The General 3

I woke on Sunday morning around 7 AM, quickly packed my belongings, locked them in storage, and made for the road. More daylight, I was convinced, would mean a better chance of getting a ride. I threw up my sign, and stood eagerly waiting. It was drizzling a bit but I didn't mind - my clothes were still a little wet from the day before anyway. (I had worn all my heaviest clothes in yesterday's rain, and so had nothing to change into that morning, but no matter.) Before long I had my first ride, a young local man who lived just up the road, and dropped me at a little breakfast spot where I gulped down hot coffee, eggs and hashbrowns, and dashed back to the 198. I decided to walk a bit up the narrow freeway (which had been no more than a two-lane road for some 40 miles now), turning from time to time to thrust out my sign and my winning smile as soon as I heard a car coming up from behind, which was not so frequent now, as I was getting out into deeper country.

As far as I can tell, success in the world of hitchhiking depends upon a few key variables, as anyone who has tried it will likely consent:

1) Visibility: Obviously, if you cannot be seen, chances are slim you'll be picked-up.

2) Accessibility: Being visible is all well and good, but if you're not positioned so as to afford potential rides the time and space required to first consider, and then actually proceed with the business of pulling over and picking you up, you're out of luck.

3) Weather: Intensity of rain/snow seems to me to correlate positively with pick-up frequency.

4) Attitude: A smile does seem to help - despite famed warnings about the wildness of the world.

Anyway, I eventually found what I took to be a prime location, out in front of a local home, incidentally, and stood for a moment, my eyes on the road. I was a little surprised therefore, when a man's voice came from behind me, asking if my car had broken down - it was his house I was standing in front of. No, I explained, I had no car, but had come down from Canada by bus to see the biggest trees on planet earth. He seemed to be intrigued by this, and after a short chat, we two were off in his car, en route to Sequoia National Park - maybe a twenty minute ride or so. Along the way we spoke about my travels in India and the United States, and as he dropped me at the visitor's centre, he kindly remarked that if I needed a place to stay, he would put me up in his RV for as long as I liked, and that if I needed anything whatsoever to call him, anytime, at home. I thanked him warmly for this generous offer, and said goodbye, walking into the central office to see what the rangers would make of my plans to walk up to the General.

Inside, a nice young girl explained to me that she had seen people bike or jog my proposed route, but never walk, and moreover, these trips had been in summertime with the sun high in the sky, and the roads free of snow.

"How much snow is up there anyway?" I asked.

"Well, it's been raining down here for nearly three days, so I'd guess about three or four feet." she replied.

This news, coupled with the fact that it was still about 20 miles to the giant forest (not to mention some 3500 feet up, in elevation) did not have me jumping for joy, but as I explained to this girl - and to everyone else who had been looking at me sideways since Visalia when I told them my plan - I had simply come too far to turn around and go back now. And so, with her blessing, off I went up the General's Highway, in a good rain, alone, at around 9 AM. I knew it was a long way, so I was moving at a pretty good clip, jogging a little at times, when the incline subsided. It wasn't long until I started to feel the wet coming through my longjohns and boots.

My first break was about an hour into the ascent, to shake a little water off, munch on a few mango slices, and re-group mentally. Judging by the map, if I kept my present pace (which in itself would be impressive, I thought) I could expect to have reached the General by early afternoon, and assuming I didn't stay long, and that the descent would take about the same amount of time, I'd hopefully be back at the visitor's centre by around 6 PM - about an hour or so after dark. The prospect of running uphill all day without anything more to eat than an orange, and half a bottle of water was daunting, but on I ran. Another half-hour went by before a van slowed-up beside me (only a handful of vehicles had gone by at this point) and a jaunty-looking woman poked her head out around a smiling ginger-bearded man, and offered me a ride. (They were on their way up the mountain to ski.) I quickly accepted, and off we went.

It wasn't long before I realized that I would never have made it up that road on foot. Ever onward and upward we snaked, soon entering slush, and then snow, which quickly deepened, and soon enough, we were seeing vehicles off the road, and plows hard at work to clear things up. About an hour or more we must have driven deep into the giant forest, until at long last we came to the parking lot for the trail up to the General Sherman tree - you'd never know it though, for all the snow, easily three feet in places, and far deeper where the plows had piled it. We got stuck, in fact, at one point, and had to get out the shovels to escape. But I could care less - I was there! I had only a short walk to complete my pilgrimage. It was a beautiful moment, up there in the silent snowy woods.

I snapped a quick photo with my generous

new friends, and ran off up the trail like a kid in a theme park, cutting fresh tracks as I went. Before I knew it, I found myself standing before the General, all 2.7 million pounds of him. And what a sight. We were all alone - just the two of us there - the snow gently drifting down. I took a few photos in a futile effort to contain the monster within the bounds of my three inch LCD screen, and then, laughing, I fell backward into the snow thereby assuming the only posture in which it is actually possible to see most of the General at once. Flat on my back, still panting from my run, I lay in the snow for some time gazing upward - a glorious culmination of so much planning and effort.

In time a few others came to see;

a couple from Bristol, and a youngish man from Germany, and we made chit chat as they snapped photos of their own and moved on. Getting alittle cold, I thought I'd better go too, but not without saying goodbye.I hopped the low guardrail separating the General from the people of theworld, and made my way up to a man-sized nook in his vast trunk (easily 40 feet in diameter) and there I stood for a moment, my hands pressed against his ancient bark - cold, but as alive now as it was some 2500 years ago. And then, smiling, I took my leave, walking and then running again down the trail.