7/3, Independence/Bishop

[Aaron Doss]

oh, yeah! waking up in a very comfortable king size bed with my
gorgous, awesome husband next to me. both smelling like soap and
shampoo (instead of some dishsoap or sweat) and just one step away
from a bathroom. i loved this morning. i quickly dressed and went to
get our complementary breakfast (fresh baked wafels, bagels,
creamcheese, jelly, muffins, milk, juice and lots of other fresh
fruits). aaron and i ate this in our room, watching tv and enjoyed. we
couldn't stay too long though; we needed to do shopping for the next
section and fill a resupply box for Tuolome and ship this out and do
all our stuff with our bounce box. it was kind of a rush because
shopping needed to be done in bishop but our bounce box was in
independance and there was only one bus going at 1:30.
we first went to a store called "smart and final" it's like a whole
sale store where everything is in bulk but it wasn't a big store. the
prices were great and we were able to resupply most of our food here,
including a big bag of carrots! for our diners (yep, lipton/knorr and
mashed potato's) we went to Von's where we also got some awesome fresh
bagels and focacia to take with us on the trail together with some
cheese and cherry tomato's. and while waiting for the bus, we got our
selves some more cheese and focacia, some Pepsi, yogurt and fruit. you
know how in front of the grocery stores they usualy have there display
of yard furniture for sale? well, that's what we thought was an
awesome place to enjoy our food. an other hiker, Cheers, and Phuk Fu,
were there too and we kind of bummed out at the lawn furniture in the
midst of our back packs, millions of grocery bags, slurping our
drinks. i would have been so embarrassed normally but my standards are
so different lately... !
our life is not matching "regular" life at all but for some reason i
think the whole world knows we are hikers and that what we look like
and what we act like is normal behavior. oh well... i hope it wil help
me to look different at things that are "weird" to me when we get back
home.
we got on a little short bus which was quite a challenge with 5 hikers
with pack and 16 days worth of groceries plus our snacks and of course
the locals with their 4th of july supplies. just wait for the pictures
but it was hilarious. all us hikers sat in the back row of the bus
(seatbelted) with the (empty) wheelchair area and part of the walkway
packed with our stuff. the ride to independence took about an hour and
i fell asleep, not missing any chance to nap. i guess i really
reinforced my new trailname "Napalie" and Zack officialy declared that
no other name would fit me better.
we arrived in front of he courthouse were we dumped all our stuff on
the lawn, in the shade of a big Sequoia to sort everything out. the
guys went to the post office to get boxes and to pick up or
bounceboxes and i started to organize our food by day supply to make
sure we were set. because independence is so small, soon we found out
that a bunch of hikers were in the courthouse motel. actually, squatch
had checked in there. he was going to stay for Independence day in
Independence. he let us use his room to charge batteries, burn photo's
to CD and to use his fridge untill we would head for the trail. many
hikers were in that hotel and soon we were sucked in to the hikers
social crowd. Zack came up to us and told us that they were all having
a BBQ that night AND .... that some of the hikers organized to hike in
the 4 of July parade that next morning. Independence is small but they
do try to celebrate independence day in a big way. we thought that it
was such a cool idea! im!
agine; we are just passing by hikers and now we would have the chance
to participate in a parade! i never walked in a parade! oh well;
what's an other day ... the experiences make the trail too and we
decided to not pass on this experience.
we checked in in a cheap but nice hotel, Ray's Den and shared the room
with zack to save some cost. Linda, the owner just bought the hotel in
October and she was a nice lady, giving us a nice discount.
zack, Aaron and i went to the little grocery store and bought some
bratwurst and buns and mustard to BBQ that night and of course some
good beers for Aaron and a nice specialty ice tea for me. it was a
happy happening at the courtyard of the courthouse motel. hikers
mingling and exchanging experiences while BBQ-ing there foods. Red
Neck and Mountain Tripper were the organizers of our parade
participation and they were making a banner from a sheet that the
owner of the motel, Ben, gave them. he is also very hiker friendly.
while zack stayed with the crowd for a little longer, Aaron and i went
to the nice and cool (outside temperature was about 95f after the sun
set)hotel room and watched some tv.
it was a fun thought to be here tomorrow but i do also get somewhat
anxious about our time frame. the sierra's are not as easy and we
expect to be quite slow through the snow. we really need to crank up
our daily mileage big time after Tuolumne. although many people still
are behind us and we are not really out of average, our way of hiking
is fairly relax compared to others. we often take extra days on the
trail to enjoy what ever is there to enjoy and we also enjoy our zero
days ... alot. our breaks are long and so is our morning ritual. we do
really believe that it is not all about hiking to canada but also
about the journey to get there and we do have alot of fun, together
with zack, who is just like us, if not worse. however, i DO want to
make it to canada before the snow in the cascades. we were previously
thinking of coming back in the last weeks of september but since we
have no jobs waiting for us, we don't really have any pressure to
hurry. but the snow is pressure. !
so i often feel pulled between enjoying the moment NOW and the
pressure of hurrying up and make it to get our goal LATER. but NOW is
fun and real and well ... there might be no LATER. so we stayed
another day in town and frankly; we enjoyed the thought of it.

aaron and napalie