For two miles, we had followed a shaded trail that led through a lonely pine and ash forest outside of Bend, Oregon. For the last mile, we had seen no one. At the two-mile mark, we arrived at a fork in the trail, where a weathered wooden sign directed hikers to turn left if they were bound for Moraine Lake, nearly 7,000 feet in elevation on the slopes of the South Sister. We turned and found ourselves on a thickly-wooded, rapidly ascending slope. It was a sunny day but unu