Real de Catorce '02

     We six youth and two adults left Friday night and drove to Linares.  After staying the night in one of the youth's cousin's house, we continued to La Paz, San Luis Potosi.  Here we met our host and toured the mine where he works.   La Paz is a mining town.  Basically, most everyone in the town works in the mine.  That evening we went to our host's pool hall, and played pool for a few hours.  The next morning we awoke at 3:30 to depart.  We finally left at about 4.  The main reason we left so early, was we could get a ride to about 3 km to our destination by riding with our host.  But, this meant we had to leave early.  We finally got on the trail with packs and all at about 5 AM.  It was dark, and I made the announcement, "There is nothing worse than hiking in the dark."  Soon I realized I forgot to knock on wood.

    The sun rose around 7 AM.  It was a beautiful day.  It was a beautiful day until 7:30.  At 7:30, a cool front started coming it.  There was a small mist (not drizzle; mist).  We decided to stop and have breakfast: GORP!  We figured the mist would go away.  We were wrong, as it just got worse.  We continued on our hike, in the mist.  The wind started blowing.  Since we were traveling through a canyon, all of the wind channeled through it and pushed up on us, making the mist bombard our face.   It was getting colder, and the rock trail was becoming harder to climb.  I slipped several times.

    The night before I had decided to take a lot of water.  I was carrying over 5 gallons of water on my back (For those of your who don't know, that's about 40 lbs).  This was in addition to my normal gear.  The previous day I had also picked up a wonderful hiking staff.  It was tall, sturdy and lightweight.  The whether got so bad, and I became so angry, that I decided that I needed some anger relief, so I took my hiking staff and threw it off the side of the cliff.  It flew pretty far, but to this day I wish I had kept it.  I also decided to leave about 2 gallons of water on the trail.  As the slower group behind us came up to it, they realized it must be pretty bad ahead, because to leave water is a "mortal sin."  Cheerfully they refilled their jugs with it. 
    The faster group finally arrived at the halfway point, which was on the peak of the mountain.  This is where we agreed to meet up with the slower group.  The wind climbing up the mountain was bad, but on top of the peak, it was terrible.  It was so cold, that our lighters did not work.  The camera's batteries were too cold to function.  I was up there in shorts.  There was a small shelter and a wooden fence that blocked the wind.  This fence saved our lives.  We all hid from the menacing wind behind it.  I immediately changed into my rain pants, which were much warmer.

    We would have went inside the small shelter, since it had a roof to block the rain, but it had a door and a huge padlock on it.  We looked down at the extra, large cedar poles sitting next to the fence, then looked up at the door.  We all immediately picked up the pole and tried getting into the shelter with a "battering ram."  Although we never got in, we did make a dent in the door.  We would have made it in, but then the adults arrived on the top of the peak and said, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING." Now that everyone was up there, it took us about 2 minutes to race down the peak.  In that 2 minutes of distance, the whether changed completely.  There was no more cold or rain, just sun and wind.  It was beautiful, although the wind was still gusting near 50 miles per hour.   After a long break for lunch, we finally arrived at Real de Catorce.  We checked into a hotel and then wandered around town.  After a good night's rest, we took the bus back to La Paz and proceeded home.

    Our guides told us that in the 20 years of hiking that trail, they had never once seen it like it was that day.  The next day the weather was beautiful.  When we got home, we told people what we had been through.  They suspected that we never wanted to go there again, but we told them, "WHAT?  Of course we want to go back!"  So this year I am going back again; this time for 3 days of hiking.

    A few months later someone saw my red "Real de Catorce" shirt and mentioned that they had been there, but it had been very dry.  I just laughed.