A Night I'll Never Forget

The last few steps were murder on my poor legs and back, we had been plugging along all day. We stopped for water a few hours ago and I knew the next time I stopped walking, I'd be done for the day. We were in the alpine mountains, out in the Wrangle wilderness. We were above the tree line and had just dropped down into willow scrubs that lined the creek. We found a nice gravel bar to spend the night. The tundra carpet on the mountains is a squishy mat of lichens and moss, almost impossible to walk on. We spent a lot of time on the edges of 2 creeks that flowed from the melting ice above us. I let out a groan as I dropped my pack, which weighed almost 60 pounds. We were sitting in the most beautiful spot you could imagine. We set up the tent on a large gravel bar where 2 streams came together. We were back quite a ways from the water. We collected some willow and started a fire to dry out some gear that got wet from the stream crossings we made in the morning. Nate started our little camp stove and cooked up some supper. We found some low bush cranberries and nibbled on them while we waited for our rice and beans to cook. It was 7pm and we were ready for some rest. After supper it started to rain a little and we had some coffee brewed up that we drank out of our little tin cups. I added a dribble of Yukon Jack whiskey to mine. It got dark around 11pm and we were already sleeping. What we didn't know was that it was raining a lot harder up in the mountains. The streams began to swell in the night and there was so much water coming down it was bringing half the mountain down with it. Eric wake up and noticed the sides of the tent were pushed in. He woke us up and we were a little puzzled. We could hear boulders coming down the creek crashing into the willows and the roar of the water sounded more like a major river. Tons of silt was coming down the stream and was settling in around us as we slept. The tent was buried in a foot or more and the zipper was stuck. I stood up to put on my shoes and the ground under me gave out and crumbled into the stream. It seems the stream was a lot wider now! Nate ripped the door open and the water flowed through the tent. They held the corners while I escaped. The water was cold and the silt and gravel took the skin off our legs like liquid sand paper. We saved the tent but lost some of our gear. It was dark and the noise of the water and the landslides was unbelievable. We drug our stuff up a 9ft ledge and escaped the water. We went to sleep wet and cold. Hypothermia was big concern, but there was nothing we could do. We fell a sleep not knowing what would become of us. In the morning we got out of the tent and to our surprise we saw the little valley we camped in was gone. The 7ft tall tree the tent was next to had only the one ft sticking out of the gravel! If we had slept a little longer, no one would have ever found us. We spent the next day drying out and drinking coffee. We lost a bit of gear that night but we managed to save most of the food and our topo maps. After we got the fires going good and all our stuff hanging on a makeshift close line, Nate looks at me and smiles....."Well, it ain't really a vacation unless you almost die at least once." I agreed, as we had another cup coffee