Day 27- May 16th

Today was our first ever 20+ mile day at 21.72 miles! Woot woot!!

Today we had a nice early start, we hit the trail by 7:45. It's amazing how many miles you can get in before the sun gets too hot. I think we were dealing with a high in the 60's today instead of the 90's since we're at a higher elevation, and it felt nice to not be burning up by 10am!

Nice chair Claire!

Soon we got some nice views of Big Bear Lake. When we were down in Big Bear City, there was no water in what you could tell used to be the lake. But now we see that the more west you go, the deeper and bluer the water becomes.

Soon we ran into Big Spoon, (our friend Jerry), who we hadn't seen since say 5 or 6! He had been taking it nice and slow and caught up while we were doing the fire closures. He has a new hiking buddy named Baloo.

We continued through the nice forested area, and then soon, out of nowhere, entered a burn:

This picture is facing south

This picture is facing north, standing in the same spot

However it was not completely bare! The fore that rolled through happened in 2003, and there are plenty shrubs and flowers and even some new trees growing. 

During our day, we caught glimpses of "Mr. Peanut", the mystery man (or woman) who we've been following for weeks and whose prints always make us crave Nutter Butters! 

Well, other than that, we did a loooooot of walking. Over 10 hours!  Nice easy grade, flat for the most part, and then down towards the end. We attribute our long day mostly to the easy trail and moderate temperature, (but partly because we're just awesome!)

The day went without any water sources, (expect a small trickle-stream about 7 inches wide), so naturally a lot of people were camped by the nice wide creek at the end of the day! 

It seems that our trail names 2-Pack and The Bee's Knees have officially stuck. And until something better comes up, I am 2-Pack and Claire is The Bee's Knees! (But she really is though) :)

I seem to have some kind of rash on my leg. It makes sense because I've been in shorts all day and parts of the trail were bushy. It's not poison oak or poodle dog bush because I'm not in agonizing pain, but I'll keep everyone posted!

Tomorrow we are expecting to roll into Deep Creek Hot Springs before dark (16 miles away). How awesome, hot springs on the PCT, woohoo! 

More pics from today: 

Biiiig trees

Thanks for reading!