I.
A hundred yards in, a quail, backlit topknot quivering, ran across the fire road, then his mate, legs pumping, followed and I saw a pebble near her, but the pebble ran as well. A baby, backlit and in silhouette, almost beneath the female’s breast it ran, and then another, kumquat-sized (a kiwi far too large) it ran across, and then another, and five more, and by the time I stopped counting, hand held involuntarily to heart, a full two dozen hatchling quail had crossed the road before me, visible in outline only, black against the blazing canyon.
II.
Ninety-five degrees in that canyon, and I stopped now and then on the switchbacks to cool. Eight hours of hiking, and in the sixth the sand was in my eyes and I wiped it away with a fingertip, and then more sand in a few moments. I wiped again, and then again some minutes later, and then I looked at my finger after the fourth daub and saw the pale white crystals, sharp, and tasting of salt. My shirt was streaked with white. The straps of my pack were streaked with white, and at the summit the tourist women watched me eating and drinking, head down and oblivious to them, and from the corner of my eye I saw them gesture at me and smile to one another.
III.
She stood under Moses Rock Ridge, attention fixed on something on the ground, and did not hear me coming from behind her. From thirty feet away my eyes rolled across her shapely flank, saw the small hairs stand up on her neck under the slight breeze, and her coyote ears cocked toward the ground, listening for whatever gopher or ground squirrel she was after, and the moment stretched out languorously long and I wondered at last when it would break. I am not so clever yet to surprise a coyote by my own stealth, I thought, my breath too ragged and the chafing straps squeaking at the thermometer ring, but there we stood. And there we stood a minute longer, cicadas clicking furious in the blue oaks, until a cricket jumped and her gaze followed, and she saw me streaked with white standing not far away at all and slipped down into the ravine in fluid sidelong panic.
IV.
The Back Creek Trail is not a trail for going down. It is a trail for climbing, steep sections paved in tumbled gravel, drop-offs on one side and then the other steep enough to break a leg, with no one coming by for days. So i descended it, 13 miles into my hike, a summit gained and then down a ways on the other side, and up a steep section of trail back halfway again to the summit, a thousand feet of climb added to my usual hike, and then four inch shuffling steps, an hour to walk a mile, thighs near burning with the slow descent. Head-high chamise, and then bay laurel, and after a long hour with sweat stinging my eyes I reached the creek, a lurid trickle beneath the elder, and I longed to lie prone in it, to let it flush the salt from my eyes. My strides broadened. The wind picked up. At last I came down off the mountain, into broad tawn fields of dry oats, a savanna of sparse blue oaks, and only two more miles to the truck.
