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We felt so lucky when we scheduled the High Sierra Trail for July 4th lat year. Unfortunately, the overnight parking lot in the Mt Whitney portal was being repaved, so short of hitching an 11 hour ride all the way back to Sequoia, a thru-hike was out of the question. Oh well, we thought, we'll just yo-yo it. What's the worst that could happen. Before setting out for 10 days in the backcountry, we stopped by the Sequoia ranger station for our permits. The ranger ran through the usual protocol of 'Leave No Trace' ethics, then handed us two wag-bags. "We've had a lot of trouble with waste in the Whitney region, so you need to pack it out past Crabtree Meadow." the ranger told us. I asked if there's a place to dispose of them. While the exact response is hazy, to avoid accusations of libel, he tells us they can be disposed of at the ranger station. "So we have to carry them around til then?" we ask. Yeah, but they are airtight, so it should be good for a while." he assures us. We hike to the base of Whitney, camping amid the grass covered valley of granite, reminiscent of a golf-course on the moon. Come morning, we have a summit hike ahead of us and, wanting to shed excess weight and avoid potential catastrophe, we take care of business into our wagbags. The plan is simple, hike to the summit, hike back down, sleep. With this in mind, we leave our tent, sleeping bag, and pads in place. Aware of the numerous marmots in the area and their fondness for anything plastic, in a spur of the moment decision, we also left the wag-bags inside the tent for safe keeping. After an uneventful summit, we return early to our tent exhausted and hungry, only to be greeted by an overwhelming smell. While we were summiting, the tent turned into an oven, fermenting in the wagbags until they inflated beyond the limit of their seals. They never exploded, but they didn't need to, instead venting their fumes over every single surface of our tent and gear. It is a pungent scent, part sweet, part rotten, but the slightest whiff cuts right to the most fundamental animal recognition of corruption. Greeted by the prospect that at least a thousand dollars worth of gear has been contaminated beyond recovery, we focus solely on the need to dispose of these balloons as quickly as possible. Remembering the assurance of the ranger, we pack up and hike. I carry the wagbags in a grocery bag hanging off my pack, feeling bad for every hiker we pass who must assuredly be walking through an unmistakable cropdusting I leave in my wake as the bags continue to vent. We reach Crabtree after sunset, and I beeline to the ranger to ask where to dispose of this burden. "You have to pack it out like everything else." she tells us. "But the ranger told us..." "I don't know who you talked to, but you were supposed to dispose of it at Whitney Portal. Otherwise, you have to carry it the rest of the way back." After some pleading, she gives me a trashcan liner to double bag them. We set up camp and attempt to sleep in a gas-chamber of our own design. Mid-way through the restless night, we attempt a thorough scrubbing of every surface with wetwipes, to minimal avail. We wake to find every piece of equipment still reeking with the smell of jenkem. Worse, the bags have reinflated and continue to impart their scent into everything in the vicinity. Knowing there's no chance we can carry these for another 4 days, we weigh the option of just burying them. As a last ditch effort, I talk to the ranger again, who explains that this is an ongoing problem, and if I don't pack them out, she will have to do so herself. After substantially more pleading, she acquiesces and allows us to leave them among the other stragglers in two full 5 gallon buckets. We packed up our still tainted gear and hiked 15 miles in silence. At the end of the day, we set up camp and found the smell had mostly outgassed, leaving only fading traces. That night, we had the Kern hotspring all to ourselves, and everything was right with the world. Mark my words, whoever was stationed at the Crabtree Ranger station on the morning of July 7th, 2016, deserves a promotion. A Horse Named Mandy fucked around with this message at 21:07 on Feb 17, 2017 |
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Feb 17, 2017 14:04
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| # ¿ May 3, 2024 01:34 |
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That raises the question: are they pooping in a bag and throwing it off the edge, or are they hanging their rear end over the edge and letting it rip?
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Feb 18, 2017 03:22
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Verman posted:Why on earth would you bring a poo poo bag into your tent? In retrospect it was a horrible idea, but at the time it made some kinda sense. At most campsites, the local fauna have learned to associate any and all plastic with food and will tear it apart to get inside. So our options were to take the bags with us up a mountain (not ideal), stash them in the bear canister with our food (hell no), or hide them in the tent. The soil around Guitar Lake is very thin and the whole basin is basically one big water source, so we were doing our best to be good people. You'd be surprised how quickly those ethics go out the window when you spend an entire night being kept awake stewing in a sewage smell so bad it never normalizes.
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Feb 18, 2017 10:07
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