would have shouted,

but I was so deep down, so Las Trampas, that I continued padding quietly. My first thought was 'jackals', although of course not. My second thought was that this was about mating; communicating, not about me. And my third thought was that it took everything I had not to sprint for the gate on my wigged out knees.

I made it, of course, home to cook a huge pot of pasta and look up animal sounds on the Internet. I'm fairly sure this was bobcat - it's the closest match I could find. They are normally silent, but become vocal during mating season, which can start as early as January.

So it all makes sense, now. But I thank my goddess for things that do not make sense, for huge roars in the night, parks bigger than me, for the awe-inspiring mystery of it all.