Following the Sun (15 page)

“By God you walk fast,” he said. “Why so fast? You've got to pace yourself, don't you know.”

In other company, I'm a known dawdler.

“Eat up Griggs. I have chocolate for the hard climb after lunch. See that peak behind me? We'll scale it this afternoon.”

The peak was an unassailable, jagged needle, rising above steep snow slopes and rude gorges.

“Surely you jest,” he said. “But what is that thing making its way up the peak?”

I trained my binoculars on the thing and saw what must have been a chamois crossing the lower slopes.

“Brown bear,” I said.

Griggsy's eyes widened considerably.

Our lunch consumed, and most of the bottle drained, we made our way back to the car, and pushed on to the Pic du Midi d'Ossau. We were now in snow, and stopped for another hike, tracking upward for a half a mile or so, Griggs lagging again, wetting his street shoes and pants in the softening snows. In time we came to a south-facing spot clear of snow and matted with dry grass.

“Rest here, Griggs, while I scout the region.”

Obediently he sat down and then lay back with his head on a warm rock. I walked on, following a lead through the light snow and climbing higher toward a narrow pass at the top of the slope. Halfway there, I looked up and saw a dark form emerge in the sky above the ridge and begin circling the valley above the spot where Griggs lay. I got a look at it and realized it was a golden eagle.

Along with the ever-present choughs, a red-legged bird related to crows, I had been seeing hawks, kites, common buzzards, vultures, and at one point (I think) a rare and endangered lammergeier above the ridges, riding on the updrafts of sun-warmed air that rose up from the valleys below. In other areas during migratory seasons, but most especially in the autumn, soaring birds such as hawks and eagles take advantage of these thermals in their long overland flights. They wait all morning on their night roosts for the sun to warm the air, then, by midmorning, they fly off to the rising columns of warmed air and circle upward. Once the lift cools and weakens, they soar off to the south along the ridges, losing altitude all the way, but not wasting precious energy. When they come to another sun-warmed thermal they ride upward once more, circling to stay within the column. Sometimes hundreds of these birds will collect in one updraft, a phenomenon called a kettle among birders. In this manner, drifting downward, rising up again and soaring forth, they roller coaster southward all day, until nightfall.

I climbed onward, but the snow was getting deeper and it was not easy walking; the damp began to penetrate my shoes, so after a few detours to follow animal tracks I went back down and rousted my companion, tempting him with the thought of a brandy in a warm café.

The sun here was brilliant, almost blinding as it reflected off the snow, and I noticed that the redness of my friend's cheek was not due solely to his unaccustomed exertions. He was getting a sunburn.

I had been out on the road for nearly a month, riding in the open sun each day, so I was already tanned. But old Griggs, who was a troglodytic sort in any case, favoring the night over the day like many Madrileños, was getting the worst of it. He had been sleeping with his face up to the sun and was already red.

Looking down at poor Griggsy there, all burned, his hindquarters sore from the bicycle ride, fatigued, his legs aching from the hike I had put him through, made me feel sorry for my old friend. I used to tease him a lot when we were children (never mind, he teased back with devilish ferocity). But I felt bad for him mainly because he was such a willing, enthusiastic sport, game to jump into any lark, and then, only when he was in the midst of it, having second thoughts. I extended my hand to him, and helped him to his feet. He hobbled down to the car without complaint.

Over the course of our time together, it had occurred to me somewhat paranoically perhaps that my old friend Griggs was possibly now working as a CIA agent. Yale was, after all, the traditional breeding ground for this itinerant species, and Griggs had lived all around the Western world without apparent means of support, with odd jobs in the offices of foreign journals, insurance work, trade, and now, as he claimed, advertising in Madrid. I had teased him about this mercilessly while we were in our various watering holes and restaurants, and he always denied it, as of course he should have. But now, I felt, if he was indeed CIA, it was all part of the same thicket he used to get himself into when we were children together. Jump in and find yourself in deep water.

Why the CIA would post someone in Madrid in that period of time did not in any way fit my theory, however.

We drove slowly back down to Gabas, stopping often to look at birds, and then went to look for a café.

The next day was also clear, and I thought Griggs might like to have a look around the trails and road near the Pic de la Sagette, so after an obligatory stop for a second coffee, we began weaving northward on the narrow roads and then climbed again to the de Pombre wildlife refuge. The road was closed, so we got out and walked down the Gare de Brousse and thence higher and into snow, this time mixed in with cleared patches where flowers were blooming. The earth was cool and soggy, but the sun was hot, and the air fresh and moist, and there were deciduous trees and rushing streams, which we crossed, leaping from rock to rock to get to ever higher pastures. On the bank of one of these streams I saw a dark little water ouzel bobbing along and managed through much cajoling and directions to show it to Griggs.

He had apparently recovered from his various ordeals.

“By God,” he said at one point, “you seem to have taken the right path in life. This is marvelous. Health-giving. Just what I need. We should climb on till nightfall, scale that peak ahead. Feed on chocolate in the true mountaineer fashion.”

“I'm going to quit smoking—” he announced, “—after this.”

Once again the snows grew deeper and when we came to another south-facing cleared area, we sat down on the grass to rest. Ahead of us were sweeping snow pastures melting back to reveal patches of fresh green pasturage, interspersed with patches of snow-flattened brown grass and a hint of alpine flowers. Below, grumbling and roaring, was the stream we had crossed, and all around the valley we could hear the voices of other streams and waterfalls gushing. Silently, above us, flights of choughs, buzzards, and black kites would drift over the valley, dark patterned against the cerulean blue of the spring sky, and below us I could see little rising and falling drifts of sparrows and buntings. I sat there with my glasses, scanning the deep crevices and slopes, and spotted another chamois bedded down in a sheltered hollow. I tried to show Griggs, but he couldn't seem to find it.

“Shall we be off,” I said.

He rose and crumpled again.

“Seem to have stiffened up there.”

“Work it out,” I almost said. But sympathetically I suggested we descend and look for more adventures.

“Perhaps there is a café up here somewhere,” he said vaguely.

Back in the car, we drove on and came to the entrance of a cable car that led up to the Artouste ski area, at Pic de la Sagette.

I asked a couple who had just come out from the car what was at the top and, as I expected, they said there was a restaurant at the peak. Griggs, when he learned of this, was all for heading up, but I actually wanted to do a little more walking as it was still morning, not really time to start in on one of his seemingly eternal eating adventures.

“Why don't I just go up, scout it out, get a table and meet you there,” he said.

This seemed a fine idea, and I set off while he waited for the next cable car.

I walked up the road for a while, and then turned off and began to climb through the alpine meadows, seeking out the cleared sections. This was, if anything, a more beautiful valley than the one we had been in the day before. The sun now was downright hot, and the snow was melting back from the grassy patches minute by minute, literally. I became aware of the tiny alpine wildflowers that had bloomed underneath the actual snow cover. One of them looked to me like the tiny red-stemmed
Soldanella
of the Swiss Alps. In some clear patches I found blue gentians and the tiny green leaves of some species of montane or tundralike willow. On the jumbled rocks of a sun-warmed scree, I saw bell-flowers and more species of clinging small-leafed willows, and the little cluster of flowers called alpine cushion—known as
cuscinetto
by Italian alpinists.

All these flowers were tiny, but colorful, and all of them have developed strategies for surviving the extreme temperatures of the high altitudes. In some the buds of the flowers form underneath the snow cover and bloom when they hit the warming rays of the sun. Some even bloom under the snow to get a jumpstart on the season. On clear, warm days during the previous summer, they stored the energy of the sun in their leaves to form the buds for the spring blossoming. In the warm seasons, when there is no snow cover, they need to capture every available hour of sunlight to get ready for the next year. Speed is of the essence for these energetic little plants; and the whole point is to produce a flower, and then, often through color and the patterning on the petals, induce some wandering insect to land and pick up the pollen and spread it around the meadow to other blossoming flowers of the same species. Timing is everything. No doubt here, in this high country of late spring snows and chill nights, there are many individual flowers that bloom futilely, unvisited by even so much as a gnat.

I sat back on the grass and stared out at the impossible blue of the sky above the white peaks, at the dark, somewhat ominous dagger peaks free of snow, the white rolling slopes, the periodic flocks of choughs that would emerge from a mountain wall, cross the valley, screeking and creeking, only to disappear around the mountain on the other side. I felt a solar-induced peace of mind settling over me, a sort of rhapsody of the heights, and were it not for my social responsibilities I would have stayed there for the rest of the day, feeding on landscape. I had not been in such radiant country in years, and looking out over the snowy peaks, gleaming now in the morning sun like the halls of some celestial temple, I could understand why so many ancient cultures associated mountain peaks with their most powerful gods.

The great sky god Zeus and his company of fellow deities lived on the top of Mount Olympus, and his early Roman equivalent, Jupiter, had many shrines located on hilltops and mountain peaks. The Native American people had the same reverence for mountains; their many wind gods are associated with mountains, and throughout Asia there are many Buddhist and Taoist shrines and temples located on mountaintops. Of all of these, the ancient primordial religion of Japan, Shinto, was most deeply associated with mountains, in particular a singular peak, perhaps the most famous mountain in the world, Mount Fuji.

There are many gods in the Shinto religion—too many some would say. The earliest are obscure primal deities associated with chaos and creation, and there are gods of the earth, and gods of the sky and rains and thunder and wind, and gods beyond counting who preside over all things good and evil in human affairs, birth, marriage, death, riches, poverty, strength, and disease. But out of all of these myriad spirit beings emerged a goddess whose worship developed into a national religion, the goddess of the sun, from whom, supposedly, the supreme ruler of the nation claimed descent.

The sun goddess, the beautiful Amaterasu Omikami, was born in Japan, according to one account, from the left eye of the primal creator Izanagi, but she chose to live in the sky. From her there developed one long, unbroken “Succession of the Sun” that made up the ancestral line of the imperial rulers of Japan. Early in the history of the world, the whole of creation almost came to an end because of a nasty trick played by the devilish storm god, Susano, who was constantly tormenting his sister, Amaterasu, and destroying her good works. One day he threw down from heaven a flayed, piebald horse, a thing so hideous to look upon that Amaterasu fled into a cave and sealed the door behind her. As a result, the high plains of heavens grew dim, darkness swept over the earth, and demons and evil spirits and goblin devils emerged and ran to and fro, scattering chaos and ruin. The eighty thousand Shinto deities grew disturbed; they congregated in the riverbed of heaven and held a council to figure out how to entice Amaterasu out of her cave, for if she did not emerge, surely the young world would perish.

Finally they devised a plan. They lit bonfires and set up an eight-foot mirror in a tree to reflect the light toward her cave, and then they held a dance and began to shout and cheer, and they were so entertained by the erotic dancing of the beautiful young goddess, Usume, that they began laughing, and the laughter rolled across heaven and earth. Inside her cave, Amaterasu could hear the commotion, and wondering what it was all about, opened the stone door slightly. Light spread over the land. She grew curious and emerged further, and then one of the gods came forward and took her hand and gently led her out and then stretched a rope of straw across the cave entrance so that she could not go back in completely nor close the stone door.

Now every day she comes out of her cave, but every night she goes back to rest, and at these times an ominous darkness falls over the land.

The best place to see Amaterasu, when she first emerges from her cave, in fact the most sacred site in all Japan, is the summit of Fuji. Each day, for centuries now, pilgrims have ascended to spend the night at the summit to greet Amaterasu as she rises out of the sea.

Long before I was born my father lived in China and used to travel to Japan every summer. On one of these visits, he made the pilgrimage up Fuji and he used to entertain me with bedtime stories of his ascent. This was in the years before there were trolley and bus routes most of the way up and it took him two days of hiking over rocks and loose volcanic sands to make the summit. There were little way stations on the route that would feed and house the pilgrims and he spent the second night on the summit, sleeping on the cold floor of a temple with other pilgrims, waiting for the sun. As is often the case on Fuji, dawn was gray and clouded, and only a dull milky light spread over the land below him. I have a photograph he took on his way back down of a group of fellow pilgrims, struggling up the steep slopes toward the summit. Interestingly, like pilgrims to Santiago, they wear wide-brimmed hats and carry long staffs. These latter are issued to climbers at the base of the mountain and were traditionally stamped with
kanji
signatures at way stations set up along the ascent route. I still have the one he was given.