Dear Tehya, Jacob, Jack, and Savannah,
Last Thursday was my birthday, and I wanted to make some grand gesture to prove that having birthdays at my older state in life could still be an adventure. Enlisting the support of my summer hiking buddy, sister Janet, I picked Grandeur Peak as my perfect mountain top destination. Janet promised to go slow and to not abandon me along the trail. We left my house a couple of hours before sunrise and started up the trail about 6:30. For awhile we walked next to a cheerful little mountain creek and then we started up a series of switchbacks that took us from the pine forest to a mountainside of scrub oak and wildflowers. Thankful for the whispy high clouds that blocked the morning sun we finally reached the top of the mountain with its airplane views of the Salt Lake Valley.
What is the first thing you want to do when you get to the top of a mountain? Well besides doing a little victory shuffle? You call people!!! (Thank you cell phone) I called your Grandpa Jones and then I called you. You all wished me a happy birthday and sang to me all the way from Virginia. Then we called my brother. Dave, because he has hiked that same mountain many times. After congratulating us, he casually said, "Did you know there are rattlesnakes up there?" We laughed. Stopped. Looked around the rocks. Walked more carefully around the top, thinking now was not the time for a close encounter with a rattlesnake.
A few minutes later another climber, a man from Sandy, joined us at the top. "Did you see the two rattlesnakes on the trail?" he asked. "No." "How long have you been here?" was his next question. We replied, "Oh, about 30 minutes." "That explains it then. They must not have been out yet." He went on to tell us that he usually hikes up the mountain earlier to avoid the snakes that like to come out and sun themselves on the south side of Grandeur Peak. Even though the mountain is 8,800 feet high, rattlesnakes still like living up there at the top, maybe it's a view thing. He had walked around one on the trail and watched the other four foot long one crawl back into its hole.
After telling us his snake observations, the man tried to explain to us where to look for the danger on the trail. I think he could tell that we had stopped listening after he said coiled snake. My heart pounded so loudly I couldn't hear, let alone make sense of what he was trying to say. So he hesitated and then asked if we were ready to go down. If we were ready, we could go down with him and he would help us get past the snakes. That was an offer we did not refuse.
The trail started straight down and then curved along the south slope of the mountain. Just before the trail turned to go along the eastern edge our guide stopped. There! Along the side of the trail was the coiled snake. I would like to think that we would have seen it, but I don't know. First of all, we had never even thought about snakes on the trail. I just worried about having enough air to take each step. And Heavenly Father had given us so many other things to see: clouds, flowers, trees, views, that watching the dirt trail for every step hadn't seemed that important.
Then.....Janet and I realized that this was the place we had lost the trail. We had been so careful climbing up. We never took shortcuts. We never bushwacked. We always followed the path that had been trod by hundreds of others. But not this time. Ahead of us was a big rock. To our right, a hillside of smaller rocks. It looked like people had picked a faint trail through the smaller rocks so we decided to go that way. About halfway up I looked to my left and saw the real trail. A big, smooth, curving trail. An unmistakable trail. Janet stood just a little ahead of me, and she noticed it too. For a moment we hesitated, choosing between the smooth path and our rocks. Choosing to meet up with the trail a little higher we scrambled up the rocks and kept going to the top.
So now we were standing with our helpful guide watching the coiled rattlesnake and wondering where the other one was hidden. We showed our hiker friend where we had scrambled through the rocks and we all went down the wrong part of the trail that now we knew was the right part of the trail. No snakes in sight. No rattling noises. No snake bites and emergency helicopter rides to the hospital. Just a long, long, long, hot climb down the mountain to the car.
Janet and I talked about this on the sunny slope of Grandeur Peak. I am happy I could climb a mountain on my birthday, but that is not what I will remember. I will remember the tender mercies of a loving Heavenly Father who caused a rattlesnake inhabited trail to become hidden from view, and who sent a watchful hiker to guide us past the unseen, unknown danger. Janet and I wondered what had caused him to hike up later than usual to the peak, but we knew that he was in the right place at the right time for us. Do guardian angels wear backpacks and hiking boots? Yes.
So, thank you Janet. And to my sweet grandchildren, pray every day that you may receive the tender mercies of a loving Heavenly Father just like we did on the top of a mountain in faraway Utah.
Love,
Grandma
