Done with PCT... for now

I will probably update this blog someday.

June 17th Kearsarge lakes to bishop

July 16th creek to Kearsarge lakes

July 15th Guitar Lake to creek

June 14th Whitney

June 14th 753 to guitar lake

June 13th death canyon creek to 753

June 12th 710 to death canyon creek

June 11th Kennedy medows to 710

Spent another morning chilling on the porch. I had planned to zero here and let the folks I had been hiking with before I 15 catch up but that was before some of the other hikers pointed out we could make it to Whitney with a full moon. It would require doing a few big days again but just sounded so great that I had to go. 
That meant I had to stop procrastinating and grab my packages. The one I mailed from Agua dulce was exactly as expected. The new shoes were definitely needed since my old ones had no tad left and the left shoe had lost all cushioning since walker pass. The other package was the bear vault that Grommet sent. It was filled with all kinds of goodies. I couldn't find a good way to get the vault in my pack, it was either weighting heavily on one side of the pack or digging into my spine. I decided to just strap it onto the top and see how that goes.

I decided to stick around for the spaghetti dinner that was going to be served the hike. While I was waiting Jay showed up. He decided to get back in the trail and hike instead of sit at home and drink. I highly approve. I told him about my Whitney plan and he wanted to give it a shot. We hiked 7 miles to a nice camp spot and called it a day.

June 10th kern to Kennedy medows

Short 3 mile hike along the kern to Kennedy medows. It was a great morning. Amazing how much happier I was hiking when I had easy access to water, the area wasn't a desolate burned desert, and there was a town at the end.

Kennedy medows was fantastic. There were about 20 hikers there chilling on the porch if the store waiting for them to open up and start making breakfast. I'm not sure if it's a PCT tradition or if it's just the class of 2014, but whenever a hiker makes it to one of these big milestones where other hikers are gathered the ones there welcome the new comers with a round of applause. It's great. There was some nice camp spots in the first behind the store where I stashed my stuff then I spent the rest of the day hanging out on the porch of the store catching up with the other hikers.

June 9th 673 to kern river

I left my food bag out of my tent last night, which was a bad idea. The ants git in and got all over my cheese. Not a big deal since I had more than enough food but I haven't had cheese in a while since the desert is so hot.
I had to hike 8 miles on a half litre of water since I dry camped last night without planning to. It wasn't bad since it was almost all downhill. When I got to the water real time, who I had hiked with out of little bear spring, was sitting there relaxing. He had an extra day to waste while waiting for a package at Kennedy medows so he was going to take it easy. Which meant he was doing a 20 mile day to the kern river. I wasn't planning on going that far but there was a huge burned area with no water or places to camp so I ended up going there also. We split up at lunch time since he didn't think it was that hot, and it wasn't while there were trees. But I could see the burnt area and decided to wait. Turns out I was right. The burnt area sucked. It was an easy 10 mile downhill but with no shade and water it was not pleasant. I was definitely ready to be done with the desert after that. I made it to the river which was rather disappointing. The area that was near the trail for water was a beaver pool. Very gross. But I was out of water so I double treated a litre and set up camp. I didn't see real time so I assumed he just did the 3 extra miles to Kennedy medows.

June 8th 657 to 673

A beautiful morning. Got up to watch the sunrise and hiked to the next water source. Water in this stretch isn't too bad about every 10 miles. Which is great since I lost 3 litres of carrying capacity. My 2 and 1 litre water bottles both sprung leaks right before walker pass. Not a big deal since I had an extra 2 litre bottle but if the other 1 litre breaks I won't be able to use my sawyer filter.
The hike was a nice change almost the whole day was spent under trees. It still got really hot mid day but with all the shade and trees it wasn't that bad. I had planned to hike 24 miles to a water source but on my way there I saw such a great camping spot that I had to stop. It was on a ledge with a perfect view of the valley below. Unfortunately there were ants. Which meant I was in my tent instead of enjoying the scenery.

June 7th walker pass to 657

We dilly dallied in the morning and eventually got back up to walker pass with the supplies I needed to make it to Kennedy medows. I waited at walker pass for the heat if the day to pass then hiked 5 miles. There was a nice camp spot with a great view of both sunset and sunrise so I stayed.

June 5th and 6th

Had a good time fishing the kern river with dad and dan. Didn't catch anything but I don't like fish anyway. I did start to get the hang of fly casting at least.

June 4th bird spring pass road to walker pass

Nothing like a morning hike up a mountain to get you going. Luckily for me there was a fully stocked water cache at the road so I was able to drink a few litres before I started so I could carry less up the hill. The view from the top was more of the same and in ready for the desert to be over. I hiked until lunch time as usual and found a shady spot to rest in. I picked a bad spot, I should have kept going when I saw the cow shit everywhere. The shade was nice but I got bit by a tick while I was resting. I didn't notice it since I was sleeping in some pointy leaves and just thought it was another leaf prick. Either way I burned the little fucker. After that I just and hiked to the campground I was meeting dad at. He showed up eventually, ahead of schedule but since I had no signal since Tehachapi we did rather well. They wanted to go to a campground and spend the night there. I was like nope I need a shower and bed. You guys go play at camping I'll be sleeping on a mattress tonight.

June 3rd 605 to bird spring pass rd

Tried getting up before the sun since it was supposed to be a really hot dry stretch so I wanted to get as many miles in as I could. That didn't work cause it was cold, stupid desert can't make up its mind.
I eventually made it to the spring and filled up enough water to make it through the next 12 mile stretch without water. The next water source was a 3.4 mile off trail hike where I would miss 2 miles of the PCT. When I got to the detour it was a no brainer, there was no shade anywhere in sight except for that spring. The hike down to the spring started out fun with 2 boulder scrambles that were similar to the mahoosuc notch. The spring was flowing nicely in a fenced off area, but the shade was lacking. There was barely enough room for 6 and there was about 15 people there by the time I left. We got nice and cozy.

I left around 330 and it was still blazing hot. The hike sucked. The first few miles when I got back to the trail was in deep sand. It then went uphill while still in deep sand. Then I get to the top and the deep sand is broken up only because the trail went washboard. The washboard was about 10 feet apart so you had to walk up and down each little hill and this went on for miles. I eventually reached a road and looked up at a 2000 ft climb and called it a day. The only fun part of that stretch was when I walked right past a Mojave green rattlesnake. The most poisonous and aggressive of all.

June 2nd Golden oaks to mi 605

Woke up to some cows drinking water straight from the spring. Kinda gross. I filtered my water regardless of where is from but still not pleasant to see. They were cute cows, 3 female 1 male and 2 calves. There was another 16+ miles hike to the next water source so my pack was heavy again. I made it 12 miles to some shade before it got to hot and I had to rest.

The next water source was a little nicer, still signs of cows everywhere but at least the springs source was fenced off. I cooked dinner at the spring like I have been over the last few days. It's really the only way to do it, otherwise you have to carry an extra litre. I could have done that since for the first time in days the next water source was only 10 miles away. I wasn't going to make it there today. I just hiked until the sunset and found a nice flat spot.

June 1st Tehachapi to golden oaks spring

Had a nice relaxing day in town. The hot tub at the hotel really is a huge difference maker. I decided I'm getting bored with the desert hiking and I'm going to skip 8 miles by hitching to highway 58 instead of the road I came in on. It also gave me more time to relax in the hotel and I didn't get to the trail till around 11. The hiking was fairly easy and I made good time for a town day.  I was up in some hills for most of the day and it was much cooler. I saw my first deer on the trail, a couple young bucks just sprouting their antlers.  I hiked to the first water source 18 miles from town and called it a day.

May 31st 554 to tahachapi

Had a great sleep with the windmills going. Got a cool sunrise photo of then also. I had a short easy hike into town where I resupplied and did town chores. The supermarket in town didn't have any good chocolate milk, but they had some strange flavors, root beer and peanut butter chocolate, and I decided to try the root beer. It was ok but I think it would have been much better with whole milk instead of the 1%. It ended up tasting like a watered down root beer float.

May 30 528 to 554

Long, hot, dry day. There was only two shady spots until noon, the windmills and the little oak tree by the stream I stopped at for lunch. The stream wasn't even cool, the water in it must have been 80. Still it was water and therefore amazing since it was the only water in that 40 miles stretch.
The afternoon was a bit better since we climbed back up into mountains. Even if it was still dry at least we had shade. On my way up the mountain I took a break under a shade tree and put my hiking shirt on one of the pct indicator signs to dry. Bad idea. Those signs are made of fiberglass and my shirt got covered in it. I didn't notice until I put my shirt and pack on. At which point all the fiberglass particles started to dig into my back. Not pleasant at all.

I was planning on hiking to the road to Tehachapi but I stayed at the creek later than planned since it was so hot. So at nightfall I reached another windmill farm and thought it might be nice to sleep with the white noise of the windmill in the background. So I camped there.

May 29 Boquet canyon road to mile 528

What a day. Got up with the sun as usual and badass comes strolling by. It seems she wasn't able to take a zero at the Saufleys and hiked to the water cache at the road. She was hiking with a guy who had hiked the trail before and her suggested we take a short cut to the Andersons.
The Andersons is another trail angel hostel but the cater more to the party crowd. I got talked into going since they cook breakfast there and we might make it if we take the short cut. I made it just after breakfast. Mrs Anderson was kind enough to cook us up some pancakes anyway. Their place was very cool. The camping was in these tree groves in their backyard which almost gave you a separate room feel.
I didn't stay, Mrs Anderson was doing a water cache resupply ruin and offered to drive me 10 miles down the detour road to a restaurant. I grabbed lunch there and  another hitch to hikertown for the rest of the detour. The detour was for a bad fire that happened last year.
Hikertown is an interesting place it looks like an old west town from the movies but it's hiker themed. Also there were puppies.
I stayed at Hikertown until 5 before hiking on. The next stretch was a long desert floor hike along the Los Angeles aqueduct. Even though we were hiking the aqueduct there was no water available for almost 30 miles. Which is why everyone night hikes out of Hikertown. The hike was easy enough since we were road walking again so I made really good time.

May 28 hiker haven to boquet canyon road

The plan for the day is to take a zero and get everything organized for the Sierras. There is a twice daily shuttle down to LA to hit the supermarkets and rei. Both shuttles hold 14 ppl and were completely full, I had signed up for the morning one yesterday so I was fine but that just goes to show how crowded the place is.

I got a hold of a friend from the AT, Grommet,  who was hiking the PCT but had to get off due to injury and asked if I could use her bear vault for the Sierras. I was waiting to see if the Ursack would be approved since it's a sack and only weights 8 oz instead of 3 pounds, but the government is slow and it hasn't been approved yet. Luckily for me Grommet said yes which just goes to show how awesome the trail community is out here. Think about how you would react in normal life if a guy you only met for two days asked to borrowed a $60 piece of equipment for two months.

With that taken care of all I had to do was plan how I was going to resupply. There isn't really a town resupply option in the Sierra so you have to do mail drops.  I wanted to do Kennedy medows and the Muir trail ranch. I got talked into doing my 2nd resupply at the town of Independence. The hike to independence is a birch since you have to hike a pass but it is supposed to be very pretty and worth it. Plus it costs $50 to pick up a package from the ranch and you are bound to spend more money once you get there.

After getting all my supplies setup and a new pair of shoes Mrs Saufley helped me get the packages mailed. While we were working on it she brought up a funny song about taco bell, pizza Hut, combination taco bell pizza Hut. Then proceeded to get blast it over their speakers and dance to it. All the whole causing every hiker there to now have this horrible song stuck in our heads forever. Thanks Mrs Saufley I'll find a way to repay you someday.

Having gotten everything done I needed to do I decided to hike on instead of taking the zero. There was still 200 miles to go to get to lake Isabella by next Wednesday. So I hiked 10 miles and called it a day.

May 27 north ranger station to hiker haven

Another nice easy day today. Just got 18 miles to the town of Agua dulce.  The first 10 miles were soy easy and uneventful that I don't really recall them. I made it to a KOA at that point and they sold ice cream, had a pool and hot tub, could get pizza delivered and we could stay for only 10$. I was very tempted and after deliberating until 12 I decided that I needed to get to town and get set up for the Sierra.
So I set out in the desert during the hottest part of the day just to prove a point. I like the heat, I really do, but that would have been too much for me if there wasn't a nice little breeze that would show up every once in a while. On the way to town there was a neat state park with some strange rock formations.

Once I got to town I went straight to the supermarket and bought 4 different types of fruit. They didn't have any good chocolate milk so I had to settle for a root beer float.

Some local trail angels have a hostel setup in town called hiker haven. It lives up to it's name. There must have been 30 hikers there when I arrived. The atmosphere was great and the owners, the Saufleys, were extremely nice. They have cots setup for the hikers to use almost all of them are in the west side of the property and clumped together. I got lucky since I arrived after the heat when most of the previous days hikers were starting out I got a pick of the cots, mine was situated away from all the others on a hill so I had some quite.

May 26 sulphur spring to north ranger station

We got up early because badass was feeling antsy after cutting the hike short by 3 hours yesterday. We had heard that the first few miles of poodle dog brush, now known as poodle dog shit, was "mostly avoidable" and Tank, badass, and I decided to try it. I think the description was very accurate. I was able to avoid all of it except one 10 yard stretch where I missed a side trail that skipped it. I was careful though and only touched it with my pant legs and poles. Once I got past that part the brush wasn't an issue, it was all over but not encroaching on the trail. I was glad I hiked that stretch as there were some great views which the guys who took the road walk missed.

I think this part was the epitome of the smell of the desert. There were so many flowers in bloom and the poodle dog shit brush smells pleasant as long as you ignore the fact that it wants to kill you.

The next stretch of trail was not described as even mostly avoidable we were just told don't even try just take there detour. The detour was a 17.5 mile road walk with no water and almost all uphill. I decided to wait out the heat of the day before tackling it.

The climb was a joke, since it was graded for cars it never got difficult. I was surprised by how nice the road walk turned out to be. Without the stress of worrying about the poodle dog shit brush, the quality of the trail, or cars I could just hike and enjoy the view. After about 11 miles of asphalt the road turned into dirt but it was still much easier to hike than the trail so I just stuck with it until I hit the camp. I ended up hiking until 10pm but my legs felt great and I know I could do a 30 mile day on the trail, not just on a road walk.

May 25 little Jimmie spring to sulphur spring

Turns out 20 hikers showed up last night not 10. Badass, Tank, Real time, Stomper another Canadian, and I all hiked out early in the morning planning in making it to at least sulphur spring if not further.

Stomper had already hiked the PCT twice and said he remembers the next hill being worse than baden-powell. It wasn't. I think the last time he did it he had hiked out after baden-powell in b the same day.

After we got off the hill our first detour of the day occurred. This one was to protect some endangered frogs. There were two options, a 20 mile hike that was reportedly in really bad shape since the trails it followed were never designed to have the amount of traffic the PCT was sending over them or a 3 mile road walk along the "dangerous" highway 2. I didn't find out how dangerous it was cause I got a hitch as soon as I reached the road.

The hike today was only difficult due to the heat. Luckily for me I got trail magic twice today. Unluckily for the trail angle someone stole his bear can with the trail magic in it. Tank was grabbing a coke out of the can when someone asked him if it was his, Tank said no so the guy took the can. Later on at a different tail magic stash there was a note asking if anyone had seen his can. The rest of the hike was uneventful but we were starting to reach the area where the poodle dog brush was reportedly really bad. We ended up staying at sulphur spring even though we all felt we could keep going just to avoid the brush at twilight.