Tick walk

Big Sur is a pretty special place (look for another post on that soon), but I have to admit my journey up Mt. Manuel in Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park was anything but awesome.

It's a 10.5-mile slog that covers about a 3,300-foot elevation gain across some really beautiful terrain. But guidebooks warn to be wary of two things: poison oak and ticks. Well, I avoided one.

A couple miles into the tough hike, I felt a stinging on my back. I reached under my shirt and discovered what felt like a zit that needed to be badly popped. So I reached back to pop it -- and pulled out a red tick. I freaked out and threw it to the ground before I had time to see if its head was still attached to its body.

For the next 8 miles, I was super paranoid about ticks. Whenever I walked near some timber or branches on the trail (which was often because it wasn't very well maintained) I would wipe down every inch of my clothes, check my pack and search my hat for the little critters. A few times, a couple would be crawling up my pant legs or hanging out on my pack.

Aside from the tick stress, the hike was just plain hard -- steep, long and lonely. And it had a bunch of false summits. In fact, what appears to be the summit at the end really isn't. You have to hike another quarter-mile to a rather unspectacular summit. But the summit medallion was there, and that means you've reached your goal. I was stoked to see it.


I was also stoked to see great views of the Santa Lucia mountains, the Point Sur lighthouse and the beautiful Pacific Ocean.

Turns out, I must have got the head out of my back when I ripped the tick away. It stung for a few days, and I was highly paranoid about getting Lyme disease -- especially since I'm uninsured. But I'm fine now, a couple weeks later.

All in all, it's a beautiful hike. But it's a trial -- both in steepness and in creepy crawlers.

The details:
Trail name: Mt. Manuel
Location: Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park
Length: 10.5 miles
Beginning elevation: 300 feet
Peak elevation: 3,3800 feet
Difficulty (out of 5): 3 (5 if you count the ticks)