"walk away quietlyin any direction, "and taste the freedomof the mountaineer. "camp out among the grassesand gentians of glacial meadow, "in a craggy garden, nooks fullof nature's darlings. climb the mountainsand get their good tidings." "nature's peacewill flow into you as sunshine flows into trees." "the winds will blow theirown freshness into you, "and the storms their energy,
while cares will drop offlike autumn leaves." [wind blowing] filmmaker: when iwas in college, i tooka backpacking trip through shenandoahnational park in virginia. a passing hiker told me about the most spectacular andbeautiful trail he'd ever hiked. that day, i decided thati would whatever i could to make a film aboutthis place he described. after years of planning andpreparing, i finally connected
with 5 adventure-seekinghigh-school students from near my homein north carolina who were setting offon this 220-mile journey. the teens were friends throughscouting and sports teams, but these were not your typicalextreme sports types. they were just regular guyslooking for a challenge and a change totheir daily routine. their accomplishmentalong the trail and mine in actuallycapturing it
is proof to me that we areall much more powerful than we can even imagine. [whistle blows] travel, travel, travel. you're on the plane.you're the bus. you're on the train.you're all over the place. and then all of a sudden, the bus drops you offin yosemite valley, and you're at thebackpacker campgrounds,
and you're like, "here we are. "this is what all thishas been leading up to, is this time right here." john muir musthave been bad-ass. don't get lazy and leaveone of these unlocked. this one is locked.this one here is not. if you do that, a bearcan get into these. every couple of years or so,we like to do somethingkind of fun and crazy, so the last few years,we've done a couple ofcross-country bike trips.
a bunch of these guys have beenon cross-country cycling trips, and so now they'rekind of in the flow of, what kind of crazy thing arewe going to do this summer? mmm... i've never donethis before, ever. don't tell brian. i've never done anythingthis physically strenuous. i feel like i'm going to be ableto judge the entire trip by how the first day goes.
filmmaker: any concerns? yeah. i hope my fooddoesn't get eaten by bears because only about a third of itfits in my bear canister. i hated to haveto come around to the other sideof the park to begin, but i wanted to be legit and not have any troubleswith the law, so i did. soundtrack:♪ it's you riding away... ♪ i'm a little nervous.
i really don't know howhard it's going to be. the john muir trailhas the reputation of being the most famous and the most beautifultrail in the world. as soon as we leave this sign,it's pretty much just us until two and a half weekslater, when we reach the end. we start in yosemite valley, go through ansel adamswilderness, john muir wilderness,the sequoia redwood forests,
and then finallyto the highest point in the continental u.s.in mount whitney. the scenery is just supposed tobe monumental the entire time. every day,it's supposed to be just the best dayof hiking possible. "backpacker" rates itnumber one trail in the world. everybody else that'sdone it says it's themost spectacular thing, so i figure might as wellcome check this thing out. this is a gnarly trail.it's sweet.
we've gone up, like,2,000 feet already and haven't evenhiked that far. but i'm feeling good.i mean, it's gorgeous. brian: we lost ourfirst hiker, patrick, who's not an officialmember of our group, but we kind of feelresponsible for him. and after 7 hours, he hasn't made the 4 milesup moderate 7% grade. granted, it wasa little steep,
it was a little warm,but 7 hours. boyce hiked700 miles of the a.t. i mean, come on. is he right behind me? oh, i thought he wasright behind me. so, do you have acrazy story to tell? a little bit. i was cramping up. did yosar find you?
yosar? yosemite searchand rescue. we registered you aspreliminarily lost. i was like, yeah,that's probably me. a member of our crew, zach, is throwing upand can't keep water down, so that makes mea little nervous. we're thinking he'sa little heat exhausted, and he's going totake a little nap.
my name is shelton johnson. i'm a park rangerhere in yosemite, in the division ofinterpretation and education, and i've been in yosemite,i've been calling it home, for about 18 years. people use wordslike "spectacular," it tends to be hyperbole, except when you're in placeslike yosemite valley. actually, i think that
calling yosemite valleyspectacular is understatement. every day i come in,i'm inspired, because every day i come in,i see something new. i came in two days ago,and i saw a rock fall between middle brotherand yosemite falls. very exciting. it wasa john muir moment. the sierra nevada comesfrom the spanish, meaning "snowy mountain range." it's the highest mountain rangein the contiguous united states,
and the highest peak, of course, in the contiguous united statesis mount whitney. but that's just basicallygetting into statistics, you know, and it doesn'tmeasure up to the statistics. i mean, it's an amazingmountain range. i love the rockies,i love the smokies, but from my point of view, there's no place likethe sierra nevada. whether it be yosemiteor whether it be sequoia,
there's just a feeling here thatyou don't have anyplace else, and i think that it stemsfrom the rock itself. john muir referred to the sierraas the range of light, and so it's basically--it's granite. it's a plutonic igneous rock,which is a very geological way of describing howa rock responds to light and also how it affects andinflects the human imagination. the bedrock that's here,this granite, is the stage for all the wonder
that people experience whenthey're hiking on a trail. it all starts withthe granite itself. you can't talk about anyother story in the sierra without first talking aboutthe granite, about the rock. i'd say everyone isdoing about the same. we're all a team here. well, compared tozach, at least. poor zach. i feel sick.
i can't even talk. i'm definitely scared,if this is day 2, getting out there,dehydrated, can't move-- what am i going to do? i've already thrown up3 times on this trip. i just want it to end. i'm not feelingphysically tired as in muscles hurtor anything yet; it's just my stomach, and ifi can get through that,
i think i'm going tobe all right. [sigh] we started hiking it, and zach startedfeeling not too good, so we decided to help him out alittle bit, split up his stuff. what should itake out? we want youas light as possible. i think that was good because we added, all,a little bit of weight.
i mean, it wasn'ttoo bad for any of us, but it reallyhelped him a lot. let's go. still keep it slow,though, zach. i was thinking the entire time,when i was looking at him, i was like, i think he's goingto get through these days and be, like, "wow, the rest isreally easy compared to this because i was sick the entiretime and still hiking." it was pretty killer.
pretty much, if youtake it slow, it wasn't ridiculously hard. most beautiful spot i'veever camped before, i think. brian: day 2,we're at mile 10. no. i think we're actuallyat 13, but still. you know, we're keeping itslow on purpose, though. i find if we come out and westart hitting things real hard, the first 2 days might go,ok, people will be tired, but like on day 3 or 4,
people are justgoing to be exhausted. knees are going to blow out. heels are going to getworse than they are. so if we kind of, like,slowly build it up, we'll do a lot better. zach: i'm definitelyfeeling better. i'm just, like, going upand down and up and down. and then i tried togo down to see the lake. i'm trying to jumpover this little creek.
i get my first foot in-- completely sinks in the mud,like a half a foot down. smash my face and everything right into the mucky, dirtywater that's disgusting. i'm freezing cold. if this is all thatthey can throw at me, nothing is goingto stop me. so i was sittingon this rock out in this gorgeous meadow,just kind of thinking.
i was just kind ofthinking about the trip, thinking about life in general. it's such amind-blowing experience. i just want to inspire peopleto get out there and do it, and also, to kind ofconserve the environment. so, i mean, i'm probably goingto not drive my suv as much. which is a total lie. hey, petey.what's up, buddy? well, the john muir trailis essentially--
you're literally followingin the wake of john muir. john muir was known forhis nomadic wanderings around and throughthe sierra nevada, and i think that'sa particularly kindof famous route between yosemite andsequoia national park. of course, he fought and spenta great deal of his life trying to have yosemiteset aside as a national park, but in his own mind, there should bea sierra nevada national park.
the area that's betweensequoia and yosemite, which is also very beautiful, not nearly as exploredas yosemite and sequoia, is also full of superlatives,and for him, the whole area should have beenset aside as a national park, and i think that anyonethat hikes that trail can bear witnessto the imagination and the vision of john muir and why that area shouldalso have been set aside.
brian: he's gotboth battles. he's throwing up,and his feet arejust hamburger. but he's atrouper, dude. ♪ there on that hillwhere we set our felts ♪ ♪ we had storiesto back our hearts ♪ ♪ but history's course tooka turn towards divorce... ♪ this is tough. i mean, there's probablynot a tougher 200 miles in the countrythat's a real trail.
♪ i ain't boundfor this old world ♪ ♪ i have foundand i'll find yet again... ♪ i'm tryingthe bear bag here. we'll see how this goes. that night, it reallykind of got under my skin that he waited right before--we were just about asleep. he couldn't even wait andlet us get good and asleep, and he jacked us. get out of here! hey!
[banging] [shouting] this is going to bea long-ass night. he didn't evenmess around. he just came upand just boom. 10 minutes in. we were stillall awake. i kind of wantto move my tent. me, too.
that was awesome,though! no, that wasn't awesome. all right. so let me justtell you what happened. i looked out, and isaw eyes looking at me, and i went, "oh, crap,we got a big bear." he just came straightthrough this campsite and stole all our food! but then he was like,"that's a bear!" and i was like,"quit playing."
that was ridiculous! let me tell you something. "b" is a bad-ass. i got about, you know,3 good minutes of sleep before the bear came throughcamp and took all my food. we got out there.you were out there in your underwear chasinghim off, and that was cool. was it big? he's a not a little baby,that's for sure.
he's not a baby. i used to not respect "b"at all--like, not at all. but right now, i haveso much respect for him, because he was up there,like, chasing that bear. girl: yay! that was awesome. everything in hereis a hodgepodge of everything we found thatwe thought we could salvage. let's see the booty.
oh, yeah. this is mostlymine, i think. we had to recover a lot after the fun experience of lastnight, so that took a while. we got out of campkind of late, like 8:00. ♪ are you gonnamake it at all ♪ ♪ you know i stall ♪ ♪ are you gonnacarry the load... ♪ the first 3 mileswere flat meadow.
i'm ready forto this mountain. and then we hitdonahue pass, which kickedall of our butts. ♪ especially his own selfthe most ♪ ♪ now he's gottamake room for both... ♪ day 3 and 4 were awful. they were just miserable. we were so tired. we just hitthe ground running,
going straight upthese mountain passes. we were pushing ourselvesto the limit, but we were only getting in maybe 10, maybe 15 milesin a day. it is so hard on your body,and it hurts so much, and we were all like, "we'renever coming back out here. "this is awful.we hate this." it was terrible duringthose 4 days. that's travelingin style there.
yeah. we need some chaps. it's just a lot harderthan i expected. ♪ always gotta carry the load ♪ is that good pooh? ha ha ha! ♪ you know i do ♪ ♪ i always gottacarry the load ♪ the group so far, we'redefinitely taking a beating.
like, it's not so muchthe group. the group, we're friendsand all, but it's like everyoneis just beat up. i'm pretty physicallyactive and everything. i'll do 3 sports.i run a lot of the time. there's no way i couldhave been ready for this. this is just...it's intense. tomorrow is going tobe a little easier. it's going to be a long day,but it's not as many uphill.
so hopefully tomorrow we'll kindof get some spirits back up, and then we've got vermilionranch a little after that. we're getting there.i think it's a lot mental. if you just push through it,you can do it. each mountain rangehas its own character, has its own personality, and ithink to really get a sense of the personalityof the sierra nevada, which is a long mountain range and an impressivemountain range,
you have to walk the extentof it, the length of it. you can focus onone particular area, but that's only the characteror the personality of that one particulargeographic area. so to really get the feel of it,you have to do the whole thing. i mean, i have a senseof the sierra nevada, but i haven't hikedthe john muir trail. knowing it only in sequoiais not the same thing as knowing it in sequoiaand yosemite
and all the placesthat are in between, knowing itin all of its moods. what's the sierra likein the spring? what's it like in the summer? what's it like in the falland the winter? what's it likeduring a thunderstorm? on a bright, sunny dayin the summer? what about when theleaves start changing at the higher elevationsin late september?
all of those things add up to a fuller descriptionand a fuller feeling of what it's like to say,"i know the sierra nevada," and john muir knew thesierra nevada in that way. i'd say probably day 5 is when-- especially the group,but me, too-- really was kind of like,"we're getting stronger. we're doing it now." ♪ it doesn't hurt a bit ♪
♪ it's only in your head ♪ was it good? uh! ohh! oh! that's foot one.that's not the bad one. this one is worse. ♪ you're walking on a wire ♪ ♪ you're hangingby a thread ♪
jesus. ♪ it doesn't hurt a bit,it's only in your head ♪ i love all you guys. you're all awesome. i think you're allgoing to make it. i know you'reall going to make it, and i just wantedto say thanks, and i'm glad i got know someof you a little bit more. so, thank you, and i'mgoing to miss you guys.
see you, pete. see you. ♪ bite down on this,it's only in your head ♪ our visitation in 1996was 4.1 million. it probably will be over4 million this year. whenever you havea place that's popular in the way thatyosemite is popular, when you have that concentrationof people coming into any place, just walking through a meadowchanges the meadow
because meadowsare wetland areas, and a footstep cancreate change or damage that can last much longer thanone's presence in that meadow. the same holds truefor a trail. you know, trails are designedso that people can maneuver and move through a landscapeand see it at its best. i mean, it's not likethey're just put there. it's not just thatthey're following the contour lines on a map.
the trail is there becausewe want you to walk here, walk this way, walk here. that's one thing that peoplecan do--stay on the trails. if there's a sign thatsays don't do this or don't do that,don't do it. it's there for a reason. i would say find your ownroute mentally, spiritually, but follow the trailthat's actually there. our longest day before thiswas 15 miles, i think,
and then todaywe went almost 18. we've been getting upat 6:00 every morning. i think we got onthe trail 7:00, maybe, so we were decentlyquick in the morning. ♪ breathless in the mornin' ♪ ♪ gone to better lands ♪ ♪ i just sat there silent ♪ ♪ as the longest day began ♪ this is spectacular.
the cool thing is, we'll behiking in the woods one moment and you can't even see it, and then we'll pop outin a clearing like this, where there aren't any,really, trees, and you see the wholehigh sierra, and it's just so huge,and it's so magnificent. it's almost justhard to take in. i, adams conrad, do not hate hikingas of right now.
wow. and i almost do nothate brian burnham. i thinkwe got one left. oh, yeah? i might hate himin a few minutes. i felt a lot stronger todaythan any other day. i mean, i was stillvery tired, of course, but i feel likei'm getting stronger, and the packs aregetting lighter
because we're eatingmore food and stuff. today definitely feltlike we were going inthe right direction, and we're definitelygetting better at this. but overall, it wasnot a bad day. we stopped at a couple of lakes,and we went swimming once. we just went ata much faster pace, so we still got to campat about the same time as even when we were onlygoing like 12 or 13 miles. so we definitely picked upthe pace today.
there's no turning back. it would be really,really hard if is was in, like, zach'sposition, to be that sick, so i completely understandwhy he had to turn back, but as hard as it gets, i stilljust want to keep going on and keep pushing through it. ♪ and thisweathered photograph ♪ ♪ is all i have to show ♪ i'm having fun.it's definitely a challenge.
parts of it are not so fun, but overall, it's definitelyvery rewarding and fun. there's differentkinds of nourishment. you know, there's nourishmentthat comes from food. there's nourishment that comesfrom friendship, companionship, but there's also nourishmentthat comes from the things that you see that are wildor on the wing that move by. for john muir,going by right now, the waterfowl that justflew by, those ducks,
that was nourishment of a sort. and the wind that's blowingaround us right now, that warm, kind ofcoolish warm breeze, that was nourishmentfor the soul and for the spiritof john muir. so i think the reason why hedidn't have much with him-- because he was beingfed in other ways. he was receivingnourishment in other ways. so, yeah, he didn'thave much with him,
but why would hewhen he's walking through an environmentthat's sustaining him? good morning. it's pete. i'm up. uh. how'd you guyssleep in there? ok. i think.
you're still in the woods,in case you were wondering. the morning is so easy. we're loose. it's cool. mosquitoes aren't out yet. we're climbing a thousandand something feet in the morning. i just lovebig hills, aidan. the past few days, we've campedat the bottom of passes and just kind of killed itup those passes
and then just cruised downhillfor the rest of the day, and i really like that. it's amazing how quicklythe body adapts. we've gotten so much stronger. you can feel it, too,in the morale. the first couple of dayswas a little, like, low, shaky, kind of "i don'tknow if i like this yet," but as we got stronger, as we started gettingfaster and faster,
the whole groupsort of picked up, and now we're going throughthese 18-mile days fine. we werecrushing that. at 4:00, we're going to catchthe ferry to vermilion ranch. we'll have a night there. we'll have running waterand showers, and we'll get a day off,so i'm looking forward to that. ♪ without a hero ♪ ♪ who could be our hero ♪
♪ drive into the city ♪ ♪ the subject of the day ishow can we repay this ♪ ♪ debt of all the money ♪ ♪ money we aren't makinglately ♪ ♪ lately ♪ ♪ lately ♪ ♪ lately i've beenon my back ♪ you got toresupply, right? hey, i like that.
so anytime you guys areready for your resupply, just pop on in here, and we'llwalk on out and get it. restaurant is openuntil 8:00. it's protein night tonight. so that means barbecue. how you can pay me ispay as you go. we'll set up a tab. all right. so, we gotto resupply for 9 days, and we cleared thisside of the store out.
we probably should have justmailed in our resupply. vermilion is awesome.i love this place. it's pretty expensive. they hada moderate resupply. the food here is so good,and they, like, pile your plate full of food,like until you're stuffed. coming out of 6 days,we were hungry. we hadn't really hadtoo much real food, especially breakfast food,so we came in here,
and we were just like,"oh, my gosh, this is so good." so today i've been thinking, i've just got to eatas much as i can. there's no resupplyanywhere in the next 9 days. next 120 miles, no resupply. we're going to be outin the middle of nowhere. it's just going tobe insane, pretty much. morning is the best time tojust kind of get out there and get the hardest partof the day over with,
so i anticipate that we'llbe up and moving early, and we won't take many breaks. there's no quit. i would never--unless somethinglike broke a leg or whatever. it doesn't matterhow run-down i get, i'm just going to finishthis at this point, especially sincei made it this far. i'm going to finish thisthing if it kills me. i'm guessingthis is the pass.
i couldn't get him to stop. unbelievable. keep going up and upand up and up. beef stroganoffis legit. so you guys arein the food mood? i'm so hungry. but, you know,it's all mental. i'm not really hungry. my stomach is justsaying i'm hungry.
i can go without food.gandhi did. i think the best wayto travel these places is with a sense of reverence, that it's an honor to bein this kind of environment, and it is a sacred place, and totreat it as a sacred place. you know, when peoplewalk into a church, their voices, before theywalk in, may be loud and they may be just kind ofblustery and all of that. as soon as they walk in, there'sthis hush and there's this calm.
there's a stillnessthat takes over, even if it's a churchthat's not of your faith. so i think it's the same thing when you enter a trailinto the wilderness. there should bea sense of reverence, of spiritual connection. it's just a place where thedivine is manifest on earth. let's getto hacking it. this is patt, right?
yeah. p-a-t-t.two ts. patt with two ts. and... and richard. richard. from... [with accent]richard. richard. from poland. what's the message ofthe muir trail ranch to the other hikersout there?
we do everything we canthat'll have you leave here with everything that you need,and in good spirits. we've got fresh spring water. we've got the email. we've got the hiker boxes. i wish they werethe barbecue. that's right. i'm just packinga lot of food. everybody stocked up on,like, 9 days' worth of food.
it was probably too muchat the beginning. then we just added like5 more days, 2 days in. i'm going to eatso much tonight. i guarantee this willbe gone by the end. my stomach hurts right nowbecause i ate so much. i ate one huge sausage. the run from muir trailranch to whitney is longer than anythingon the a.t. i mean, you have to havea week's worth
unless you can walka mad mile. you got it. see the sun coming downa little bit through the clouds? oh, it's beautiful. what do you reckon, ty? you ever been ina place like this? this is amazing right here. this sunset--beautiful. never been in a placelike this in my life.
this sucks. i hate my life.ha ha! [laughter] pete, are you getting upfor the sunrise? no. when you're outside a park, you see it's defined bythose little blue lines. "there's yosemitenational park." but as you can see, right now,where we are in the valley,
the only limitation is the edgeof the cliffs around us. we're in this7-square-mile area. emotionally and imaginatively, it just seems likeit goes on forever. that does somethingto the imagination, and you realize that whenyou're within wilderness, that it's much biggeron the inside thanit is on the outside. and i would saythat any place that's bigger on the insidethan it is on the outside
is a wonderland. up and at 'em. hehh! is it that timeof day again? we hiking it? ♪ clouds cover the stars ♪ ♪ and hide theirhopeful flickering ♪ ♪ trunk of our car ♪ ♪ an angelhas lost his wings ♪
♪ and he willshine tonight ♪ muir pass. that's the part they sayyou're going to remember. ♪ blueberry tree ♪ ♪ the prophetwho interprets dreams ♪ ♪ we had no choice,we had to try ♪ ♪ we had no choice ♪ ♪ we had to try ♪ i would say that the traildoesn't change people at all.
what changes people is thatthe trail is the means by which transformationtakes place. ok? the trail itself doesn'tdraw attention to itself. it's what happens to youalong the trail. so along the trail is where youencounter, early in the morning, just as the sun iscoming up, a mule deer that walks in front of youjust 10 feet away and looks at you as if,like, "you're late," or, "why are you here?"
or, "what are we going totalk about now?" the trail is what leads you tothat point right around the bend where you see that lastlight of the sun, that alpenglow onsome far-off peak, and you're scrambling, lookingat your map trying to find out, "what's the name of thatpeak? it's so beautiful." and of course, at that point,that peak doesn't have a name because the sun itselfhas made it nameless. we just have tokeep on going.
there's no choice. we don't have the optionto take a day off or get extra food somewhere. we just have to tough it outwith what we have. so we're about toclimb mather pass, which is supposedto be one of the hardest passesin the entire trail, and this is the startof it, right here. south up this hill.
looking forward to it. hiking with ty. currently, when i hike,i'm sweating, so i smell like ammonia. i'm starving, and it'seating all my muscle, so i'm probablygoing to die. you hungry? i could definitely go forsome food right now. yes, the trailgoes up there.
i like our routinethat we have of just usually lookingfor one pass a day to do, just because you kind ofknow what to expect, and you get up earlyand do the climb early in the morningwhen it's still cool, and then you get to the top, and from there, you canjust kind of cruise down. it was challenging. still working onmather pass.
i'm pumping some water forthe pass, so i can drink. we got a long wayto go here. we've already had lunch. we're only at the lake. we've got about4 miles up to 12,100. we're just going to begoing way up and way down, and we're going to behitting higher elevation than we have so far, so theoxygen is going to be low, and getting up especiallyjust that last 100 feet
going up that pass, i know,is just going to be brutal. i love him.he's a great guy. he just eats my biscuits. "real world--sierra hd." talking junkabout everybody. so looking south from mather...we just walked 150 miles. we're killing this. mm-hmm. getting it done.
like down, up, down. we'll get rightthere tomorrow. i'm stoked to do it becausei see it as a big challenge, and it's real wilderness, which i've neveractually been in before. but we need to make sure that tomorrow,we're camping right there, because then glen is easy,and then we get lower. pete: tell meabout your food,
how hungry you areduring the day. all we ever talk abouton the trail is just food-- what food do we want,what place we want to go to, what we want to eatwhen we get back. it's pretty ridiculous, really. i get so hungryduring the day. i just have toforce myself not to eat more thani have for that day, just because if i do,i'll starve at the end.
when we get back to san fran, we have every single hourplanned out of eating. the other day,i laid out all my food, put it all in a nice littleneat line and everything. it's not that bad, really. i've got a quick barfor breakfast, 3 granola barsthroughout the day, one of them being a powerbar,and then a good old dinner. basically, i've justgot to stick to that.
if i go over my ration at all,things could get bad. pete: what isyour order at wendy's the minute you getout of here? a baconator combowith a large pepsiwith large fries. 3 baconators,medium-size drink, small frosty,and a small fry. all i could think about onthe way down was sesame chicken. i was thinking aboutjust, like, a fork, and just, like, eating it.
we'll see. maybe i mightgo biggie, but... you know, someone who'scoming from the east coast. let's say they're usedto hiking in the smokies. i would say that's goodthat you know the smokies, but now you have tolearn the sierra. there's stillsome similarities. if you're going take waterfrom a water source that's a stream, creek,or a river or a lake, assume that it has giardia.
it's better to assume thatit has and prepare for that than to assume, "oh, thislooks perfectly clean." unless you can see at that leveland you have eyes to see that, you're in for a bad day, and ifyou're in for a bad day in the middle ofa backcountry hike and suddenly youcome down with giardia, that's a bad scenarioright there. every place has its own uniquecharacter and its own risks. i'm a ranger.
when i go for a hike in anotherpark in another state, i go to the visitors center, and i ask, what do ineed to watch out for? imagine the scenario of someonenot doing that, and they decide, "i'm going to hikethis trail in zion called the narrowsof the virgin river," and they never hearabout flash flood danger, and they're just walking around, they say, "oh, boy,look at all those clouds,"
or, "did you hear thunder?" they're about to die. we're ready to geta cheeseburger. hunger isthe main thing. i could hit thatchili burger right now. to be honest, i didn'tplan much at all. i'm older thaneverybody here. you guys will fall overand die before i do. i like the effort of it.
it crushes you frombeginning to end, and i kind of like that becausemy typical life is too easy. this is--you got to earn everystep of it, and i like that. everybody wants togo out for a weekend, but if you want to come outfor weeks at a time, there could be no better way than to get broken inon the j.m.t. that one hurta little bit for me. i'm a little fatigued.
yeah. it wasa little harder. i can't get enoughof this stuff! just every day, pullinginto camp, it's so nice just to know thatyou're done for the day and you just have some time torelax and not have to go through all the physical stuffand mental stuff. we found some triple berrybetty crocker muffin mix in the bear box over there. we're trying to getall the calories we can,
so we just mixed itwith some water, and now we're cooking itlike scrambled eggs. when do westart eating it? let me seehow it turns out. you want to justeat it like this? i mean, we can. god, i found...i scored. mmm! mmm.that is good.
that is so good. hold on.let me taste it. what's the verdict?how is it? it's really not that good. it's good.he's lying. i would eat thisfor breakfast,lunch, and dinner. this isn't biscuits. no. these are pancakes. it's good like that.
don't let it burn. oh, my god. oh, yes! whoo hoo! look at it. it's solidifying.ha ha ha! they're not done yet. i got to testit, though. yeah, you test it.i'm afraid.
is it gross? it's edible. it's good. look.it's great. it's a little bitraw right now. it's like pancakes. it goes downkind of funny. we got a wholeother bag. that wasjust training. we're aboutto be stuffed!
this is likegourmet! we need some more. aidan, let's go. more. california--most of california, you can't evenbuild fires any more. i'm actually shocked theylet you do them up here. i wonder if youactually can. you can. this is oneof the weird placeswhere you still can.
mount ansel adamswas named for ansel adams while ansel adamswas still alive, so he could literallywalk around and say, "yeah, that's my mountainover there." most people neverhave that experience. when there's a peak or a valleyor some sort of topographical or landscape featurethat's named after them, they've moved on to thatnext plane of existence, and they're not thereto witness that.
it makes sense that john muirhas a trail named after him because his perambulations,his walking and maneuvering and movement through the sierra and the movement ofthe sierra through him, because he influencedthis place, but the place alsoinfluenced him. i always ask myself,what would john muir be, who would john muir be,if it had not been for that intimate contactbetween him and these mountains?
he familiarized himself withthe flora, with the fauna, with every aspect of the naturalhistory of this environment, probably more so thananyone else of the time except for, of course,the native peoples who have been here for thousandsand thousands of years. i got to goback to school. i can't drop out. you guys haveany extra food? that looks likea cool place.
here you go. ohh, i can't wait. we're going to catch a few.i got a feeling. yeah, boy! here's numberone, baby! it's definitely edible. ♪ the snow was falling,we could feel the cold... ♪ all right. i'm getting readyto go fishing in a lake, and we've already caught,like, 7 fish for dinner.
it's going to bereal good. yoo!that's a nice one. throw it on theground. the ground. nice. 6, 8, 10, 12. who's hungry? is that the oneyou caught? yeah, this isthe fish i caught. it is so good.
look how cleanyour hands are. prepared excellently.it peels right off the bone. put some spices and saltright in there. it's just awesome. nothing like catching a fishand eating it a few hours later. [belch] i have just this left.it's so good. he scored some foodoff justin. really good.
he tried not to say anything,but he's definitely hungry. he's out of food. the dangers can be mitigatedby education, through education. i mean, you can be lightheartedand just filled with exaltation, but you need to sit downwith books and make notes and really think carefullyabout where you're going, how you're going to get there, and think about what'sgoing on on day one, what's going to happen day two,where do i get supplies.
preparation makes the differencebetween excitement and horror. excitement is, "boy, it's goodwe prepared for this. wasn't that amazing,that storm?" horror is, "yeah, we didn'tbring this and that, and i thought i wasgoing to die." no one wants this feeling of"i thought i was going to die" on any kind of hike, but theydo want this feeling of "i've never feltso close to god"--positive. "i never felt so closeto god"--negative.
when we're out herein the mountains hiking, you just have to keep going. every day, there are some partswhen it's just so hard. doesn't look like there'smuch of a way over. the motivation tokeep going is just to have that accomplishment,just to finish this. this is not just some easylittle trail out in the woods. this is 220 miles upand down mountains with 35 pounds on our back,
so, i mean, just forthe accomplishment. that's the main reason. to make it through thephysical challenges, i guess i kind of just rely on everyone else out herea little bit, just because i know if they cando it, i can do it, too, and i know they're hurtingjust as much as i am, and they're stillpushing through it,so i know i can, too. this little spotright here.
[humming] i'm glad that it's kind ofover, but it's our last pass. it's kind of sad. it's kind of fun, like,kicking my own butt every day. 3, 2, 1. [camera shutter clicks] we're in such a remote area,and it's just going to be tough to be out here and have no otheroption besides going on. so i was kind of worried,but now that i'm out here,
i'm not as worried,and now i can definitely see that we're going tobe able to do this. it's going to be hard. food supplies are probablygoing to be running low, but there's no waywe won't make it. the story fortonight's dinner-- aidan and i are doinga little combo. he's made a cheddar andbroccoli mashed potatoes, and i'm making a pennewith pesto sauce
with fresh cheddarsprinkled over the top. we're going to split ithalf and half. and i've got an ice-coldlemonade on the side. we're still eatingpretty good. when i've been hikingearlier, like day 4, i was, like, "when i get home,my pack is going in the garbage. this is terrible." but then, on 5 or 6,i was like, "it doesn't matterhow hard this is.
i'm so lucky to be out here." we can't see from here. i think it's goingto be that way. i thinkit could be whitney. knowing that we'reon the tallest peak in the continental u.s., i justcan't even get over that. there aren't many placeslike this in the world. "positioning waste bagfor use." one hiker's toiletis another hiker's camp.
that's why use the wag bag. we are at guitar lake right now,at the base of mount whitney. we have 5 miles lefton the j.m.t., which we could probablyfinish today if we wanted to, but we're going tokind of hang out and soak the feetfor a little bit. wow! it's still cold! this is pretty muchour end of the j.m.t.
i don't know what sortof odds we survived, but this thingis definitely hard. it's the real deal. god, the last 5 days, all the big passes havebeen tough, for sure. but do them, kind ofget in a rhythm. camp in the basin every night,climb up the valley, do the switchbacks,get to the top by lunch or maybe a little after,
cruise 3 or 4 milesback down the tree line, camp, do it againthe next day, do it again the next day,do it again the next day. you get in the rhythm,but it definitelywears on the body. the feet are feeling it. feeling a littlecalorically deficited. so hungry. i think that thejohn muir trail is probably one of the most majestic trailsin the entire world.
i don't think i will beable to top it--ever. it's pretty amazing.very majestic. yes, very majestic. ♪ the tales are told ♪ to understandthe american character, you have to understandwilderness, period. for so much of our existenceas a country, there's been wilderness, and our character was shaped bythe encounter with wilderness.
we didn't arrive on theseshores as americans. we arrived as either we werebritish, we were spanish, we were italian,we were whatever, but it was through that intimatecontact with the land, working the land, buildingtowns, building communities, going into the forestand getting a log cabinout of that forest-- that work, that sweat,that toil, those experiences withthe continent itself that shaped us as people.
so if we lose parks, if we losethese windows into wilderness, we lose these windowsinto the very crucible that helped define usas a people. that what makes americaamerica, is this encounterwith wilderness. we're going to start itat 5:00 or 6:00, finish this puppy up, and then head on down towhitney portal for some food. burgers.
very big burgers. trail crest, here we are. aha. mount whitney,here we come. ♪ strategies forold situations ♪ ♪ and the future fearthat you're facing ♪ the resupply. we're about30 seconds behind. ♪ the story's been toldand it's telling still ♪
watch out now! i have climbedwhitney. by far, one ofthe coolest thingsi've ever done. california isan amazing place. the top of the world. ♪ get chewed ♪ ♪ riding away ♪ ♪ soundwaves of proof ♪ ♪ as new hearts procreate ♪
♪ let me sharethis old heart with you ♪ ahh! we made it. ♪ well, i got a dream,and you do, too ♪ ♪ what's the worstthat a dream can do ♪ ♪ we got a dream,when it comes true ♪ ♪ what's the bestthat a dream can do ♪ ♪ ooh ooh ooh ♪ 14,495 feet.
it's ridiculous. highest pointcontinental u.s., baby. cool. woman: you can see all theseamazing jagged peaks, but to really be in herein the moment, climbing up that rock pile, it's a totallydifferent experience. makes you all feel alive. brian: i think they'llprobably appreciate
how good they got it, because we got itgood at home. we really do. there's nobody here that'sscratching to make it, or they wouldn't even be here. we're all pretty wealthy.we're lucky. portal store. ♪ i got a dream,and you do, too ♪ hurry up!
♪ we got a dream... ♪ all the way down,to you guys. to hacking it!
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