Behind the Lines: by David Heiller

David Heiller Editor's note: This column was written after he presented the readers of the Caledonia Argus the long article he wrote for Backpacker Magazine. I’m back to the present and the land of the living, after a four-week hiatus down memory lane. A lot of people commented on my adventure in the mountains 33 years ago, which I reprint ed in this space. Some final thoughts: I was having lunch last week with a couple of colleagues. One man asked me how I could not have known about the possibility of bad weath er, a snow storm. David and the kids on our 1998 backpacking trip to Rocky Mountain National Park. I stammered a  bit; and the other man, a back packer himself, said it simply: “We’re flatlanders.” That was part of it. It’s one thing to be in a snowstorm in Houston County . Granted, it’s not flat here by North Dakota definitions. But there aren’t many snow storms in which a healthy 2 0 -year-old man could not wade and tromp through to get help in r...

David Heiller Editor's note: This was originally published in Backpacker Magazine, and later included in a book called "The Whole Hiker's Handbook." The cruelty is beyond comprehension. 10,485-foot Tuolumne Peak. “The most crucial 150 feet of my life,” I thought as I stood shivering in the snow. For the past six hours of that fateful November 10, 1973 day, I had waded through drifts up steep switchbacks below the peak. Now, standing on a small bare patch of soil protected by a dozen large pines, I scanned the outline of the snow-choked trail as it rose steeply over a crest. Beyond the crest was Yosemite Valley, 20  downhill  miles to the south. For seven days I had back-packed over mountainous trails, many like this one, always managing to stay one step ahead of the deep snow. But now? This was the most crucial distance. The final 50 yards. The chilling wind, my snow-soaked clothes and numbed hands were forgotten. With all my remaining strength,...

David Heiller The wind was blowing hard out of the northwest last Friday afternoon, carrying snow like little bullets against our faces. Already, about 16 inches of snow lay on the ground. Malika and I were playing in it, after nearly going crazy with cabin fever for much of the day. First I made a snow angel, which Mollie promptly trudged through with a wild, cabin fever laugh. Then I dove through the air and landed on my back in a big drift. Noah Mollie went off to make more snow angels. I lay there, out of the wind, feeling the snow tickle my face, feeling the soft bed of snow underneath, feeling quite comfortable. Then a memory flashed into my mind. No, something more powerful than a memory, a sensation that made my face quiver first with fear, then with anger. It had happened in November of 1973. I had been backpacking in Yosemite National Park in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California. A blizzard had caught me there, unprepared and alone, 20-plus miles f...