Backpacker

Day 1: MondayPops was supposed to call late Sunday night. After a three-day solobackpacking trip in the eastern Sierra, he had planned to fish Sundaymorning, take the rest of the day to hike out, and arrive at the trail-head well after dark. When noon rolls around on Monday, October 17,2016, and he still hasn’t called, my brother Tim and I are concernedbut not alarmed. Pops, 74, is an experienced backpacker, and it’s notthe first time he’s gone hiking alone.We make some calls to the Bishop Ranger Station, trying to deter-mine if he’d changed his itinerary, or maybe emerged from the wil-derness without calling. We spend much of Monday waiting, andfinally hear back that Pops had secured a backcountry permit for theSouth Lake trailhead indicating he’d be out Sunday, as we expected.Our anxiety grows as several more hours pass. At 10 p.m., a rangercalls to confirm: Pops’s car is at the trailhead. He’s now more than24 hours overdue.Tim and I don’t need to discuss our plan. We’ll grab our gear, get acouple hours of sleep, and drive six hours to Bishop from our homesin the Los Angeles area. We should be there by the time Search andRescue teams are heading out. Fortunately, they know where to startlooking. Pops had checked in with his SPOT beacon on Saturday night,so we have his coordinates. He camped at Barrett Lakes, in the back-country west of Bishop. We’ll find him quickly, I think. I hope.My two brothers and I started backpacking with Pops as kids. Wewould often be out in the Sierra for more than a week, fishing at leastan hour a day. I remember one trip during which Pops told us how heand his cousins used to hide rocks in each other’s packs. Naturally,we spent the week playing the same prank on each other. On the hikeout, we were able to sneak a heavy rock into Pops’s pack. After a fewmiles, we finally snickered a confession. But the joke was on us: Popshiked on with the extra weight like it was nothing.Back then we called him Dad. I started calling him Pops about 15years ago; it just seemed to fit the athletic father of three and grand-father of five. Others know him as Bob Woodie. Everyone agrees he isa kind man, a great dad, an engaged grandfather, a doting husband,and a lover of the High Sierra. He enjoys backpacking with others,but if no one is able to go with him, he’s never hesitated to go alone.Day 2: TuesdayTim and I arrive in Bishop at 8:30 a.m. and meet with officials of theInyo County Sheriff ’s Search and Rescue division, who tell us that wecan’t be a formal part of the search effort. But they’re sympathetic toour situation, and make it clear that we’re free to look on our own.They loan us radios so we can stay in contact with the SAR teams.We pore over the topographical map and quickly determine that,``````Clockwise from left : Bob Woodie withsons Robert (middle) and Tim (left )at a Sierra trailhead in 1988; Woodiepassed through Dusy Basin on the wayto Barrett Lakes; Woodie fi shing inYellowstone in 2016.