The Veil is Thin

By Noam Yaffe

I continued up the trail, now ascending into the higher elevation, the October air cooling. I passed a couple, who looked like they hiked this trail often, descending: the last people I would see for the rest of the day. I reached the uppermost sections of the Dry Brook Ridge trail and spied the rocky ledge through the berry bushes before finding the curving side trail that led to it. The view from it was stunning, impressive, and on par with some of the best Catskill views. This view faced West, beyond the High Peaks of the Catskills and into the rest of the valley, lower mountains, and hilltops. The High Peaks of Graham and Balsam Lake Mountains were visible to the left, and to the far left I could see the rest of Dry Brook Ridge, curving and undulating before descending sharply into the valley separating the ridge from the peaks. There was the dried up Pepacton Reservoir, looking more like a low laying field than a body of water, as the view's centerpiece. I saw the valley and the warm houses lying low inside it. The view was spectacular, and I was instantly satisfied with this route, no matter what else it held in store. I was a view hunter, and this view was one of the last I had to capture before experiencing them all within the park.

I dropped the heavy pack, dug into it, and threw on all my layers. The wind was whipping the rocks below me, and the clouds had gathered on the horizon, creating wispy streams of mist, a light precipitation that rode the breeze into me. After an internal debate, I decided to take my dinner upon this rugged and windy ledge, as I wanted to enjoy the view and felt it was worth braving the wind and light rain. After all, the hot food would warm my body and, along with the view, my spirit as well.

I fired up the Jet Boil and began the cooking operation, glancing out into the cloudy valley and mountains, staring at the leftmost portion of the view and tracing tomorrow's route along the rest of the ridge, into the valley to reach the unseen road, and up the steep slopes to the faraway high peaks above. I tried to pick out the exact slope, the exact ridge and bump along the mountain that I'd be climbing. I enjoyed the hot soup and tea while the wind blew mist on me. I snuck in a couple of tokes with my back to the wind. I felt rugged and adventurous, the lone traveler, the lone warrior atop this mountain, braving the conditions for the pleasure of the view and the outdoors.

As I neared the end of my meal on the rocky ledge, I studied the cloudscape again and saw a curtain of dark gray concentrates, some of which dipped in surreal shapes and forms within the textured sky, twisting like little tornadoes, giving the scene an intense, supernatural feeling. I felt vulnerable facing those clouds. It looked like a portal into an alternative reality, and not necessarily a happy one, was approaching. The mist thickened, and I packed up my bag, followed the trail another few hundred feet, and stepped off into the wilds in search of a place to spend the night.

I crunched my way off the trail and into the forest of the ridge top, finding a relatively flat section of land. I counted my paces and estimated that I was at least 150 feet away from the trail, then searched for a clearing that was level enough to pitch my tent. After a short while, I came across a small fire ring, nestled in among the dried leaves and craggy branches. In an instant, I was overwhelmed by emotion. Someone before me – how long ago? – had gone through the same search for a campsite, and they had found it here, setting up a fire ring to make it homier and cozier. I felt a connection to this unknown person, and I wondered what their circumstances were like, what their life experience was that led them to this very place where my life had led me, in the here and now. I felt a bit lonely, my only relation to another person being this metaphysical connection to a stranger, but I was happy to have what seemed like the entire forest to myself. I knew I would make my camp in this area. I found a suitable place to pitch my tent, near the fire ring but a bit deeper into the woods, on a flat surface of leaves and dark soil, underneath a tall, leaning tree. The site reminded me of Giant Ledge, with the trail along a ledge with a spectacular view, and the campsite tucked away behind the ridge. I remembered the stunning night view from Giant Ledge and, after pitching my tent and setting up my backcountry campsite, followed my urge to experience the night view off the spiky cliff of Dry Brook Ridge.

I worked my way back and crashed through a group of thick trees, finding myself right on the trail, hugging the edge of the ridge, with a different but similarly jagged rocky ledge. This one was smaller than the one I sat at earlier, but it still provided an expansive view of the deep valley and surrounding mountains. Now, the thickening sky converged with the land at the horizon, blurring the distinction between the earth and the heavens. A blue haze pervaded the air, casting a dreamlike glow across the valley.

Deep inside the valley, two houses shined bright yellow lights into the night, the glow illuminating a small sphere around them before fading into the surrounding darkness. The houses were far away from me in distance, several miles across the forest and a few thousand feet below this cliff, but also in spirit. They were defenders of society, the tamers of the wild, while I was a mere visitor, only a temporary witness to this wild section of the earth, impenetrable to those without spirit or courage. I wondered what the people inside those houses were doing at that very moment, why they had turned on those lights, while I was standing solo atop the wet rocks of the mountain. Nearby, headlights from cars moving down a country road pierced the black forest before curving and fading back into it.

The sky continued to darken, and I stood at the cliff, feeling a thin veil of mist caressing the outsides of my synthetic layers. I stood and lost myself among the shadows and the lights, imagining the interiors of the houses and following the whips and curves of the headlights. Eventually, I realized that the misty wind was causing me to shiver, and I performed a final meditation of gratitude before heading back into the forest and finding my campsite.

I ducked inside the tent, covered myself with the sleeping bag, and wrote a passage in my notebook. When I later crept out of the tent to conclude my nightly routines, I emerged into a forest of mist. It had invaded the woods while I wrote in my tent, and I now found myself inside a cloud that had become stuck on the cliffs, as I had been earlier, transfixed by the grand scale of the world before me. However, the moon was out behind the mist, casting a pervasive glow into the atmosphere, illuminating the small pellets of moisture in the air as they waved past, creating a lingering light, like the sun's dip behind a mountain at sunset. I watched my breath trail off into the atmosphere.

My sense of wonder and adventure increased then, as I felt like I was on a quest on some mystical journey. The excitement was paired with a level of fear, as I was the only person in the vicinity in these wet and cold conditions. The fear was mitigated by the knowledge that, however I felt about it, I was about to spend the night right here. I turned low my thinking mind and replaced it with my feeling mind. I felt the awe and excitement of the magical misty cloud surrounding me, and I felt the necessity of warmth, dryness, comfort, and sleep. I brushed my teeth, stashed my bear can, surveyed the glowing mountain mist one last time, and crawled into the tent.

I did not experience any sustained period of good sleep, instead tossing and turning throughout the night, dozing only in small increments. After a few hours, I roused from another round of dozing and stumbled out of the tent into a drastically altered scene. The mist had lifted, revealing a brilliant, bloated moon that crowned the sky, casting a direct and bright glow across the land. The light was so intense that it made the night turn into a ghostly bright day, a spirits' noon time. It reminded me of the Lake Isle of Innisfree, where "Midnight's all a glimmer and noon a purple glow." Here I was on this mountaintop, with midnight all a glimmer in reality. It was thrilling, and the extreme cold did not prevent me from lingering in the white light, lost in this glimmering midnight, feeling the spirits' lively dances around me, friendly pale shadows, as they celebrated their high noon in the forest. The moon shined above the ridge, angling in toward my tent. I snuck back into my sleeping bag, still feeling the bite of the cold air, and observed the bright moonlight spilling into my tent. It flamed the ghostly glow into the interior of my little wilderness home, casting shadow puppet figures across the fabric, looking as real as the branches themselves. The wind increased the air's chill and caused the wet branches to shed their watery reserves, pouring another round of precipitation onto my tent. I lay in my tent, letting the wetness gather around the outside, staying dry and warm enough to be safe, though not entirely comfortable, and periodically opening my eyes to glance at the silver light surrounding me.