The Dharma Bums - Jack Kerouac [39]
“Plateau? My God you mean that ain’t the top of the mountain?”
“Of course not, after that we got a plateau and then scree and then more rocks and we get to a final alpine lake no biggern this pond and then comes the final climb over one thousand feet almost straight up boy to the top of the world where you’ll see all California and parts of Nevada and the wind’ll blow right through your pants.”
“Ow…How long does it all take?”
“Why the only thing we can expect to make tonight is our camp up there on that plateau. I call it a plateau, it ain’t that at all, it’s a shelf between heights.”
But the top and the end of the trail was such a beautiful spot I said: “Boy look at this…” A dreamy meadow, pines at one end, the pond, the clear fresh air, the afternoon clouds rushing golden…“Why don’t we just sleep here tonight, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a more beautiful park.”
“Ah this is nowhere. It’s great of course, but we might wake up tomorrow morning and find three dozen schoolteachers on horseback frying bacon in our backyard. Where we’re going you can bet your ass there won’t be one human being, and if there is, I’ll be a spotted horse’s ass. Or maybe just one mountainclimber, or two, but I don’t expect so at this time of the year. You know the snow’s about to come here any time now. If it comes tonight it’s goodbye me and you.”
“Well goodbye Japhy. But let’s rest here and drink some water and admire the meadow.” We were feeling tired and great. We spread out in the grass and rested and swapped packs and strapped them on and were rarin to go. Almost instantaneously the grass ended and the boulders started; we got up on the first one and from that point on it was just a matter of jumping from boulder to boulder, gradually climbing, climbing, five miles up a valley of boulders getting steeper and steeper with immense crags on both sides forming the walls of the valley, till near the cliff face we’d be scrambling up the boulders, it seemed.
“And what’s behind that cliff face?”
“There’s high grass up there, shrubbery, scattered boulders, beautiful meandering creeks that have ice in ’em even in the afternoon, spots of snow, tremendous trees, and one boulder just about as big as two of Alvah’s cottages piled on top the other which leans over and makes a kind of concave cave for us to camp at, lightin a big bonfire that’ll throw heat against the wall. Then after that the grass and the timber ends. That’ll be at nine thousand just about.”
With my sneakers it was as easy as pie to just dance nimbly from boulder to boulder, but after a while I noticed how gracefully Japhy was doing it and he just ambled from boulder to boulder, sometimes in a deliberate dance with his legs crossing from right to left, right to left and for a while I followed his every step but then I learned it was better for me to just spontaneously pick my own boulders and make a ragged dance of my own.
“The secret of this kind of climbing,” said Japhy, “is like Zen. Don’t think. Just dance along. It’s the easiest thing in the world, actually easier than walking on flat ground which is monotonous. The cute little problems present themselves at each step and yet you never hesitate and you find yourself on some other boulder you picked out for no special reason at all, just like Zen.” Which it was.
We didn’t talk much now. It got tiresome on the leg muscles. We spent hours, about three, going up that long, long valley. In that time it grew to late afternoon and the light was growing amber and shadows were falling ominously in the valley of dry boulders and instead, though, of making you feel scared it gave you that immortal feeling again. The ducks were all laid out easy to see: on top of a boulder you’d stand, and look ahead, and spot a duck (usually only two flat rocks on top of each other maybe with one round one on top for decoration)