The Fujifilm Paradox

 

I love Fuji. I've had an X-T3 and X-T30 in the past and currently have an X-H2s & X-T5.  On top of this, I also own several of their top tier lenses. I have sold off all my other photography gear, including full frame Canon bodies. It's fair to say, I'm all in on Fujifilm. This isn't to bash the brand. 

  I also want to note that I'm writing this to people who know the Fuji system. I'm not going into detail about everything. This is written with the understanding that the reader has preexisting knowledge of the Fuji system and its current state of affairs. 

  I've noticed some odd things about Fuji cameras and their users. This all started a few weeks back when I realized that I liked the X-h2s (or rather the X-H2 PASM body style) better than the X-T5. 

  Initially, I was disappointed with Fuji's decision to crown the new H2 line of cameras as "flag ships". I felt it went against everything the brand claimed to be and that distinction should have gone to the XT line. After all, the XT cameras really put the brand on the map and are responsible for its loyal following. (Sorry X-Pro Users, I will never understand your love for that painful to hold Leica wanna-be, I don't get it and never will.) 

  I bought the X-H2s first as it was the first of the new bodies released and I needed the "S" version over the regular H2 because I shoot a lot of sports. It is important to note that all camera manufacturers are selling two bodies now that have different purposes. The reason behind this, I believe, is so they can make more profit as a pro photographer would, in most cases, need both a camera built for speed and one built for resolution. 

  At this time, there were rumors that the X-T5 would be released soon and that camera would be designed as a "photography first" camera. Essentially the same as the H2, but with the classic retro dials. Having used the XT3 and loving the it, I couldn't wait for the XT5 and ordered one as soon as it was released. I felt it was a better camera in style and execution than the H2 line. 

  For the next year, I primarily used the XT5 for everything excluding sports. But then, something happened in the last few months. I hadn't picked up my H2s since last football season and when I did, I noticed how much quicker it was to shoot with than the XT5. 

  

It's important to note that I shoot mostly in full manual. 

  

I've always found that the X-T line was a bit awkward to shoot in manual.  I find this weird as one would think with all the analog dials that it would be the better option to shoot manual. But that really isn't the case. In fact, to shoot in manual pretty much negates needing an exposure compensation dial, since you would handle that with one of the other aspects of the exposure triangle, usually ISO. 

  In the last few years, auto ISO has been perfected. I remember a time when the auto ISO function, didn't really pick the best ISO or would fluctuate wildly. Now it is extremely reliable. So much so, that most people, from my experience, shoot with auto ISO. Technically, I'm not shooting fully manual if I'm using Auto ISO and therefore, I also don't need the ISO dial. 

  That brings us to the third dial. Shutter speed. This and the aperture ring are really the only settings I change most of the time; which means, I'm not really shooting manual like I think. In actuality, I'm only shooting two/thirds manual. This is an important realization, because one, it lessens the need for the dials like I had originally thought. And two, most people that swear by the dials shoot in aperture priority which is really shooting two/thirds auto. 

  In addition to this, I found it cumbersome to adjust the dials on the XT5 while looking through the view finder. I think it is because the XT5, while the same size as the XT3 I had, somehow feels cramped. This makes me have to pull the camera away from my eye and look down at the dials to adjust. This not only takes me out of the moment and slows me down, but it is a total pain in the ass in the dark or in low light situations. 

  The top screen on the H2 line is easier to see in almost all situations, and also has a light for dark environments. Making the H2 line much quicker to operate in the moment without even taking into account the PSAM dial or custom modes. 

  Of course, the H2 is bigger and this is viewed by most Fuji purists, as a negative. However, most of them, myself included, find the need to add a grip to the X-T line of cameras. I believe the pushback most users expressed over Fuji removing the battery grip accessory from the X-T line, had more to do with the need for a grip to compensate for poor ergonomics than it did as a useful battery extension. This is an odd thing you find in the Fujifilm universe. Everyone seems to push for small / smaller cameras but then they go and put a grip on them. This is stupid. I don't understand this thought process at all. 

  Since I have both the X-T5 with an aftermarket grip and the X-H2s, I can say for certain, that looking at both cameras together, the H2s is only very slightly bigger than the X-T5 when the X-T5 has the hand grip. Like a quarter of inch longer and maybe one eighth taller. Really, nothing significant.  

  I find myself thinking that the only real, in use advantage of the X-T5 over the H2 is the tilting LCD screen. The H2 should have had a tilt screen like the H1 and the X-T5. In every other way, the H2 is the better camera, including build quality and weather sealing. 

  I haven't decided 100% if I'm going to trade in the X-T5 for an H2. The purist in me says no, but the everyday photographer, says yes. 

A Quite Ride

  

We drove in silence, listening to the radio in the hot sun. The highway danced and melted in the distance, something you would see in June or July, not late September. The air was dense and not crisp like it should have been, yet there was still a hint of Winter in the distance. The thick atmosphere made the colors muted and faded like an old photograph.

I look at him singing along to the music just under his breath. He’s on the cusp. He’s not sure if this is cool to do or not, so he stays low, just in case. In a year, this will be gone. He’ll think he’s sure it’s not cool. He’ll be self-aware. He will stay quiet and ruminate, taking it all in. I love that he is blissfully unaware for now. Happy. The kind of happy you can only be at twelve, going to the store, to buy a new video game.

Driving Lessons for Stupid People - A Manifesto

 

I would like to say (because it’s trendy at the moment) “I don’t know who needs to hear this…….”, but I do know. It’s you. Yes you, the person parked in the left lane doing the speed limit. Let’s get something straight right off the bat. In America, there is no speed limit in the left lane. Period, end of story. This is not up for debate. It is a fact. I don’t care what the signs say, I don’t care what the tyrant politicians say, I don’t care what the cops say. Good drivers know that you don’t drive the speed limit in the left lane. Yet, there are those that for some strange reason haven’t figured this out, or they have and refuse to accept it. Either way, we’re going to get to the bottom of it right now.

1. The proper way to drive in the left lane, regardless of what state you’re in, is to constantly accelerate. It’s that simple. You just go and keep going. If you come upon another car, they need to speed up, or they can move over and let you by. If another vehicle comes up upon you, it’s your responsibly to either speed up or get the hell out of the way. This is the golden rule of the road.

1a. The golden rule’s younger sister - I’ve seen this posted numerous times on social media, so it’s good that it’s getting out there. And that is, if more than one vehicle passes you on the right, you are the problem. Move over to the right lane. This goes for any lane that you are traveling in. If you’re being passed on the right, you are going to slow for traffic. And yes, traffic sets the average speed limit, not the sign on the side of the road and not you. Traffic and the highway are a great metaphor for life. You can’t control it and it doesn’t care about you. Play along and fall in line and you’ll make it. Fight it and you will lose. Every. time.

2. Yield. It is a simple word with a slick looking graphic. It means, “to give over possession of as in defeat or surrender.” In other words. You lose. If you and I are on a road and you see a yield sign, it quite literally means that I’m better than you and that I have the right of way. It means that you have nothing going for you and should just stop. It means when you merge on to a road, I don’t have to move. You, having the yield sign however, do have to slow down and maybe even stop completely, but I’m free to hold the lane all day. I know this is tough because we all think we are important, but we’re not. I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll not be a dick and move over when I see you merging, if you promise to also not be a dick and slow down instead of gunning it off the ramp. Deal?

3. Braking on a highway should be reserved for when you actually need to stop or come damn close to stopping. The vast majority of the time, on a highway with no traffic lights, you should brake by letting off the accelerator and coasting. This means paying attention to traffic and obeying what the other drivers have determined to be the speed limit (see 1a). Unless of course you’re in the left lane (see #1). Hitting your brakes causes a domino effect and leads to backups and fender benders. This is never more evident than when watching a tailgater. The tailgater will speed up and hit the brakes causing everyone behind him to do the same often leading bigger problems.

4. Turn signals. For the love of god, use them. But use them wisely. There is a right and a wrong way. The right way is to put your turn signal on early and before you apply the brake. The wrong way to use them is to hit the brakes first, wait until you’re at the turn then put them on for a second. When I’m behind you, I have no idea why you are slowing down. If I’m not paying attention, I may have to swerve around you so that I don’t hit you. Or if I think you’re just an idiot, I’ll just pass you. But as I do, you might turn into me. This can all be avoided by putting the turn signal on first. Then applying the brake.

5. Lost. It happens, the GPS doesn’t work or is flat out wrong. Your phone disconnects, you lose the signal, or you’re just not sure where you are. Do not slow down. Do not randomly pull over. The world doesn’t exist around you. No one cares that you’re lost. Don’t make your problem everyone else’s problem just because they happen to be on the road with you when your GPS shit itself. Maintain your speed (or acceleration #1) and wait until there is a parking lot or off ramp for you to pull over.

6. Fill in the gap. At a red-light, a stop sign, or in general traffic. Do not stop and leave a gap between your car and the one in front of you. Pull up. There are people behind you that might need to make turn or are stuck in the previous intersection because you’re taking up too much space.

These are just some of the rules of the road. They are not my rules. I didn’t invent them and there are plenty more. This is how people actually drive. Most of this list is simple common sense, or it should be. If nothing else, following the above advice may help you avoid being the victim of road rage. If you don’t agree, that’s fine. I don’t actually care. But next time you’re on the road doing ten miles above the speed limit and being tailgated or passed on the right, don’t ask what is their problem, instead, remember this list and move over to let them by because their pro

There is Nothing Social About Social Media

 

Social media has left a lot of us disillusioned, cheated, and trapped. We gave up our information long before we realized what we were getting into, before anyone really knew how it was all going to work. When we found out we'd been duped, it was too late. Our own interests and literally "likes" were used against us.

We friended and followed everyone we met. We added everything we actually liked and a ton more shit we didn't, just so people would think we did. Now fifteen plus years later, we are left with feeds full of things we don't and (in some cases) never did like. There are no more updates from friends because the algorithm shows us ads and things it knows will piss us off.

It does this to keep us engaged because humans are so simple minded, that things designed to hurt us, keep us coming back for more. We are repeatedly touching a hot stove. The more it burns us, the more we touch it.

It's okay though, because over the years, all those people that we followed and friended; the ones we never really liked, but wanted them and everyone else to think we did, (there is a pattern forming here, pay attention) well, we quietly unfriended, muted, and blocked them a while ago. Other people began to catch on and in addition to culling their "friends", formed smaller circles of actual friends and those they saw in real life on a regular basis. This was done of course ironically in group texts and chat rooms, not even in the media apps themselves.

So when you do spend days removing all the digital bullshit of over fifteen years and find the setting to just show those few people you actually want to hear from, it's a ghost town. You'd have better luck of finding life on the CB Radio.

So why not just stop?

We've been conditioned. Most smokers are surprised to find that the hardest part of quitting cigarettes isn't the chemical addiction to nicotine, It's the conditioned habits of the act of smoking. Quitting is more dependent on their mental state and muscle memory than the chemicals.

So all those times waiting in line at the checkout, at the bar, while your tea was steeping, or yes even taking a shit for way longer than any healthy human should, you were conditioning yourself. Forming habits and routines that for some people can be hard to break.

So many things these days are tied to some sort of social media account it can be very difficult depending on your lifestyle to just walk away.

The result is we are more detached and isolated than ever before. Who cares if we can communicate half way across the world when we no longer talk to our neighbor across the street because they posted a meme we didn't like.

Clipless Pedals Vs Flat Pedals

 

This is more of a “Freddy vs Jason” kind of discussion. If you have to ask who wins, you’ve missed the point.

 I’ve been in love with riding my bike my whole life. Not cycling; riding my bike. There is a difference. I didn’t understand this until a few weeks ago.

It all started back when I was eight years old and I learned to ride a two-wheeled bicycle for the first time. It was to my eight-year-old-world, the equivalent of learning to fly. Sounds sappy because it was.

I lived to ride my bike, it’s all I wanted to do and I did it whenever I had the chance. As I got older the bike became more than a toy. It earned me money delivering papers, it was my therapist when I needed to get away and think, it was my freedom.

I raced mountain bikes during my teenage years. This was the nineties and at the time a lot of people were switching over to clipless pedals. I didn’t understand this for cross-country mountain biking. There were too many situations where I wouldn’t want to be clipped in. Even using toe-clips, I would pull my foot out and place it on the non-clip side of the pedals, knowing I might have to bail.

The problem with clipless pedals wasn’t the pedals or the fact that that you were clipped in. Toe-clips were essentially the same thing as far as being connected goes. The problem as I saw it was the shoes. This in my opinion is the worse part of riding clipless.

Now for a matter of clarity, I’m talking about SPD mountain specific pedals which are double sided and known to be easier to clip in and out of compared to their road-bike SL counterparts. The mountain bike shoes as a result of being designed for off road use are much easier to walk in and have treads to help with grip and traction when off the bike.

Here is my problem with them. Most athletes perform on the balls of their feet. This is the part of the foot that has the most balance and agility. When jumping off, well anything, I don’t land on my toes or my heels. I land on the balls of my feet. This is more critical when jumping off onto uneven or rocky terrain. Anyone familiar with clipless pedals and the shoes required to use them knows that the ball of the foot is where the cleat is located. This is not ideal for landing on rocky or uneven terrain. There isn’t much traction with metal on rock and between the cleat, and the plastic plate it screws into, there isn’t any give in this part of the shoe either.

Due to this I was quite happy to stay with my toe-clips. At least for mountain biking and off road riding.

For as much as I loved riding my bike, I fell out of riding for a few years while in collage. I returned to the bike a few years after graduation when my life and job settled down.

At the time, I needed a bike not just for fun, but also commuting. I went with a cyclocross bike. Living in the city and not having much in the way of woods or mountains, the cross bike was beefy enough to handle commuting and the occasional off-road-lite of the local park.

When I bought the bike I went with clipless pedals, eggbeaters to be exact. I was an adult after all and riding primarily on the road, I figured why not.

That was seventeen years ago and I’ve been riding clipless ever since.

I had the same falls that everyone has….stopped at a busy intersection during rush hour tip-over. The unclip right foot, but lean left oops. As well as the, “I forgot how to shift and now I’m stuck in way too high of a gear and slowly rolling backwards train wreck”. Okay, that last one might just be me.

The point is I took my lumps and stuck with it for nearly two decades. During which I rode clipless for commuting, cross racing, training, fitness, gravel riding, everything. I even had to buy to a pair of clipless shoes on vacation when I brought everything I needed to ride, except my shoes. That was an expensive mistake.

During all that time even though I never really thought about it, I didn’t really like clipless. I did it because that’s what you do when you are a “serious” cyclist and I was a serious cyclist. I mean, doesn’t that list of riding types I did for nearly two decades prove it?

At best I found riding clipless an annoying necessity like wearing a cup shoved in jock strap for baseball.

I also think, and this could just be me, but putting on special shoes to do something specific changed my mindset. Putting on the shoes meant I was about to be serious and possibly about to start hurting myself by pushing my limits. I think on some level, that took a little bit of the fun out of riding my bike.

As time went by, I, like most cyclists, accumulated bikes. And when the kids came along and were old enough to ride, one of those bikes would get flat pedals put on it so that I could just grab it and go with them. During these family rides I was more concerned about them then I was about my own riding. Instead of jumping off due to a technical section, I was jumping off to help them.

But something happened that even I didn’t notice. My wife said to me one afternoon while on a short family ride that I was weaving and cutting back and forth, riding circles around the rest of the family, shifting my feet, and bouncing (bunny-hopping) with excitement. She said when ever she saw me ride I never did that. IT was always straight lines, head down, focused. Working.

Of course she thought this was a result of being with the family, and maybe to an extent it was, but I think what was happening was that I was riding my bike like I did as a kid. Like how I did in those years when I raced mountain bikes for fun. When I wasn’t paying attention to power meters or cadence.

For the last few years my feet have started to hurt when riding for long periods. I’ve been properly fitted and even have had my cleats set up through a fitting. It seems that I need a wider shoe. My feet are freezing to point of numbness in the winter for which I’ve purchased numerous booties and shoe covers over the years with mixed results.

Finally, I had had enough and put on flat pedals with wider, warmer, and cheaper regular shoes. I’m riding more and smiling more. I guess I’m not a serious cyclist after all.

Flats vs Clipless isn’t a which one is better argument. Most of what I’ve read by experts is that there is with clipless a marginal advantage at best, at least that can be measured. Most of the difference is subjective, it’s a mindset. I think you either have that mindset or you don’t.

If you worry about watts and rpm’s, if you paid hundreds of dollars more for a bike part because it weighed less than a cheaper one. You should be riding clipless. If you know where a power meter is located on a bike even though you don’t have one, you should be riding clipless.

However, if you throw one leg over the side of the bike and coast for twenty feet or more with both legs on the same side of the bike while coming to a stop, or if the pants that you ride in are loose enough to roll up the drive side pant leg so you don’t get grease on it, you should probably try flat pedals.

Why Is It So Hard to Write On An Android Tablet?

 

This is going to be a bit of rant because this isn’t what I wanted to write about. I just spent the last couple days trying to find word processing apps to use on my new Samsung Galaxy Tab S8 Plus. I wanted to use the tablet as a cross between a laptop and a tablet, something which it is well designed for from a hardware standpoint.

The problem, as with all Android devices, is the apps available are limited or treated as afterthoughts by their developers. I find this dumb and incredibly short sided because there is so much more potential in the Android system, but that is a post for another day.

This isn’t my first Samsung tablet. I’ve been with Android since the beginning of the system, so it’s not like I didn’t know what I was getting into. What did surprise me was how annoying it is to use what is available.

On my PC, I like to use Scrivner. There is no app from Scrivner for Android and though they did originally tease the possibility, they have made it pretty clear that it is unlikely that there will ever be one. And the hunt for a replacement begins….

There are a lot of potential options, but for my needs I’ve focused on a just a few. To be clear, I’m only looking for a word processor. Nothing else. No other “Office” features. Something that I can write journal entries, articles, blog posts, essays, short stories and maybe at least have the bare essentials to organize a book down the road. I want something that is on my harddrive. Not in a browser and not something that is a subscription. I have no problem paying for the software, but I don’t want to rent it.

Oh and it would be really great if the relationship between me and the developers, was just us. No one else involved in the relationship handling transactions or logins. More on this later.

Nothing exists like what I’ve just described. It just doesn’t. I think that is sad. I’ve noticed that Samsung is on an Island to an extent with it’s hardware and I wish they would just go all in and be a true competitor to Apple. They need to start making software that compliments their hardware. They can’t wait around for Google or the Play store to get its shit together.

Anyway, since nothing truly exists like what I’m looking for I went with the closest options that seemed to fit my needs. IA Writer, JotterPad, & Word.

IA Writer — I’ve used this in the past, which is really the only reason it’s being considered. But for some reason, there seems to be no trial version with this? I can’t do anything other than write essentially a note and save it locally, but could not save to the cloud or export. I can’t format or play with any of the settings……. Unless, I buy it. I have no problem buying it, but I want to know what I’m buying. I want to make sure it does in fact fit my needs. Everything I tried to do in the app caused a pop-up to appear asking for me to buy it. This is literally the digital equivalent of a used car salesman following you around the lot. I will never buy it now. Any interest I had was killed by that tactic.

JotterPad — This seemed to have a lot of potential. That’s all I can say because the only way to use it was to log in using either Google or Apple accounts. I’m done with that bullshit. Google has nothing to do with this. Neither does Apple, Facebook, Twitter, etc. If I can’t login or use a service with an account that I set up with them, one on one. Then I simply don’t use that service. Too bad, it did look promising.

Word — And then there is this guy. The McDonald’s of the word processing world. It does the job, it just does. It might be complicated at times, it may do a lot of things I can’t imagine anyone ever needing, but it does the job and has for many a writer for as long as Windows has been around. It just won’t be doing it for me for $69.99 a year. It’s a digital type writer. I’ve bought far more powerful and complex software for far less. I’d pay it to have it as long as say Windows 11 is around, that could be a few years. But, not $70 a year, every year. That is just stupid. The online version is free, but you need to have an internet connection and part of my needs is the ability to work offline. Plus, just like I don’t want a third party getting involved in the account setup, I don’t want to be forced into using OneDrive to save all my files.

So, I guess the search continues. For the record, I wrote this on OneNote because that was the only other usable writing app on the tablet. This is an incredible tablet by the way. I highly recommend the Tab S8 Plus. Also, if there is something I missed that might work let me know in th

Weirdness on Haycock Mountain

 

Back in 2012, I had a very strange experience on Haycock Mountain in Bucks County. I never thought much about it at the time. I was mostly just pissed and frustrated more than anything else, but looking back on it, it was the last time I hiked alone. 

It was late August and it had been raining for a few days straight. Finally around noon on Sunday, the rain let up and I decided to try and get out for a short hike. I had been hiking frequently the last few years but had just moved to Bucks County. Since I had been preoccupied with the move, it had been a few months since I was out on a trail. Being new to the area, there wasn’t any time to properly research the trails. It was by accident that I had learned of the highest point in the county, Haycock Mountain. Now to anyone who grew up in the mountains of Northeastern Pennsylvania, this wasn’t so much of a mountain as it was a large hill. But math doesn’t lie and according to the numbers, this was the highest elevation within the borders of the county. So mountain it is.

I looked up the location on Google maps and was happy to see a parking area and it even showed a trail. I quickly put the coordinates into my GPS to create a track that was a simple out and back, or rather, up and down. The trail was short just over a mile and since I had been hiking for awhile, like a lot of hikers, I had also dabbled in Geocacheing. At some point the previous year I had loaded all the caches into my GPS that were within a hundred miles of Philadelphia. Adding these points of interest into the GPS meant that you could easily be notified if you walked within a quarter mile of cache. I could see in the mapping software that Haycock was home to a few caches and decided that I would stop and take a look to see if I could locate some of them on my walk.

By this point it was early afternoon, but according to Google it would only take about forty minutes to drive to the parking lot. I figured even if I wasted some time looking for the caches it still wouldn’t take more than a couple hours to complete the hike. Arriving at the parking lot, the trail-head was easy to find, though it was not marked. I was glad that I had taken the time to add the track into the GPS.

Everything was soaking wet, like still dripping wet. A slight breeze would ignite a downpour from the saturated leaves above. There were plenty of wet slippery rocks and I was happy to see that this was looking like it would be at least a moderate hike. It was around the halfway point on the trail that the first alarm beeped letting me know a cache was near. I spent some time poking around off trail trying to find it, but gave up after about twenty minutes. Returning to the trail, I continued walking up toward some larger rocks. Entering some bigger rock outcrops which turned out to be large boulders, another alarm sounded indicating a cache. I Maneuvered around the boulders over and in between them looking, but not finding anything. At one point, it became quite disorienting. The boulders were about six to eight feet high and walking between them you couldn’t see where you were going or from where you came. Kind of like a corn maze, but only out of dark sedimentary rock. After slipping between a few of them, I became aware that it would be pretty easy to slip and fall and become stuck. What’s worse, no one would be able to see you unless they were right on top of you. That is of course assuming anyone was there to find you. I hadn’t seen anyone on the trail, there were no cars in the lot, other than mine, and with the conditions being as wet as they were, it was unlikely anyone would come by that day.

I found my way back to the trail and continued on. I was nearing the top of the mountain. The terrain was pretty much just climbing over, around, and in-between boulders with still no trail markers, but at least there was some graffiti to use as reference. Emerging at the top I took note of where I was and the direction I came from, with no real indication of a trail, I knew from past hikes in unfamiliar places to pay attention to landmarks in case you get turned around. I checked my watch to see how long it took to ascend to the top. Even with spending a good while hunting for the Geocaches, it had only taken a little over an hour to get to the top.

Walking along the top of the mountain there really wasn’t much to see, at least not at this time of year. Between the lush greenery and with all the rain the past week; nature was exploding. It appeared more like a jungle than the Pennsylvania woods. I climbed to the top of a large flat rock, it looked like a table and was a little bigger than a twin bed. I explored the top and found some more graffiti and a couple Cairns.

Satisfied that I saw everything there was to see, I decided to find the trail and head back down the mountain. Looking at my watch I had spent about a half hour exploring the top. I returned to the area where I emerged from the trail, but was unable to find it.

This is where things start to get a little weird.

I was certain I was in the right spot where I came out of the thicker bush to the more open area at the top near the base of the table rock formation. However, I could not see anything that looked like a trail. There was no opening in the rocks where I came through just thirty minutes before. I doubled back along the top and retraced my steps and still everything pointed to where I thought it should be. Finally, I pulled out the GPS. My GPS provides a track from the time you turn it on. It can actually be a nuisance if you forget to reset it before starting on a new hike. Essentially, it is a bread crumb trail that shows the path you’ve taken and this is in a different color than the track you are following to reduce confusion. The GPS was on and working, but no track….

This never happened before. I’ve seen it do weird things when not acquiring a signal or drifting due to the imperfections of the technology. But the unit appeared to be working fine except for two things. First, it showed no activity, no bread crumb trail nor the initial track I had loaded on to it in preparation for the hike. There was an active track being recorded according to the log, it wasn’t deleted, it just wasn’t showing on the device. Even the trip timers were still counting time and recording distance. The second issue was the unit could not zero in on my position. On the screen, my position is depicted with an arrow pointing in the direction of travel. This arrow was bouncing all over the top of the mountain. The best way I can describe it was that it like using a car GPS off a main road such as in a parking lot of a shopping center. The mapping software does not always have the layout of the parking lot and as it tries to locate your position it tends to bounce around. Once you exit the lot and enter the roadway it settles down. Well my device wasn’t settling down. If just kept showing me moving erratically as if I was jumping two hundred feet to the west and then fifty feet south west. I watched it do this for nearly fifteen minutes. I tried standing still, I tried walking in a straight line, nothing.

Now I have a pretty good sense of direction and it’s not like I was out in the back country. And, I was on a hill for chrissake, all I really had to do was walk straight down. So I picked the direction I thought made the most sense, based on where I thought I exited the trail, and the position of the sun which hadn’t moved too much in the now forty or fifty minutes I had been at the top. I scrambled up a boulder that I swear was blocking the way that I came and all I saw was nothing but more boulders. Big, Smooth, and very wet boulders.

First step put me on my ass and I slid to the edge. I was able to stop before sliding off between two other large rocks. Now at this point, I wouldn’t say I was in a panic, but I’m not a hundred percent sure that if I had fallen between them I would’ve been able to climb out given how slick the surface was and how tall the rocks were. I pulled myself back up and onto my feet and carefully studied my next move. There wasn’t one, at least not a smart one. I had to jump across which wasn’t far, maybe five feet and down a foot, but having just nearly cracked my head open, I wasn’t feeling all Bear Grylls. Still, there really wasn’t an option. I couldn’t believe how many and how big these rocks were. They seemed quite larger looking down on them then they did when I was coming up. And the funny thing is there wasn’t any ground visible. Coming up I was walking around and in between these like a maze. Maybe I chose the wrong direction?

I decided to go for it and made it across sticking the landing with just a little wobble. This time I sat down and scooted to the edge of this rock only to find myself in the exact same position again, but now further down the hill. Going back was out of the question. This continued for what seemed like longer than it should have been. At one point, I looked up and saw the rock face that I had seen on my way up, now of course I knew that face was the vertical side of the table looking rock I had stood on. This meant the trail should be right here, this was the point where I entered the boulder field initially. But no trail, just more rocks.

Eventually, the rocks gave way to a leaf covered slope. I checked the GPS, it was working again! I could see both my original track and the breadcrumb track from my ascent. But they were showing as a half mile away, further down the mountain…. I bushwacked to rejoin the trail only to find I still had another half mile to go to the parking lot. I was so relieved I didn’t bother to question or add up miles and just hauled down the trail to the car.

Once I was at the car I scrolled through the GPS data. Somehow, even with circling around looking for the geocaches on the way up, it still showed just a little over a mile to the top. But the decent track showed nearly a two and a half mile track down….and what’s weirder is that looking at the track, the part of the track that went through the rocks showed as a straight line; a mile long. Once I finally got out of the rocks the track looked normal with all the little bumps and curves of the trail as you would expect, but not only does that not make sense, the lines crossed each other and tapered together near the top. This means I did choose the right direction and I somehow managed to cross right over the same trail I walked up the mountain on through the rocks. That trail wasn’t there when I was coming down, I know because not only did I not see anything resembling a trail, I didn’t see any graffiti either. I crossed over the same area, even if I somehow manged to miss the trail or any ground at all, how the hell did I not see any graffiti, it was everywhere on the way up.

There was something about that place that gave me a weird feeling, a feeling of dread or despair if that makes any sense. Not the whole time, it started once I entered the rocks on the way up and it never really left until I was able to rejoin the trail on the way down. At the time, I chalked it up to being upset at not being able to find my way or even a little panicked after realizing I could get hurt doing this. But that doesn’t explain why I felt like that before it even happened.

It occurred to me after writing this, that not only was this the last time I hiked alone, after hiking alone regularly for a few years, it would be my last hike at all for nearly eight years after. Maybe it was my subconscious, or maybe it’s just a coincidence that life got in the way at the same time I began to lose interest in hiking, but whatever it was, it’s b