After a glorious two days in Ojai, we woke with a mission. Matthew wanted to hike the Punch Bowls which is a hike up into the mountains he had done several times before. He wanted me to see it as it was so beautiful. The hike was a an eight mile round trip up and down a mountain where we would follow a river bed to a series of waterfalls and pools. We got up early to try to get a parking space in the tiny parking lot but I made Matthew first stop to get me a smoothie and the Farmer and the Cook. Matthew doesn’t really eat in the morning but I knew I was going to need some energy. Frankly I was nervous because it was really hot and Saturday’s hike was really hard at a fraction of the distance.

We arrived after the parking lot was full even though it was only 8:30. We parked down the road a bit and hiked to the trail head. Matthew had filled my backpack with water because he knew we would need it. Suprisingly, the first part of the hike was largely shaded. The mountains were protecting us from the sun. We followed the river bed and frequently had to cross the water carefully on stepping stones to get from one side to the other, It was difficult to find the black diamonds that marked our trail so we spent a lot of time scrambling over rocks searching for the elusive markings. That was the hardest part of the hike.

The river bed was covered in rocks of all shapes and sizes smoothed by the water that flowed over them. The trickiest part of this climb was just maintaining your footing. Sometimes you had to step from rock to rock and at other times, between them. My old ankle joints did not appreciate the terrain. It was like nothing I had ever seen. The plants were largely dried looking like if they were touched, they would crumble. There were rugged mountains where layers of rock were exposed in zig zagging stripes. We walked through an avacado farm past huge pump jacks gathering water from deep below the surface. We walked along cliffs and back and forth over switch backs.

Eventually we came to a narrow part of trail that descended into a pool. We had to stop because a family in front of us was slowly negotiating the crossing. They had a little girl age seven and the dad was carrying a two or three year old strapped to his back. It was a bit humbling to realize that they wee persevering despite their ages and the weight they were carrying.

There was another family with a little boy splashing in the pool. He was screaming like he was freezing but when I put my hands in it was no colder than the brook in Vermont in July. I don’t think these Californians can handle cold like us Mainers. They lack the grit that comes from living in below freezing temperatures for most of the year.

I was tired and a little nervous that we weren;t to the top yet. Matthew wanted to stop and have some beef jerky in a beautiful area where the rock was completely smoothed from the rushing water that had one flowed there. I hate stopping on a hike (SEE PROPOSAL STORY). I was a bit sullen as I had been drinking water like it was my job and my stomach hurt. It was also three and a half miles into the hike and I had no sense of how much longer we were going. I insisted we continue further even when Matthew told me he thought we should turn around having arrived at one of the “punch bowls”. We walked to the second bowl and it required more rock scrambling.

It opened to a large, shallow pool that was nearly covered by an awning of rock. Matthew told me if we went further we would have to climb the river in waist deep water to reach the other pool. He may have been lying. I’m not afraid of water but I was trying to keep my new Brooks from premature aging and I saw a rope dangling from a rock highter up on the trail. It suggested you might need to hold the rope to stay on the steep rock it flanked. No thank you.

We walked down and it always feels harder and longer to go down than to go up. The sun was now higher in the sky and there was little shade to keep us protected. I tried to keep up my cheerful disposition but it lagged a bit. I decided the only way forward was to fantasize about the burrito I planned to stop and get for lunch. We finally reached the car and both felt pleased with our accomplishment. It may not surprise you that I was more pleased after consuming a raccoon-sized burrito at a little taco joint in Santa Paula.