From: John_-_Winston@cup.portal.com
Newsgroups: talk.religion.newage,alt.alien.visitors
Subject: Re: UFOs and Newage
Date: Fri, 21 Aug 92 21:08:35 PDT
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
Distribution: world

In the bottom of the crater there is a small lake.  As most people 
know the cinders and soil made from volcanic ash are very furtile and 
will grow plants if they are watered properly.  The thing that 
interested me was that this student said there were people living 
inside the craater by the lake.  They were normal people and not like 
the people inside the mountain.  They wore overralls and the women 
wore long dresses much like the clothes people wore in the United 
States during the 1880's.  The men had old time type of guns that 
looked sort of like a blunderbust.  The people were friendly and 
talked with the ranger about the fire trail.  They were trying to keep 
areas around the mountain cleared of vegetation so that if a fire came 
up to that point it would stop.  They found out that some people 
during World War 2 had tried to get away from being drafted by hiding 
inside the crater.  As far as the story went they stayed in there for 
quite a while.  
	I told Nola about this story but she had never heard of it and 
rather doughted it.  She had heard stories of people going into that 
area during the winter and nearly freezing down near the lake at 
night.  That's one area that could use some more checking out. 
	Mt. Shasta is not too hard to climb from the west side where 
the ski lodge is.  People start off from the ski lodge and can make it 
up in one day.  If they are very good they can make it up and back in 
a day.  I've even heard of a real mountain climber that started by 
himself and made it across Shastina from the north side, went over the 
main peak of Mt. Shasta then down the Mud Creek area on the southeast 
side into the McCloud area in just one day.  
	There are times that people come from an area like the San 
Francisco area that is only 40 feet in elevation and come to Widow 
Springs that is about 5,000 feet elevation only to find that their 
noses would start bleeding uncontrolably before they even start their 
climb.  It's best to come to the area from one to two weeks before you 
attempt to climb the mountain.  Two weeks is the best amount of time 
to get accustomed to the altitude but most people in good shape can 
make it OK in one day if you really want to stretch it. 
	Nola once met a young man that was highly gifted with ESP who 
had the ability to bound up the side of the mountain to the door.  He 
could make it up in nearly a run.  Nola has had old ladies 72 years 
old who went through the two week training period at Widow Springs 
actually make it all the way up and into the door.  They followed the 
instructions exactly and were allowed to go inside the mountain. 
	During one of my trips to Mt. Shasta the next year I had a few 
people out at work who wanted to go with  me.  Two of us started 
getting into shape about two months before we went.  We had gotten in 
shape by taking about 6 mile hikes.  I had a little incident that 
happened to me previous to that time that had cut 5 tendons and one 
artery but the doctors had me all wired back together and then removed 
the wire and I was getting OK.  My oldest boy was then about 15 and in 
perfect shape (pole vaulter and all that  sort of thing).  There were 
two hippies about 21 years old that  came along also.  My friend Bob 
was also along and he was also a hippy.  He had walked me into the 
ground during a previous trip.
	We thought we really had it made this time because  we brought 
along a Susuki 80 cc trail bike.  We got up there and you guessed it, 
that bike wouldn't even make it up to the jeep trail.  I wound up 
kicking the thing in the tire.  So here we were one happy group.  The 
first thing that happened was that we couldn't find the jeep trail and 
wound up hiking from a nearby road for 5 miles before we got up to our 
original starting point.  We were takiing it pretty easy so far, sort 
of like a sunday strole.  After getting up to the tree line and 
passing the cedars, the spring, after finally getting through the 
shale a little bit then everybody sort of went a little crazy.  Bob 
(the boy that had walked me into the ground before) all of a sudden 
started yelling at me, "Your not going to walk me to death up here".  
Then I asssured him that I had no intentions of walking  him to death 
so he decided to go back down the mountain.  Another one of our group 
developed a blister so he decided to go back down.  One of the hippies 
started getting a headache.  My mind was changing in just the other 
direction.  I decided to spend the night on the mountain with just my 
coat on and make it the rest of the way up in the morning.  Then 
another person started pleading with me not to try to do that.  He was 
just about in tears so I promised him that I'd come back that evening.
	So all of them except my friend that had gotten in good shape 
had turned back.  While talking with the others my friend had struck 
up the hill without me and was about 50 yards ahead of me.  The wind 
was blowing pretty hard in our ears so he coulldn't hear me when I 
called to him.  I struck out after him.  We were at about 10,000 feet 
and could only walk about 30 yards before we were breathing like a 
race horse and would have to rest for a while then start out again.  
Finallly I caught him.  We finally got to an area where we had to rope 
ourselves together while the other one would go over a dangerous area.  
All this time I was wondering how in the world that a 72 year old lady 
made it up there.  By this time the mountain area was really getting 
big.  You could put a good size town on that mountain up on those 
glaciers.  We finally got up  to a bunch of rocks and decided to rest 
for a while.  My friend ssaid he saw a large rock about the size of a 
baseball go past his head but he thought at the time I had caused it 
to fall but I wasn't above him at the time.  We took a few pictures 
enjoying the scenery but didn't find the door and decided to go back 
down.
	When we got down we found that the hippy's headache had gotten 
worse and he had passsed out on the way down the mountain.  They had 
to go get the truck, come and get him and bring him back to Widow 
Springs.  He was resting there when we got back and finally got OK a 
few hours later. 
	We all made it home but  these same men  came back a month 
later during their vacations and climbed the mountain again. This time 
they slept in sleeping bags on the side of the mountain but nearly 
froze on the mountain over night.  One of them (Bob) made it all the 
way to the top.
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