Part V in the story of my 7-day solo trek on Isla Navarino, continued from
Part IV: Refugio Charles and Lago Windhond. To start at the beginning or to see the full list of Navarino episodes,
click here.
I am the queen of late starts. Despite waking at around 7 am
I didn’t leave camp until around 10. I first spent around two hours trying to
mend the giant holes I had burned in my socks at the fire at the previous
camp—an attempt that later proved futile, at least in part because of my
terrible sewing skills. I didn’t bother with breakfast and just ate some
cookies and one of the sandwiches I had packed instead. I put on my damp socks
and boots and took off with a little fanny pack with food and a poncho, leaving
my tent up in case of bad weather, and thinking I’d be back from the bay—which
was
right there—by lunch. Ha!
 |
| Frankensocks |
First, less than two minutes in to the trek my bowels made
the sort of gurgle that means “DO NOT IGNORE ME” and I barely had time to drop
my pants before I suddenly became a full two pounds lighter.
Not long after that, I was stopped again, this time by a
large river that was not on the cheesy whole-island map that I now had to rely
on (this part of the island falling well off the edge of my halfway decent topo
maps). It was, I realized, on my GPS map which if I had seen before should have
warned me (my excuse: my phone screen is nearly impossible to read in the glare
of the light of day, and with all the rain over the past few days I didn’t
often want to take it out of my pocket). None of the creeks that had been very
difficult to impossible to cross that I had been hopping and wading through and
skirting before had been on the GPS map, so the fact that this map showed up
should have clued me into the fact that this would be a large obstacle. Indeed,
this was no creek. It was a legitimate river. I walked along its banks for over
a mile, trying to see if there was any chance of a shallow spot I could wade
across or a series of logs or something, but there was nothing, no way to cross
without swimming, which I might have considered if not for my cold (I had woken
up with a sore throat, headache, and full sinuses), it being very cold, and not
wanting to dunk my camera for a second time in 30 hours.
 |
| My campsite. Camera was still a little soggy (hence the fog)... didn't want to get it any wetter. |
The river did not go straight to the bay, which as the crow
flies was less than 4
km away. It went instead another 12 km to the east, increasing the distance I needed to walk by at least 3x (or 16 more km out and back). I mentally
came to terms with the reality of my not making it back by lunch, needing to
camp another night in my little hilltop room with a view, and it being now
extremely unlikely that I’d be able to make it back to the Dientes circuit in
time to make a quick go at it.
But damnit, I was going to make it to that bay! Over the
next four hours I marched through forest, peat bog, spiny death bushes, and beaver
swamps that in some cases I was only able to get through by tightroping across
their dams—in two cases breaking them (sorry beavers, but you did make the
route impassable, plus, you are a non-native species…so I didn’t feel too bad).
 |
| But this guy was a native species. He can stay. |
Most exhausting of all were the chest-deep mounds of
beachgrass on the dunes when I finally approached the bay. Where hiking through
the peat bogs was like walking for hours on a mattress, the beachgrass involved
lifting my leg to my chest, scrambling up, sinking back down, repeat. When I
arrived at the beach I was exhausted and my tendons hurt.
 |
| More bog. |
But I made it.
To the end of the world.
 |
| The beach at Bahia Windhond |
At least as close to the end of the world I could get
without passage on a yacht or a trip to Antarctica, as close to the end of the
world as I could get without a whole lot of money I don’t have. The farthest
south anyone I know has been who hasn’t been to Antarctica.
 |
| Yay!! |
I had a glorious ten minutes in the sun when I finally
arrived. I ate my sandwich, stripped naked and had just started to wade into
the water when I saw the giant dark storm cloud heading straight for me. I thought
the better of going for a frigid swim with a storm coming and a four hour walk
back to warmth before me. So I waved goodbye to the end of the world, threw my
clothes and poncho back on, and hit the chest-deep grass again just as the hail
hit.
Where on the hike there I had had many moments where I’d
grin and laugh when I’d see some vista and remember where I was and what I was
doing, on the way back my brain switched off and I just marched, too tired and
cold and wet to enjoy the scenery. I marched back through the mounds of
beachgrass, back through the beaver swamps, back through the peat bogs, through
forest and plains, through meadows and over hills, poncho on, face set, trying
to keep up a good clip to stay reasonably warm in the cold rain.
 |
| A sampling of the scenery I marched through. |
I marched for hours like that until suddenly, at the top of
a ridge forested with tall, slender trees, a gentle wind made the trees sing at
the same time that a cloud opened up, sending soft green light dancing around
me. I was dazzled.
The moment hit me like a shock, a reminder of where I was,
of all that had brought me there, and I was floored with gratitude and
happiness. It was like the God I had loved as a young person had appeared in
front of me, held out his arms, and said, “See? It was all okay in the end.” I
looked around me, bathed in the dancing light and singing trees, filled with
the feeling of everything being okay.
In that moment I realized that all of the struggle and torment
and tedium and heartache (and good times as well) that had eaten me the past
decade and especially the past few years had, as a culmination of forks in the
road that my life had taken, brought me there, to this magical grove of trees on
an island on the cold, sweaty, southern toe of the Americas. There, to a place
and on an adventure of which my self a decade ago would never have dreamed.
That it had been okay in the end.
More than okay: Incredible. And there I was, standing outrageously happy at the
end of the world.
 |
| Forest |
I was moved to do something I hadn’t done in over a decade:
I prayed. Dropped to my knees, face to the sky, surrendered myself to the
universe, and prayed. I prayed to no deity in particular, having long ago
become disillusioned by and walked away from the religion of my childhood, so I
was simply talking to the air. But the feeling was the same as when I used to
pray in my youth; I felt connected to the universe, felt my soul bursting
inside me. It was a prayer of thanks, and a prayer for forgiveness: forgiveness
for my lack of understanding and appreciation of all these years, and
forgiveness for the anger and bitterness that I had been refusing to give up
for so long.
And finally I forgave, in words out loud to the wind, those
people against whom I had held the anger that had been eating me alive.
I forgave my German ex-fiancé who, I was finally able to
accept, did what he had to do to protect his own happiness and sense of self. In
that moment I realized truly that I am happier now than I could have been with
the real version of him that I had refused to see and refused to accept. That his
leaving was, even though the circumstances were terrible, in the end a gift. That
my heart was broken but was returned to me, and that it was in my power to heal
it, because my heart is a big heart, a strong heart, and a good heart. In that
moment I was finally able to let him, and the rage and disgust and fury that
had been rotting me from the inside these past few years, go.
I forgave my beloved sister who, also in making decisions to
protect her own happiness, had burned to the ground her own relationship—a relationship
that I had held onto as a lighthouse of hope in the wake of my own falling
apart as proof that true love was possible. If true love like hers was
possible, I felt some hope that I might also find it someday. When her marriage
ended I was devastated, because I saw it as proof that I would never find a
lasting relationship because real and lasting love does not exist. In that
moment in the trees I realized that my happiness does not depend on my finding
a soulmate, if such a thing even exists. I realized that I am the happiest I
have ever been right now, and I am alone!—and my happiness certainly doesn’t
depend on the relationship status of my sister, who I adore and wish every joy
in the world.
I forgave the friend who had been my buddy during much of
the time I was struggling through the former two hurts who, without word or
explanation, threw me off in a way that ripped open the wounds that were just
starting to scab over. I realized that although I may never understand why he
did it, that I was okay now, that I could be grateful for the happiness he
brought me in a very dark time, and that I hoped that whatever he is up to now,
that he is happy.
 |
| Stream |
And finally, I forgave myself for my shortcomings and the
hell I put other people through during these dark years. I forgave myself for
taking so long to get over the other things—for the hell I put my own self
through. For being small and bitter and jealous and angry and needy and an
imperfect human. I had been furious with people for ruining my life. I needed
to see that my life wasn’t ruined, that it was, in fact, better than it
otherwise would have been, before I was able to let go and forgive. That was
not big of me, but it was human of me, and sometimes we have to forgive
ourselves for being humans, not saints. Whatever the path, in the end I had
fought through the darkness and clawed my way up from the deep well I had
fallen into. I had been brave enough to throw a middle finger to expectations
and go on a quest to find where my soul had run off to and to try to heal my
heart. I hadn’t done perfect, but I had done good. “It’s okay, Carie,” I
thought. “It’s okay now.”
The wind and light wrapped me around me as though the universe
was also saying, “It’s okay, Carie, it’s okay now,” and giving me a hug. I
stood, feeling if not fully healed at least a whole lot closer. And I felt at
peace in my heart for what very well may have been the first time of my 20’s.
The rain started again and the magical huggy wind spirit wasn’t
going to take me back to camp, my feet would have to do that, so off I went
again. My GPS was acting screwy but I was pretty sure I could find my way back
to camp without it. Sure enough, an hour and a half or so later, I laughed out
loud when I rounded a corner and almost stepped in my giant, now half-melted
turd from the morning (bad pootiquette, I know, but I figured nobody would be
around this area until long after the weather had taken care of it, and I didn’t
have a trowel on me). I was home!
 |
| Home sweet home. |
For dinner I cooked a noodle soup and then promptly knocked
over the pot and spilled it all over the ground, so I ate dirt-coated noodles
picked off the ground and cookies for dinner, enjoying the view for about
twenty rain-free minutes before the rain returned. It was a cold night, not
only because I had a cold but because it was a cold storm, and I curled up
inside my tent bundled up in several layers including a down jacket inside my
down sleeping bag and still felt cold. Cold, but content and happy, and whole.
Spoiler video from the trek:
