Chattooga: Descending into the Myth of Deliverance River

Trail Mind

Trail Mind RUSSELL BRIDGE TO LICK LOG CREEK This page intentionally left blank Backpacking calls out the wilderness inside ourselves, and we're always surprised by its sane and gentle nature. ALBERT SAIJO The Backpacker N MID-MARCH I approach the Chattooga Wild and Scenic River corridor from the northeast on South Carolina Highway 28. I can think of no better way of spending a weekend than backpacking in the remote country above Russell Bridge. In Pilgrim at Tinker Creek Annie Dillard sits under a sycamore simply to "watch new water come down the creek." I want more than that, but I'm not sure what. I know I want the next two days to offer up some silence, and some reintroduction to the Chattooga, which I haven't seen in several weeks. I'm with Terry Ferguson, chairman of South Carolina's Heritage Trust Board, and Wofford College geologist. Terry's an old friend, a serious scientist with a softer side informed byJames Joyce and depth psychology. Ours is the type of intellectual friendship that's possible at a small liberal arts college, and we cultivate it— poet and scientist—as much as possible across disciplines. We're driving in my blue Toyota truck. My dog Ellie Mae is in the back, hanging her head out of one of the tiny windows of the camper top, catching the breeze. It's warm already, approaching sevI enty, and we've got the windows down in the cab as well, following Ellie's lead. She is both poet and scientist, exploiting the moment, reveling in the air, experimenting with velocity, her ears at a gaudy right angle to her head. Ellie is a cross between a beagle and basset. Her body is too big, head too small, legs long but spindly. Though people make fun of her, Ellie has had her fifteen minutes of fame; in 1996 she was featured in a large picture in the Perception kayaks catalog, and every time we went near a river that year people would stop, stare, andsay, "Hey, that's the Perception dog!" Along Highway 28 we see yard sales, peanuts boiling in black kettles , and pigskins hanging in cellophane bags. Wearen't in the backcountry yet, but not far west the blue haze of the mountains is distinct and inviting. "I haven't had a pack on in sixyears," Terry moans ashe shifts in his seat. "I'm out of hiking shape." "And we're both fat," I smile. "A sad commentary on our state of affairs." Though now he spends more time staring at a computer monitor or chairing meetings where people talk about valuablenatural places like the Chattooga, Terry's had his share of youthful outdoor excess . All the way from Spartanburg he tells stories of the deep past, of climbing the sheer rock faces that mark the country just west of us. As a college student at Wofford, Terry climbed most of the rock faces known to the native peoples as the Blue Wall. He tells of taking a long fall in one place, of another time getting stuck on Table Rock when a storm moved in and havingto bivouac on the cliff face, 750 feet from the valley floor. The last time we hiked together was 1993, in the Wind River Range of Wyoming. We packed into the Cirque of the Towers with a group from Dallas, including Terry's geologist brother, John. It was pure western wilderness country. We hiked in ten miles over two ten-thousand-foot passes carrying hundred-pound packs.John still likes to tell the story of how Terry and I stowed bananas in our packs. When we arrived at the campsite, they were mashed through90 CHATTOOGA out the rest of our gear. It took an entire afternoon to clean everything —sleeping bag, tent, and clothes. "It seemed like a good idea in the grocery store," Terry laughs when I bring it up. That was a climbing trip. Well, Terry climbed with his brother, and I sat and watched them with binoculars from my Crazy Creek chair. I don't mind climbing, but the rappelling has always sent me into shock, and allthe climbs in the cirque require multiple pitches, ending in multiple rappels. I was happy to watch, to do some easy fishing for the dumb, stocked rainbows in the high lakes, to hike around the cirque and disappear off the...