Rock On

I am not the outdoor type. I don’t like being hot or sweaty. Mosquitoes relish me. And I’m scared of my own shadow. I can’t spend 10 seconds digging in the garden without hearing Ian McKellen’s voice in my head, saying, “There are older and fouler things than orcs in the deep places of the world.”

But David and I rarely do things together, other than watch TV. So when he finally got a day off of work (a software person, he literally works all the time, including evenings and weekends), I begged him to venture into the great outdoors with me. I wanted us to have an experience we’d remember and talk about for years — and I wanted us to have this experience before the temperatures climbed into the 100s.

So we went to Enchanted Rock.

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I’d never heard of Enchanted Rock before I moved to Austin. (I come from a long line of non-outdoor-type people.) But when I mentioned to my friends that I wanted to go “on a hike or something — you know, outside,” all of them suggested Enchanted Rock. “It’s not too hard to climb,” they assured me, “and it’s really pretty at the top.”

I didn’t do much research before we left. Probably not my best move. But David did enough research for both of us. (He can be a bit of a know-it-all.) As we drove, he informed me that Enchanted Rock is a batholith, formed by a giant bubble of magma that rises through the earth’s surface and slowly cools. He also said it was the second largest batholith in the country, after Georgia’s Stone Mountain.

As we approached the state park, I saw a giant pinkish dome rising near the horizon. “Is that it?” I asked.

“Yup. That’s a batholith, all right.”

“Huh. I thought it would be…pointier. Like the cliffs in a Wile E. Coyote cartoon.”

“A batholith doesn’t look anything like that!”

I silently vowed to research the crap out of our next trip location, lest I be at the mercy of Captain Pedantic again.

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An all-too-familiar shape darted out near the road, then ran away. “It’s a roadrunner!” I squealed. “I wonder if we’ll see more of them in the park!”

Another familiar shape dashed by the side of the car: a deer. “I know we see them by the house all the time,” I told David, “but they’re just so neat to see out here.”

“Probably because they’re not eating our lawn out here,” he noted.

We paid $7 each at the first station in the park, then drove to the base of the Summit Trail. The parking lot was packed, which caught me off guard. I’d expected sparse cars on a Tuesday afternoon in late February. I can’t imagine how crowded the place is during spring and autumn weekends.

As we walked up the rocky winding trail leading to Enchanted Rock, an alarm went off in my head. This walk in a state park wasn’t going to be a figurative walk in the park. Sharp rocks jutted out from the ground. One misstep and I could easily cut or break a limb. Then there was the batholith itself — a giant, pockmarked slope, very steep at parts with no steps or handrails. I wondered how many people had fallen or hurt themselves on it over the years.

Then I thought about how hideous the rock would look if some lawyer demanded that steps and a bannister be added. I had a vision of people lazily sitting in a tram escorting them to the top, at which point they’d pile out, take a few pictures, toss gum on the ground, then go back down, having an utterly forgettable experience. The climb wasn’t sanitized for my protection. It would be a struggle to get to the top. And because of that, I would remember it forever.

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The trail turned from sharp and angular to smoother and sloping, like frozen sand dunes. We went up, ever upward. And just when it seemed like we were reaching the top, another slope appeared.

David walks very fast. I tried to keep up with him. Soon, he stopped, pointing out I was panting and suggesting that I take it easy.

“I’m…fine,” I gasped. My heart pounded in my chest, begging to differ. You’re not that young anymore, it reminded me with every painful beat. You only work out twice a week. My lungs agreed. The air — only barely cooler than average — was making my chest hurt, as if I’d been jogging on a wintry day.

After a minute or so of standing still, my heart rate slowed down. David resumed his climbing, an Irish-German mountain goat in a Woot.com hoodie and a Circuit of the Americas baseball cap. I didn’t try to keep up. Nor did I ask him to slow down; I’ve spent over a decade asking him to do that, with few results. I just kept going, focusing on the angle of the rock under my feet, of the hawks now flying below us, of the crowds of people speckled here and there across the terrain.

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We passed a couple I thought to be my age — until I remembered I wasn’t in my late 20s anymore. “You’re halfway there!” they cheerfully assured is. “It’s so beautiful at the top. Keep going. It’s worth it.”

Plants soon appeared, growing straight out of the rock. Just like Dr. Ian Malcolm said in “Jurassic Park.” Life finds a way.

Small pools dotted the landscape. So did gum. I pointed this out to David. “I hate everyone,” I muttered as I climbed.

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We reached the top. It was, indeed, beautiful. Awe-inspiring.

I joked to David that we should’ve gotten married up here. “The wedding guest list would’ve been a lot smaller,” I joked.

“I doubt anyone could make it up here in a wedding dress,” he dourly noted.

“So you wear wedding yoga pants. It’s not a big deal.”

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After observing the landscape around us, we started the climb back down. “Go at an angle,” David told me. “Don’t walk straight down. Focus on your steps.”

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Later, I noted with surprise that my fear of heights never once kicked in. I have no idea why. I get scared taking the overpasses on Highway 183. But there I was, just putting one foot in front of the other on that giant pockmarked dome, one ear on the highway noise (audible even from the rock) and one ear on the family with two small kids a ways behind us. The little kids made it all the way up and down the rock without a single complaint.

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We reached the rocky trail. David’s foot landed wrong. He gasped. “It’s my ankle, but it’s fine,” he said. His facial expression begged to differ.

Between his ankle, my knees (still testy after an injury 2 years ago), and wanting to get home before rush hour traffic, we agreed to take one more short hike, then leave. We set off for the Frog Pond via the Loop Trail.

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On the way, we passed a crowd of people staring with hushed awe at a herd of deer. “Did you see the deer?” one woman asked me. Her voice, warm and delighted, reminded me of my mother pointing out animals in the zoo when I was a kid. I grinned and nodded. I wanted to hug her. I wanted to hug all of them — these people standing around, absolutely entranced by an encounter with a mere deer.

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Unlike the Summit Trail, the trail to the Frog Pond involved a gravelly, almost sandy walkway. I felt like I was wading through dunes, trying to get to the ocean.

A cardinal flew into view. He dove from tree to tree, as if leading us down the path.

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After walking for a while, our water almost out, I told David I thought we should go back. He consulted the map. “We’re almost at the pond,” he said.

“But we still have to walk all the way back, and I’m pretty tired already,” I pointed out. “And then there’s your ankle.”

A good lesson for the wilderness, and for life: know your limits.

We headed back. The cardinal reappeared. “Look,” I said. “He’s leading us again!”

We’d almost made it to the parking lot when we passed half of the couple we’d seen on the way up. “Did you make it to the top?” the young man asked with a smile, a large camera in his hands.

“We did,” I grinned. “And you were right. It was totally worth it.”

Note: The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department may have to close nine state parks if they don’t get the funding they desperately need. I’m embarrassed that I’m 35 and, until yesterday, the last time I visited a state park was in elementary school. I urge you to donate to TPWD to keep these fantastic, gorgeous natural resources open to the public. And visit them! I certainly plan to.

Copyright 2013, Sarah Rodriguez Pratt. All rights reserved.