"Where The Hell Am I?!"

or, the alternative title "One Salamander...Two Salamander...Three Salamander...DEAD!"

My Pony and I took a hike this weekend on Mt. Tam that we've never taken before. It was the Cataract Trail to the High Marsh Trail to the...oh, who cares. Either way, it was 1 mile of beautiful scenery and 6.5 miles of boring, and slightly scary woods.

You see, as many of my co-workers will gladly confirm, I'm notorious for not reading everything fully before moving ahead. Many an email has been responded to with the wrong response because I got bored after the first sentence or two and didn't read the whole thing. Apparently the same thing happens when I get a new book about local trails and I start trekking about before reading all of the details. Had I fully read the trail description in my book, I would have read the paragraph describing this as one of most wild and underutilized trails on Mt. Tam and it would have helped explain why I didn't see another soul for roughly 2 hours except three salamanders (four salamanders if you count the dead one in the middle of the trail). In fact, at one point I literally said out loud "where the f--k am I?!" Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the physical aspect of it, and the challenge of some pretty steep and rocky parts of the trail. And of course, had I completely read everything instead of just relying on the oversimplified map, I wouldn't have taken the unintentional "shortcut" that somehow managed to add about a mile onto the trip.

I also think My Pony enjoyed the hike. She insisted on posing at the only two pretty spots on the trail, but these pictures are not really indicative of the kind of trail this was. It was almost entirely woods and a little creepy to the point where I started thinking of the Blair Witch. We've come to the consensus, however, that on a scale of one to five dead salamanders, with five dead salamanders being the coolest hike ever, that this warranted two and a half dead salamanders.

I do, however, try to find the upside of things, and this hike was another one of those times where I reached the end and came to three conclusions. First, I don't think being a salamander is very fun, but it's not like they really know that because...well...they're salamanders. Two, if you like to hike because it's relaxing and helps de-stress, then read your trail book completely. Otherwise, you may end up more stressed out after the hike than when you started. And three, you sometimes have to take bad hikes to really appreciate the good ones. I can't wait for this weekend's hike!