I came to Los Angeles in the first week of this month in search of better future. May be not. Let me put it this way. When I was in Burlington, I felt that nothing was happening in my life. So, I wanted to change it and hence moved to LA. Like I wrote in my last blog, it's like being thrown into hell. At least, for a while this was my impression. Now, this feeling is slowly wearing off. First week, I spent all my time looking for a place and buying some stuff needed to live here some what ok life if not comfortably.
When I was in Burlington, most of the time I was stuck to my computer and it was like I was addicted to internet. Or you could say that internet was the only friend I had. Then, finally after moving to LA I couldn't put my hands on the key board for a quite a while. I definitely loved it. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is I, finally, felt like I was doing some other things apart from spending all my time on computer.
Ok. Now, I'm coming to main point of today's blog. After first week of my stay in LA, I went for three different hikes in the last 2 weeks. I didn't finish the first one. I mean we had problems in finding the right trail. Some how, almost it took 2 hours to find the trail and by that time it was almost evening. Still, we decided to go for it. Finally, some where after walking for 2 hours we felt like we lost the trail and so decided to come back. Best part of this hiking was the feeling I had through out the hike. It was completely outside the city into the valley of trees and streams. Most of the hike was covered by shade and so it was not that difficult. I could say that it was moderate. There were lots of mosquitoes and gnats, etc through out the hike. Then, we understood we had to get some mosquito repellent. Anyway, we walked back with out finishing it. Best part of the hike was it was only two of us doing it. Since it was week day there were no people at all. Sometimes you feel like escaping from everyone in this world. I am sure you know what I'm talking about it. Some times you feel very frustrated and you don't feel peaceful at all in your mind. You feel like running away from everything. At that point, best thing to do is doing something which doesn't require any brains. I guess in my opinion hiking is the best solution.
For long time, I had this feeling that these western people hike since they don't know how it feels like living in small places filled with natural beauty. I mean, for example in India I was born in a small village and it was amazing place in it's own way. We were four kids walking everywhere around that village into the forest. I even remember climbing trees and jumping from tree to tree as part of the games. We used to go into forests and look for some small fruits called regu pallu. I don't know the name of these fruits in English, but I can say one thing for sure that they are not here in this part of the world. I can say that it was pretty much hiking into woods with out knowing that it was. I mean I didn't know damn anything like hiking until I came to USA. What I'm trying to say is here in this western world even if you live in small place it just looks like modernized place. It is like you have these modern stores and all other crazy modern life things you see these days. Where as in India, once you go away from cities you don't see anything like this anymore and it just feels like you are walking into some other world. I guess this is the reason here people love to hike as it makes them feel like they are away from all the confusion and stress the one has to face in day to day life.
I guess I'm no different. I know it's funny for me to say that I'm stressed out even though I'm not working. That is totally another story. If I start writing about that, I don't think I could finish this blog today. After the first hike, I felt some what peaceful and happy. Then last week I went to a hike with my engineering friends and loved it. We hiked to Mount Zion and it was pretty steep at some places. After that hike I felt like I was in ok shape to do difficult hikes. Even though we wanted to start the hike early in the morning, we ended up starting sometime around 11 in the morning. Which means we walked all the way in the scorching heat. Still, it was damn good. The only sore point was we didn't have food with us and my friend Kishan was pretty much hungry after a while and had to continue all the evening with out food. I guess it taught us a good lesson. I thought we were very well prepared for the hike. We had lot of water with us. We even bought mosquitoes repellent this time and it was definitely helpful.
I always thought that hiking means just walking some where into the woods. But believe me there is more to it. It teaches you survival techniques if you are stuck some where in the forest just by yourself. Or for that matter you just understand how important it is to have water with you all the time. In our daily life we take lot of things for granted and we don't appreciate lot of things. For example, coming from a small farmer family I know the value of water. Most of the times we don't care about small things in our daily life. Because we know that we could pretty much get anything if we have some cards in our pockets. For example, you are very thirsty and you go to some store and drink some soda or you even buy water and you just swipe your cards. That's it and it's taken care of. Right? Ok now let's imagine that you are some where stuck outside the city where there is no store close by. You might be having cards worth of thousands of dollars, but still you wouldn't be able to quench your thirst. Which means you wouldn't have to worry about it if you had carried some water with you. Right? Most of the times most of the people don't do that. Reason is simple. We always think that we are invincible and nothing happens to us. May be that's true. But this is life. Which means it has to happen at some point in your life. I never carried water with me any time in my life. More over I used to think that I was good at doing things which most of the people find it difficult to do. It is just a false pride thing. If I'm truthful to my self, I'm no different to anyone which means I can also get into some situations where I'll have to face severe consequences if I'm not prepared.
Anyway, when my friend talked to me about the importance of water in the hikes , I was like it should be ok and it's not that important. But on my friend's insistence, I put lot of water bottles. Of course, I did that reluctantly. My feeling was that why should we carry that much weight. Then, after the hike I understood how important it was and I definitely appreciated the good advice. More over, having a weight on your back gives you stability on the steep hikes. I am not sure whether this is right theory, but I felt this way. More over, hiking with some weight on your back improves your strength and endurance. Now, I want to do some hikes with some camping gear on my back which would at least weight 10 pounds. My plan for the next hike is to carry at least 10 kgs on my back, I mean in my back pack. This way I'll be well prepared for my future tough hikes like Mount Whitney, etc. Oho, by the way I forgot to tell you one thing here. Mount Whitney is the highest peak in the North America and I want to do this hike some time in the near future. Some one told me that it's one of the most difficult hikes and most of the people have respiratory problems at high altitude. I even heard that people should carry some medicine for this problems. Best part about this Mount Whitney is its altitude. It is almost 15,000 ft. I'm very excited about it and I want to do it for sure. My plan is to do it in two days. I read some where that it takes minimum of 15 hours hike to reach the peak. So, I'm planning to do it over two days. After first day hike, I'm planning to camp some where in the middle of the hike on the mountain. I guess it would be cool to do that it would remain as one of the best memories for sure. I always loved to push my self and I always get pleasure when I push my limits. Some times not only strength and endurance come out of pain and suffering but also fun.
Yesterday, I did my third hike in the Griffith park which is located next to my home. I walked for 3 and half hours and I enjoyed it like anything. I went with some meetup.com in LA and it was definitely memorable. We started this hike in the evening at 5:50 and came back home at 9:30. Best part was the hike was very steep at some places. For the first 15 minutes I felt the difficulty. After that, for some reason my legs were really light. I didn't face any problems at all through out the hike. I was happily climbing and walking. No panting at all. It was just awesome. More over since it was evening there was cool breeze through out the hike. I guess it made us feel awesome. There were almost 50 people around us. I met some German guy who was interested in going to some events with us in the future. It is always a good feeling to meet new people and talk to them. I guess hiking is the best option to do it. Finally, we came down the hill at 9 pm to the parking lot and every one left in their cars. We didn't like the idea of going to the park in the car since it was close to our home. So we had to walk back home in the darkness. For a while we had problems in finding the directions and right path to head back home. Finally, when we found the path, it was pitch dark. So we used our head lamp. It was very cool to use that lamp. I wrapped it around my head and I was like wow it feels like I'm doing some adventurous thing. Before we started this hike I thought to my self that where and when would it be useful. I got the answer with in hours. It was definitely very useful to have that head lamp. Next time if I'm going to night hikes or moon light hikes, I'll definitely take some more batteries too. Who knows if we are lost some where on the top of the mountain, we might drain our batteries of the head lamp and then what? Other cool thing I found in these hiking tours is variety of bags available for hiking. There are camping bags which are huge and can accommodate lot of things and mountain bags which are good for putting mountaineering stuff and camel back pack which has some pouch inside to store water. The advantage of this camel back pack is that you can suck water through a pipe coming out of the back pack. The pipe would be some where close to your mouth. Which means you don't have to unpack the bag each and every time you are thirsty. By the way, all this explains why it's called camel back pack. Right? It's just like camel which preserves water in the top shelf of stomach when ever it drinks water. Then it slowly used that water in the long journey's in deserts. This way you could never fall back in the group. I saw some more cool stuff to carry water with us like some waist thing which has some holder place to hold the water bottles.
Now, I want to do this same hike with my friend Kihan in the near future. I know that he likes to do things like this and I'm sure he would love it. More over the best part of doing it with him is that we get to speak in Telugu and we can speak so many things since I feel we are like like-minded people.
For my future hikes, I want to buy some nice camping back pack. Right now I'm not in a position to afford this type of expenditure. We already have camping gear with us. The other thing I want to spend money on is hiking navigator. The other day I went to best buy store and did some window shopping. There I checked out these hiking navigators. They are just awesome things to have with us in the hikes. They even have some watches which would not only tell us the latitude and longitude of our position but also calculate the distance we have traveled. Cool. Right? One last and most important thing I want to spend money on is good compass.
After all this, now I'm damn interested in finding how things work. For example I started reading how one can find latitude and longitude of our position and how one can make his own compass, etc. Or for that matter how we can find the directions if we are lost some where in the woods. It's just really cool. We can find directions looking at stars and looking at sun position in the day and our own shadows. It is just amazing. Best part is it's all knowledge. I don't know whether we can ever use all of it in our life. But it's not about that I guess. It is all about how happy we feel the minute we understand how to do it. Who knows one day we might face certain situations where we'll have to use all this knowledge. I'm sure then we would be very happy and glad that we spent some time in acquiring this knowledge.
What ever it is, I'm feeling quite happy because of these hikes. I want to do it more. In the first week I felt like I was thrown into hell. This feeling is slowly wearing off as I'm trying to do some stuff here. Not just stuff, but cool stuff. Even though it is just busy life here in the city, we get to do more things if we are willing to do. It is just about our attitude in the end that matters. I am glad that my attitude is moving in the right direction.
Ok, I guess as usual I wrote a lot and now I'm feeling damn hungry. Go to go. I'm hoping to write soon. It makes me feel great when ever I write something. It is like sharing something to my self. I guess not only that. Living here in the city, it's just difficult to find people to share things with. So by doing this I'm getting relieved of my burden on my mind. Ok Sreedhar, chalo it's time for lunch.
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