Jenn and Harry Go to Hell (Again)

We panted, pushing our bikes up and up and up.  Surely we had traveled more vertical miles than horizontal ones by now.  I looked back: the road stretched dizzyingly far behind us.  If I dropped a bowling ball, it could have demolished a city (not that there were many cities around here, anyway).  The bike path had turned on us, transforming from a pacifically flat, perfectly-maintained bikes-only thoroughfare into a crumbling red stain on one edge of a highway, a suggestion to passing cars that there might be some cyclists about.  Our clothes were perpetually drenched with sweat, except when they were dry and crunchy.  Road grit had mixed with sweat and chain lube on our legs, making us look even more comically dirty than usual (imagine a Victorian street urchin crossed with Pig Pen from "Peanuts").  Implausibly, we were walking by what I can only assume was a manure factory: the stench of industrial-strength dung filled the air and poisoned every breath we took, sweat mixing with tears and rolling dirty, salty water down our faces.  Eventually, we passed a sign helpfully informing us that we were crawling up a 13% grade.  This, then, was hell.

Of course, we'd already been to a hell, but this mountain was the Hell.

Also, this Hell was a lot less whimsical than Beppu.  Though it did smell just as bad.

Up ahead, at what couldn't possibly be the top of the hill, two Korean cyclists plunged towards us at mach speed.  One of them whooped in excitement.  They smiled and waved to us, and we somehow mustered the energy for a weak thumbs-up.  If, as I've heard, the most popular activity in heaven is watching the suffering of the damned, then the most barbaric punishment in hell is surely the damned watching the saved watch them.

It was 5:30, already getting to be dark.  Under ideal circumstances, we would have already staked out a camping spot by this time, but as it was, we had no choice but to keep going; each free camping site poses its unique set of dangers, but "sleeping on a 13% grade" was one too far.  We rested, we pushed, we rested some more, at least as much as holding up an enormously heavy bike can be called "resting."  We were too tired to complain, too tired to curse.  We were even too tired, somehow, to talk about "Game of Thrones."

Somehow, the farther we got from the city (and all of the weekend riders whose taxes paid for the trail, no doubt), the more the trail started to fizzle into nothingness, becoming vague signposts and cracked blue lines that carried us onto tiny country roads, steering us past stooped old women working in their rice paddies who stared at us.  "Hey, we're as confused as you are, believe me," I thought at them.  We'd even been directed up another mountain earlier that day, which made this one more impossible.

Of course, with each successful mountain climbed, no matter how difficult the journey, come the twin joys of perseverance and oxygen deprivation. 

That was hours ago, and this mountain, this steep, crumbly, empty, stinky mountain wasn't going anywhere in a hurry.  Much like us.

At last, inevitably, we did make it to the top of the mountain, just as it was getting too dark to push on.  What awaited us there, apart from some very unimpressed-looking sport cyclists in electric-white lycra, was the tiniest of rest areas, a scant few square meters of wooden planks and bolted-down benches.  The prospect of camping on such a tiny spot filled us with apprehension.  Perhaps it would be best to push onward?  The bottom of the mountain might provide some green space, maybe even somewhere we could stake down our tent without being seen by every passing car?

As we considered, I felt an odd nagging feeling.  The dread worsened as I tried to puzzle it out.  Had I forgotten something?  I scratched my back, noticing that it was drier than usual, and then it hit me.

"Shit.  Shit.  Jenn?"

"Yeah?"

"I forgot my uke again."

We sat on the benches and thought it over, trying not to panic.  There would be no hopping on the subway to pick it up in a safely locked apartment.  Neither of us could remember if I had left it at the store where we stopped for instant ramen, on top of the mountain, or at our free campsite that morning.  At the latter two, it would almost assuredly be gone by now, taken by thieves, turned in to the police by well-meaning passersby, or stolen by crows (I wasn't ruling it out).

Then I had an idea.  I checked the photos we'd taken on the last mountaintop:

Why must I insist on wearing a T-shirt under my T-shirt?
Oh, wait, that's my pasty white flesh.

Sure enough, there it was, strapped to my back.  That means it must have been left behind at the strange little general store.  Which was, naturally, back down the mountain a ways.

There was nothing else for it.  There would be no climbing that mountain with all of our stuff again, so I had no choice but to unstrap everything, leave it in Jenn's capable hands, and fly back down the mountain, stuffless.  I tore down the asphalt, passing the sports cyclists who'd scoffed at us going the other way, and before long, I was at the bottom, pedaling madly along the riverside path.

Meanwhile, Jenn took photos of the mountains.

I tore down the gravel-strewn path, screeching to a stop at the odd picket fence that surrounded the store/restaurant/house.  Out of breath, I stumbled up to the door, where the curly-headed ajima who ran the place walked to the screen door, dangling the ukulele by its strap with one finger.  I thanked her profusely, using one of the four words of Korean I happened to know, then grunted back to my bike.  I checked the time: it had taken 10 minutes to retrieve the ukulele, where it had taken over an hour to climb that mountain.  I sighed deeply, trying to ignore the cramps in my calves.

I did make it back to the top, ultimately, just as it was definitely too dark to move on.  We cooked a quick meal of canned fish (for the fourth time in three days) and set up in the far corner of the shelter, hoping that our reflective tent surface wouldn't attract too much attention.  Where there's no grass, we're unable to stake down our tent, making the structure quiver with every toss and turn.  Every now and then a truck blew by, its lights growing brighter, its engine growing louder until it seemed right on top of our heads, then passing perhaps 10 feet by us.  If any of those trucks spotted us, I have no way of knowing, but we were uninterrupted for the night.

And Harry never left his ukulele behind again.  Ever.

In the morning, we had just enough water to make the last of our oatmeal for breakfast.  The steep hillside was covered in wild raspberry bushes, a few of which I harvested for the oatmeal.  We packed up and left just as our need for a bathroom became intolerable, and we barreled down the mountain to the next town just as the rain started to pour down.  There were definitely no camping spots anywhere past where we'd stopped for the night.