On the road again

We are leaving Hiker Heaven this morning. Ahead lies the Mojave Desert and a very sunny section of trail. We plan on stopping in the town of Mojave sometime this weekend. Fun stuff!

Community

Last night was a reunion. Gene and Charlie showed up sometime in the evening. We hadn't seen them since Idyllwild and they have been chasing us for about 200 miles!

We watched a few episodes of Planet Earth and drank lots of alcohol. Later we all talked about the challenges ahead. The Sierras are coming later this month and there is an unbelievable amount of snow out there. We strategized, but also pumped ourselves up. It has been an amazing psychological drain to contemplate the snow and it was awesome to talk it up with other hikers. I could feel solid community develop right as we were standing there.

This forming community reminded me of our community back home in Portland. I went to sleep last night thinking of them.

5 June ~ HIker Heaven!!!!

Hello m'dears! Goodness and I arrived this morning to Agua Dulce where we had a wonderful breakfast with Racheopod and were reunited with our Gnar. I am now sitting in what is appropriately named, Hiker Heaven. We will be taking a zero here tomorrow and enjoying the unbelievable hospitality! You walk up to this ranch and see all of these white tents set up outside with cots inside and many stations to meet all hiker needs. An array of clean clothing and sandals to choose from as your laundry is washed, a pile of movies for all to enjoy, and even a few 'private' sleeping spaces for couples. Goodness and I have scored the horse trailer! This space is the platform that you see above a pick-up truck bed and it is quite sweet. There are a row of hiker boxes to sift through for gear, a single wide trailer kitchen, community hair clippers, and even a sewing machine that I will be hitting by and by today! We spent last night about 2 miles away so today is a near-0 for us which gives us much time to rest. The first of the month was Gnar's 22nd birthday. I grabbed a pair of numeral candles and we sang near the top of Mt. Baden Powell over snow cones. I randomly and magically found an unopened bottle of Grenadine at the top, so we busted out our cook pots and mixed the snow on in! It was fantastic! Yum! Most of that day I spent in a meditative state through some loverly country. That evening, our Cardinals split for the Frog Detour. Gnar went up to scout it out and we went down to a roundabout trail that resembled a rock quarry. It was certainly rougher terrain than we were accustomed to thus far but reminded me greatly of the Sierras. We cowgirl slept at the river after a nice long descent.

The next detour day found us also in Sierra reminiscent territory as we climbed and climbed and climbed up to a sweet saddle. We also went out on a short jaunt to a formation called 'Devil's Chair' which was just a nice long rock jetty that looked out over a valley. The odd thing was that there was this cage around the entire thing of which Goodness felt was condescending. We later supposed that it was for the area laymen to feel safe out in the wild. We joined the PCT again that evening and were delighted. :) The following day was the 3rd and we awoke after more cowgirl camping out at a small empty boyscout camp. My first thoughts of the day were happy birthday wishes to my Aunt Carol and my old pal Dave Gehrke!! Hope your day was more than you wished! We slept next to a stream with Racheopod that night and I sang Bobby Gentry's Ode to Billie Joe as a lullaby per the date. Music has been central to my walking experience and the trail is the perfect place to memorize lyrics and poems. I will be printing out many more things that I want locked in my head. So if anyone has something wonderous in mind, send it my way! I wrote out the lyrics to the Siren's song, Go to Sleep Little Babe from O Brother Where Art Thou and now Gnar, Racheopod, and I have it memorized to sing at the gloaming tonight.

Tomorrow we are getting an Angelride to REI and a larger grocery store. I will attempt to write more catch-up entriage tomorrow to detail my adventures living in a castle with Racheopod.

5/31 Cold Windy Night

We climbed into the San Gabriel mountains yesterday. The elevation gain was 5000 feet over 15 miles. The temperature was balmy at the bottom and frigid at the top.

A ton of hikers camped at the top. It was the only water source in the entire stretch.  Water sources tend to clump hikers into groups. There were hikers we hasn't seen for a week, others we had never met before. The campfire is obligatory whenever a bunch of folks are camping in the same place. Sometime after dark Gnar wandered in. He had left the motel room several hours after us.

As the night grew darker the wind picked up and the fire grew higher. Outside of the fire ring the temperature was extremely cold.

At some point in the night, I realized that I wasn't sleeping due to the wind buffeting our tent in the most outrageous fashion. I became convinced that cowboy camping without a tent was he sleep solution.

I woke a, reluctant Zm and we stumbled out into the intense wind. After some comical fumbling we were able to reconfigure into cowboy mode. Now it was our sleeping bags that were being buffeted. It was not a good night of sleep.

This morning was a quick 4 mile walk for the hitch to Wrightwood. It was all business: stuffing our faces, getting mail, and buying food for the next 100 miles. I was able to score a ride back to the trail around six. A mile down the trail led us to our friends.

Tonight a legend was born. As we got to camp one of our friends was on the way back to the trailhead. He was convinced that he could hitch back to Wrightwood and bring back some pizza. I was skeptical as the highway was not busy at all. However, just before dark he returned with two large pizzas and a steak. We gorged ourselves on pizza while Gnar cooked the steak on a stick above the fire. The fellow that went out on the pizza run got his trail name that night. We called him 'Legend' due to his legendary pizza obtaining abilities.

Hunkering down again

We are at the intersection of the PCT and I-15 at Cajon Pass. Yesterday a cold front moved in, making us reluctant to climb into the San Gabriel mountains. We decided that the best option was to get a room at the hiker friendly Best Western and start the climb tomorrow morning.

It has been a long time since the last journal. The problem has been people. We are surrounded by awesome folks. Nights have been full of campfires and interaction, leaving little time for writing. As I write this I am forgoing more of this camaraderie in our motel room.

I will try and sum up the last chunk of time. We have been traveling with our friends, Racheopod and Gnar, both of which have been mentioned previously. It has been difficult to part ways with them, and it may become more difficult as the shared miles accumulate. We all hike at different paces. Racheopod is up early and hikes fast. Yesterday we didn't even see her until we pulled into the campsite she had selected for us all. Gnar likes to build fires and stay up late. His pace is the fastest and he catches up with Zm and I even though he leaves camp at least an hour after we do.

Our stay at Big Bear was brief. At that point I had only been back on the trail for 20 miles and neither of us were interested in a town stay. Quick in and quick out to get food and fuel.

The next few days were a big trial period for my achilles. I started out super slow. So slow that my legs were sore because I wasn't used to the pace. But over time I was slowly able to build up speed. After sixty miles I was able to reach a functional hiking speed when we were reunited with Racheopod and Gnar at Deep Creek Hot Springs. We hadn't seen them since Big Bear when they zoomed ahead.

Deep Creek is a well known hiker hotspot. There were about 10 hikers there when we showed up in the evening. Needless to say, good times were had. The hot springs are fantastic at night but quite an oven by day. We stayed for about 24 hours, leaving in the early evening after the heat had passed.

As the days have rolled on, my foot has continually improved. I am now able to walk at full speed. The injury hasn't completely gone away but I don't think that my hike is at risk anymore.

I wish I could say more. Maybe a few blurbs...

-- snow in the sierras is intense. We will get there early and might have to sit for a while
-- last night we were sleeping under the stars and had to put up the tent at four in the morning when it starting raining.
-- yesterday we got a ton of free food out of some Spanish speaking locals at a picnic area. People like to give you stuff when they find out what you are doing.
--- we ate at McDonald's today. The only one on the trail. Then a Del Taco. Only fast food and convenience store food here.

That's it. Tomorrow we climb into the San Gabriels. Wrightwood on Tuesday and Aqua Dulce sometime next weekend. I will try to journal more in the days to come.

Somewhat recovered

I am hiking with Zm again. My foot problems are not fully solved but they are back to the level that they were at when I first started noticing. I am hoping a slower pace will keep me on the trail. We are off!

Big Bear City

Hello!  Zm here, finally!!  I found my Goodness on the trail about 100 miles away in 4 days time and things have been wonderful.  Racheopod and I had our own grand adventure through some very diverse terrain.  There were a few moments of heated weather, but predominantly we had more wind and it was too cold to sit in the shade.  Before the trek to Camp Goodness, she and I and Grizzly Jones did a 27+ mile slackpack which was absolutely lovely. Grizzly Jones slept most of that day but got excited with us when we ended up dropping down to a road on accident from a poorly marked trail junction. We stopped to pick up some trash, per usual, when low and behold we found Bananagrams!!!! A little more searching by Racheopod and she'd found the banana bag too!!! Such magic!! I'll tell more of my adventures soon... now it is time to bust back up to the trail! Taking a zero day at some hot springs in two days. Next stop is Wrightwood in 5 days or so. :)