Day 7- April 26

Wow, today felt so long I just had to ask Claire where we woke up this morning! Today we got up nice and early and broke camp right before 7. We were relieved to head up the hill and find that the wind had subsided! 

Before I started the trail, I thought that the desert would be the same and boring all the time. But in fact it's been complete opposite so far! We've already seen many different faces of the desert, and today we saw another. 

There were beautiful pink and yellow flowers on different cacti, (maybe prickly pear?) there were also some really really tall plants that resembled yucca plants put instead of flowers on top they just looked like huge asparagus spears:

We walked on and off with Focus, who we met up with about 3 1/2 miles into our day. We found out that he and the group of people that had stayed overnight in Mt. Laguna when Claire and I went on into the wind storm, did 21 miles yesterday! 

Claire and I were planning to walk 13.35 miles to Scissors Crossing, where we'd hitchhike into Julian 13 miles and possibly stay the night at a trail angel named Carmen's house. 

Like I said, we left camp by 7am. We reached our goal by 2pm! That's a 2mph average including our breaks! This was thanks to the low winds today (unlike the torrents of the last two days)

There was a trail angel under the bridge just before our hitch spot giving people beer and fresh fruit. I cannot tell you how good it feels to eat a fresh tangerine and apple after walking in a very arid desert all day! I passed on the beer because I knew that if I partook I would not be very productive in Julian... I did enjoy the sign he made for hikers just before we got to the bridge:

Hitching into Julian only took a few minutes, and our ride's name was Ed Manning. He's retired and has literally been driving people to and from places they've needed to go all week! He gave us a little tour of Julian before dropping is off in the back of Carmen the trail angel's place. She has laundry for hikers to use and a patio that they can hang out on and rest. 

We heard from another hiker that the night before, Carmen's landlord told her that she can't house hikers anymore, and that there was nowhere else to stay but the $80-$90 hotel rooms. 

I made a run to the post office to send some unnessecasry gear back home, then we took advantage of our free pie and drink at Mama's! This place was so awesome and had been our driving determination the last few windy days.

My complimentary lemonade and strawberry rhubarb pie with vanilla ice cream! 

Then in true dessert-before-dinner fashion, we also ordered some chicken pot pies :) We then brainstormed on what our next step was. It's too early to dish out $90 for a room when there's good camping all over. However we were looking forward to a chance for laundry and a shower.

Luckily, there's a fancy RV park that was the 13 miles back to Scissors Crossing, and then 4 miles down the intersecting highway. They had $8 campsites that included showers and a laundromat on site! We had a new plan. Quickly researching how much water and food we'd need for the next stretch, we went to go resupply at the grocery store in Julian.

In the store guess who we ran into? Carmen the trail angel! We had reunited with Joe in Julian (new trail name: banjo) and she asked if we were heading out of town. When we said yes she offered to take us back to Scissors Crossing!

Banjo, Claire, Me, and Carmen in her car

After thanking her profusely, she cruised away. Not 30 seconds later, the first car we saw, a tiny 2-door Toyota Celica stopped for us! He said he could take us to the RV Park, and the 3 of us, AND our 3 huge packs, somehow crammed into his tiny car. Total wait time on road, about 17 seconds. Best hitchhike experience ever! 

Checking out the laundry room in the park, we found an awesome hiker box with all kind of goodies, food, and shampoos and conditioners for the free showers!

The place is so hiker friendly, and there are six hikers staying the night here. Everybody is SO nice to PCT hikers in this part of the trail, it's ridiculous! 

Focus (who arrived shortly after), Claire, and Banjo. Freshly showered and waiting for laundry.

These simple amenities like laundry and a hot shower seem like the greatest things in the world! I hadn't showered for a week! All my clothes were covered in a layer of dirt. And being able to hang out and cook some food and blog like this in a nice plastic chair is just great.

Well, it's 9:49pm right now, waaaaaay past my bed time, so I guess I'll go get some nice, clean, sleep! 

Tomorrow we begin our 32 mile trek to Warner Springs! There is only one water source on the way, but we're leaving tomorrow nice and prepared with plenty of water.

Thanks for reading!

Day 6- April 25th

Last night was the toughest night camping I've had yet to date, haha. Our nice little dirt area above the picnic area became a recipe for disaster. Winds violently shook the tent, bending poles and dislodging items stored in the corner pockets. Wind continuously whipped up the dirt and then sent it right in between our rain fly and tent, causing a layer of super fine dirt to be sprinkled on us and all our belongings throughout the night. I only slept for 3 hours, in 3 different one hour increments, and I had to use eye drops 4 times to remove dirt from my eyes during the night. Everything is dirty and the winds still whipped strong through the morning hours.

Between our rain fly and tent

We were debating waiting out the wind in our dirty tent this morning, but decided to get a move on. Phillip was still asleep but his tent was flat on him. We let him sleep in, only imagining his night, and Claire and Megan and I went off. It was a good thing we didn't try and wait out the wind. It lasted ALL. DAY..

If I could describe today in three words it would be windy, rocky, and windy. We started of strong despite the small amount of sleep we had, but in a few minutes started to feel the hurt. Wind was relentless and the trail was rough. Eventually Joe caught up to us. Joe is carrying a guitar on the whole pct. Joe is awesome.

We were literally being blown away by the wind and the trail became only rocks. A rocky road (not as lovely as the ice cream flavor) and that much wind is a recipe for twisted ankles. We needed some shelter from the whipping wind, and fast!

Joe + guitar in full wind gear walking on rocks.

We referred to our maps and saw that there was a small trailhead with a "privy" and "water" near a highway that intersected the PCT. The side trip was only .5 miles off and Joe and Claire and I decided we would take it, to get out of the wind and for Joe to fill up in some water. Megan decided to push on, hoping to find a nice, windless resting spot.

The "water" ended up being this:

Luckily Claire and I each packed enough water out of Mount Laguna yesterday to not need to chance filtering and possibly getting sick from the trough, as there is a cleaner water source soon up ahead in tomorrow's plan. I'm crossing my fingers for Joe..

The "privy" however ended up being an awesome outhouse big enough to shelter 3 from the windstorm. Yes, we all rested and ate food in a bathroom: we're walking 40 shadeless, exposed miles through a storm-warning, you don't understand how nice that bathroom was.

Joe and Claire as happy as can be for being in the lou..

Since last night got real windy and dirty, I decided to dry out my sleeping bag during or break. (As it got wet from condensation last night because I sleep hot) Water and superfine dirt equal mud. Muddy sleeping bag = no good. I also got creative with our solar charger so it wouldn't blow away while charging Claire's phone:

After a few songs on the guitar, and some nice rest, we decided to head out into the madness again to reach lower ground, which was theoretically coming up within the next six miles. 

Back on the trail, we found a wind-protected switchback in the trail, and rested for a bit, talking about Wednesday's riches: free fruit and pie in a town called Julian. 

A guy ready for a pie. Joe often rests "on trail", quite literally.

With winds blowing strong but hopes up, we finally descended down from our exposed wind-march, and into a much less windy canyon. From here the trail goes back up into the wind for 13.6 miles to where the trail meets the highway on which we hitchhike 13 miles west to the town of Julian for our resupply and free pies and fruit.

We are camping here tonight and since we arrived shortly after 4, the plan is to get plenty of rest and get an early start tomorrow, to once again face the winds, and put those last 13.6 miles behind us. Although we only did 11.1 miles today, we are hoping that more than three hours of sleep and no 2 hour "bathroom break" tomorrow will aid us in our quest.

A few minutes ago I was outside the tent and we saw two coyotes about 50 ft from us cross on the other side of the valley! 

It is now 6:54pm, probably the earliest I've attempted to sleep since I was 5 years old! 

Thanks for reading! 

Day 5- April 24th

Wow, I can't believe I'm actually keeping up with this thing daily.. After a long day of hiking you're so sore and tired, but somehow I feel like I'm gonna love looking back at all this, and re-living each day on this incredible journey, so here we go!

Last nights stealth-camping was a success! I'm wondering if tonight's spot will be too but we'll get to that later.. Claire and I woke up in Mt. Laguna, and once again headed to Pine Coffee house and tavern, this time for breakfast! There were many more hikers this morning than there were yesterday, we heard them all come in early in the morning while we "slept in" until 7:30 comfortably in our tent :) 

After an awesome breakfast and meeting a few new people, we headed to Laguna Mountain Sports and bought a new stove! They have awesome, hiker-friendly prices there, and I got a sweet deal for a better stove than the one we broke! 

We also rummaged through our first "hiker-box". A box usually found at hiker hubs where other hikers toss their food that they're sick of or gear that they don't want anymore. One hiker's trash is another's treasure! I scored a whole jar of peanut butter and a brand new pair of $50 Columbia rain pants! I'm carrying these to Julian, and then forwarding them to Kennedy Meadows, the entrance to the Sierra..

After talking with some new and old friends, and gathering all the water and additional food we'd need for the next stretch, we realized it was already past noon! Time really flies in towns, that's for sure! 

We quickly ran into Phillip, who we had heard about but never met. Shortly after telling him that I haven't seen a rattle yet, he saw one in the trail! He was walking in front so I missed it. But not an hour later, I finally saw my first Rattle! He was tiny and not coiled. Just slithered away once he knew we were all staring.. A little anticlimactic but I'll take it!

We saw some awesome open expanses early on, and hiked through a few burn areas. The open expanses continued all day, but unfornutaely: The wind came.

The wind came hard and fast and stayed all day. At least 45-50 mph gusts on the ridges and exposed valleys! I quickly realized I wouldn't be using my umbrella, so instead I just loaded up on the sunscreen (just like I promised mom) :)

Taking intermittent breaks crouched behind the tiniest of bushes, our bodies were feeling the hurt. The sun and dryness, along with the gale-force winds and cold gusts combined forces to kick our butts! 

We finally found a rock to rest on and we saw Phillip (who had taken a longer break and we had gone on without him) and a girl named Megan. 

Without going into too much detail and lengthy bore, we were in a little predicament: We had to get a certain mileage today to escape a "camping ban", which basically said we can't "remote camp" (camping in a non-designated camping spot) within 10 miles of Mt. Laguna. The camping ban ends after a little picnic area, (where camping is not permitted) right next to the only road around. 

Except for this little oasis of grass and trees, there is laterally no where else to camp for miles, meaning that unless Claire and I booked 15 miles from Laguna, through the increasing winds and setting sun, we were out of luck. 

We finally made it to the picnic area, after 11.31 ROUGH miles from Mt. Laguna. We knew that we couldn't camp here, but we could NOT go on..

The four of us walked over to a picnic table to set our packs down and think, and a woman approached us immediately. "Oh great", I thought, "she's managing this area and she's gonna tell us we can't stay here."

To my surprise, she comes over and tells us that she had beers in the car for us. We were stoked!! This was the first big "trail magic" that Claire and I have experienced. We went up to her car and the four of us enjoyed PBR, and some fresh tangerines and apples! The ladies name was "Moosey" a trail name she received from hiking the Appalachian trail a few years back. She has also completed the Pacfic Crest Trail and I believe the Continental Divide Trail as well! 

Left to right: PBR, Megan, PBR, Phillip, "Moosey", Cabernet Sauvignon, PBR, and Claire!

After talking with "Moosey" for a bit, and forgetting about some of our aches and pains, we thanked her profusely and after she left we started searching for a good spot to camp.

There's a little road that heads down to the picnic area from the highway. I noticed that on the other side of the road there was some flat looking ground behind some trees. This is where all four of us are crammed tonight. Technically we are out of the camping-ban zone (I think). Well anyway that's my story and I'm sticking to it! 

The winds are supposed to reach 70 mph gusts by tonight, with a strong wind warning lasting until sometime tomorrow. That combined with a low of 36 degrees, well tonight will be interesting to say the least!

Thanks for reading!

Day 4- April 23rd

Hola!

Today was so long, it felt like two days put together! We started nice and early at the Boulder Oaks Campground, said goodbye to our trail friend Daniel who decided to leave the trail today :'(

Walking straight up another biiiiig hill, (this is starting to become a recurring morning theme of ours), we popped onto a very exposed ridge, taking in some awesome expansive views with some giant far away windmills, teasing us with air movement from afar that we were just not feeling... :p

It seems that our hiking style is to leave a little after everyone else, but then somehow pass many people in the first few hours of hiking, then "leapfrogging" for the rest of the day: (resting on and off at different times and locations than other hikers, so that you see each other multiples times a day)

A couple notable people that we see a lot are: 

Focus- (from Seattle) he started out with a small group of people but we somehow always tend to see him more than the others. (He got his trail name on te first day when his hiking buddies (Christy and Daniel) repeatedly told him to "Focus Charlie!"

Patrick- Has a very similar hiking pace as us, we tend to see this guy mainly at night and early mornings. 

Mike- just met him today, he's an older, very sun-exposed man, who doesn't wear much on the trail. Today I donated one of my bottles I sunscreen to him. (It's a weird brand that Claire says stinks) :p And I don't go through mine quickly since I'm taking protective clothing approach through the desert.

Orion- This guy is a character. We camped in the same area as him on the second night. He lives in Portland, Maine, and has the best trail laugh we've heard so far! Our second encounter was him catching up to us in the hot desert sun, BAREFOOT! To my shocked response he simply replied "I'm just trying it out"

Orion went on ahead of where we camped last night, and today on our first steep incline,we found him up on a cliff just off the trail, waking up at 10am or so (super late for a through hiker). He had hiked into the night and the only spot for him to camp was just a little smaller than his tiny tent! 

As the desert was heating up, we walked through a field of unexploded ordinances, I thought to myself "my grandpa is an expert on these, I wish I brought him along!" (Love you Papa, thanks for reading everyday)

Shortly after this picture we ran into Tommy and his awesome Poodle Charlie! He hiked with Claire for a bit (because this dog loves the ladies) and we were reminded of our dog Starlite for a brief moment:

We took small breaks all morning and kept moving, drinking enough water and snacking on some bars. By 2:00 (the hottest time of day) we HAD to find a nice shady spot for a siesta, but of course, as has happened once already, no shade for another hour! We finally found a nice spot where Claire and I laid out the Tyvek (cheap makeshift ground cloth for our tent, costing $7 instead of $80) and proceeded to eat about 8 "normal" servings of food from our pack. No joke people, we ate... (Claire pictured on her foam pad at the top of this entry)

After we ate half of our food, and laying around for an hour, we booked the last two miles down, (and then back up again), to Mount Laguna, making a new daily record at 16.77 miles! 

We had a beer and, (not surprisingly), more food and desert... (We hongry!)

Tonight we're stealth camping in the closed campground just outside the town.. Shhhhh! The free camprgeound is three miles down the road, but since we need to resupply in town here tomorrow, we weren't about to make this a 20 mile day... 

Tonight again, no rain fly. The stars are beautiful and the long day was perfect.

It's 9:07pm, waaaay past my bedtime! 

Thanks for reading!

Edit: after posting, and as I was falling asleep, I open my eyes for a second and I saw a nice long shooting star. A perfect way to end the night! 

Day 3- April 22nd

This morning we rolled out of Hauser Creek Canyon a little before 7:30, and instantly headed up a real big 4.5 mile hill. After some awesome scenery we descended upon Lake Morena Campground. And, (just as I promised yesterday), got down on an awesome breakfast burrito at the store:

Doesn't look like much, but trust me, best burrito around :)

We took advantage of the water fountain and a nice shady area under some trees to rest and recoup. I tried giving my phone a quick charge with the solar charger, but my cord doesn't like the USB port for some reason. 

Speaking of malfunctioning gear: yesterday we discovered that something had punctured the bottom of my backpack, then pierced our tent that was rolled up in the bottom of my pack, making 4 different holes. (Haven't checked the rain fly yet, as the weather has been so beautiful, so there might be a few holes there too). Nothing that a few pieces of duct tape can't fix! 

And last of some bad news: last night we also discovered that a piece on our camp stove was loose. I tried pressing it back together but when we turned it on a little propane leaked down the side (fiery propane). Not wanted to burn the campsite down, we borrowed a fellow hikers stove to make our rice and beans. There's a gear shop in Mount Laguna, 16.5 miles down the trail so I figure we'll buy another there. Luckily we have enough "dry food" to last until then. :)

Even though these things were a bummer, out here on the trail we are quickly letting go of troubles and thinking positively, moving smart and making good decisions, and listening to our bodies when they tell us they need rest or water. One could say we're "going with the flow".

Today was hotter than yesterday, with a very exposed toasty spot leaving Mount Laguna. The lightweight backpacking umbrellas are definitely saving our lives! These, in addition to our long sleeved sun-protecting clothing, allow us to walk all day instead of taking a longer 5 hour break as some others did at Lake Morena. 

It sure feels good to look back over a wide-open expanse, and not be able to see where you woke up in the morning. The feeling this constant forward-moving adventure gives me is quickly becoming my new favorite feeling.

A great view from way up above Lake Morena.

I'm so jealous, Claire saw her first snake of the trail today and I missed it! I definitely knew she encountered it by the way she shrieked, as it slithered less than two feet in front of her across our path. From her description and a little help from the Internet, I believe it was a Striped Racer. I'm still waiting to see a rattlesnake dang it! 

There are so many beautiful things to see out here, including strange and awesome rock formations:

"Grumpy Rock" -(I made that name up)

Wild green beans?:

And perfect little shaded areas, serving as our oasis(es?) during sometimes mile long stretches with no shade:

Claire had the brilliant idea to bring Berlinger foam roller on the trip, (pictured above), and I have been using it soooo much! Today we rolled into a sweet little campground with some picnic tables, and I used it to crack my back and roll out my shins, quads, ankles, thighs, and my neck!

It was about 5:30 when we rolled into our spot for the night. With an extremely hot day and our "matching" blisters getting worse, we decided to call it a day at 10.65 miles.

Tomorrow we will head out towards Mt. Laguna, 16.5 miles away. We may make it all the way or decide to split into two. The good thing is we only have to leave here with 2 liters of water instead of 6, taking almost 9 pounds out of each of our packs! 

Well it's 7:45pm here and the sunset glow is almost gone, which means it's past my bedtime! I love this way of life.

-Thanks for reading!

Day 2- April 21st

Today was hot hot HOT! Day 1 of our 18 miles stretch with no water, and we rolled out 13.1 of those bad boys today! That means only 4.9 tomorrow until we're eating ice cream and breakfast burritos on the porch of Lake Morena's general store! 

Funny story: All of yesterday people were telling us "watch out for rattles", "the rattles are out", "You'll see 10 a day!"  So naturally, all we wanted to do today was see some rattle snakes! Between 1 and 2 miles in, we saw a big group of people in one area, and were informed there was a big rattlesnake up ahead, and that everyone was waiting it out until in moved off path. After we arrived, a man named "Potential 178", (still trying to figure out what his trail name means), gave us the run-down on snakes. Here's a couple highlights:

1. Rattlers feel tremors in the ground from hikers, coil up, and then give you the warning rattle.

2. Rattlers can only strike once they are in the coiled position.

3. Rattlers can only strike the length of their body (no 5 foot snakes flying 15 ft through the air, whew!) 

4. 80% of rattle snake bites don't involve any venom. This is because they need 12-24 hours for the venom to refill. (Most learned rattles will save their venom for prey they intend to eat, not human's they are trying to avoid)

5. Baby rattlers however are the most dangerous because they haven't learned this yet, and when they feel threatened they will most likely use all their venom when striking. (I've also heard that baby rattlesnakes can't use their rattles until they grow bigger, meaning no warning rattle, but this has not been confirmed.)

So after Rattlesnakes 101, we headed down the path hoping to catch our first glimpse of the rattle but it had already moved on! We moved on as well, but didn't see a rattle all day! Better luck tomorrow... (I think Claire might not share my rattle enthusiasm, and could be just fine without seeing any at all :)

So, like I said earlier, today was a scorcher! Claire and I both left started out the morning with 6 liters of water each! Although that added 13.2 lbs of water to each of our packs, we're definitely glad we did! We took many short breaks throughout the day, and took a nice, leisurely pace. 

A lot people try to reach lake Morena (mile 20) on their first day. Many of these hikers over-exert themselves, use more water then they have due to extreme heat and their rapid pace, and then need to rest and recover for a few days, while all us "turtles" pass them by :) 

We saw many many beautiful flowers today, the desert is more gorgeous than either of us had imagined. This area is very hilly with many gigantic boulders strewn about, glittering with different minerals and quartz like stones. 

Although we saw no snakes today, we did see our share of poison oak. Towards the end of our hiking, around 5pm, Claire and I were on the lookout for a good campsite. Our feet were burning and we could feel a couple blisters coming in hot! We didn't see any sites for a few miles. Once we finally came across a small one on the side of the trail, and I had it in my mind that this would be home for the night, we were faced with a lot of this:

Deciding that we'd rather be sore for one day then rashy for a week, we continued on a few more miles to Hauser Creek (but not so much a creek because there's no water here), where we are now camping with 6 or 7 other hikers. (We started on a popular day). Helicopters periodically fly directly over the campsite, but after such a long day in the sun I'm sure we'll sleep sound with no problem! 

Some other pics from today:

Claire taking it all in.

Bees for days!

Tall Yucca plant almost twice my height! 

Thanks for reading! 

Aaaand they're off!!

It would be an understatement to say "today was a long day." Better yet: Today was an awesome, amazing, unreal, surreal, and a beautifully long day.

It started in Portland at 5:00am, where friend and former PCT thru-hiker Connor DeVane graciously took us to the airport in the early AM.

Taking a flight to San Fransico, and then another to San Diego, we then took two buses and one long trolley ride to get to Campo, CA, arriving just after 5pm. 12 hours of traveling, whew!! We met two other thru-hikers on the last bus (Russ and Jared).

After stopping for some camping fuel at the local store, we hiked the mere 1.4 miles down to the Mexican border and Southern Terminus of the PCT where we met another thru-hiker named Isaac and he took this awesome shot of us: 

We then turned around and hiked 2.3 miles north, past Campo, to the trails intersection with highway 94, where my friend good friend Alanna's mother (Susan) picked us up and took us to their awesome house in the town of Boulevard (20 minutes East). 

The sun was setting over the hills and we witnessed the almost-full moon rising over more hills behind us. Complemented with beautiful scenery and awesome Yucca cactus flower, our 4-mile 1st hiking-day ended perfectly.

Yucca flower. 

Sunset over the hills

Back at Alanna's house we caught up and met her 4 day old baby (Lucille Susan). And "Grandma" Susan cooked us an awesome meal of chicken, biscuits, mashed potatoes, gravy, and an awesome salad. 

We are so lucky that they invited us into their home, as well as treated us to our last home-cooked meal for awhile! 

Tomorrow we wake up early and get dropped off on highway 94, carrying 6 liters of water each, starting day one of two of an 18 mile waterless stretch that lies ahead!

Thanks for reading, stay tuned!