Monthly Archives: April 2015

Wrightwood is a small town, not too far from San Bernardino and LA. It has the reputation of being the most hiker friendly town and it has certainly lived up to it’s name. We met up with Cameron at the hardware store, which is in the middle of town, and the three of us headed … Continue reading »

(I wrote this post a while ago but for some reason it is not syncing with my phone so I cannot add pictures at this time. I will try to fix this later if possible, but I don’t know if it will work.) I left Big Bear City with Horizon and Merkel. Captain Deadweight decided … Continue reading »

Its been a while since I’ve been able to write and a lot has happened. I can only cover the highlights now, with a lot of pictures. So here’s the recap: immediately after we left Wrightwood, we climbed up Mt. Baden-powell. There was a lot of fog in the valleys which was stunning. We climbed … Continue reading »

It’s been a while since I’ve been able to update my blog and some memories are already getting a bit confused so the accuracy of the following timeline is not very high. After leaving Mission Creek, the terrain became less interesting; we were mostly hiking through moderately sized hills that were covered with small scrub but … Continue reading »

          Immediately after Snow Creek, we had to cross a wide, hot valley then pass under I-10. Knowing how hot it got during the day, we decided to do this stretch early in the morning, so we set the alarm clocks for 4:30 am! We left Tracker and Lance’s place at … Continue reading »

In the morning, Merkel, Horizon and I had just 8 miles to our destination, our shortest day yet. But we had a lot of switchbacks to do to get down the hillside. As we descended, the temperature started to soar and when we got to Snow Creek by midmorning it was already in the 80s. … Continue reading »

We left Idyllwild (and Infrared) in the mid-afternoon, after having ice cream for lunch. The four of us, Horizon, Merkel, Captain Dead weight, and myself, walked through town and eventually reached a trail that would connect us back to the PCT. It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon and there were a lot of people out … Continue reading »

After leaving our lovely campsite by the creek, we quickly started gaining elevation and soon entered a region of true desert. The lush trees gave way to scrub oaks and then just cactus and dried grasses. Hiking early in the morning is the best. Not only is the sun light soft and golden, there are … Continue reading »

I woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of rain hitting my tarp. We had seen on the weather report that there was a 90% chance of rain, we everyone set up their tents/tarps before going to bed and we were all glad we did. It rained quite hard for a … Continue reading »

After getting a ride from Julian back to the trail, Eric and I hung out in the shade for a while, waiting for Dead weight, Merkel, and Pre-meta to catch up (they were in town, eating pie). A guy we had seen the previous night came up, looking beat. He said his buddy had to … Continue reading »

I awoke in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and noticed that the moon, which was near full when we set up camp, was obscured in a strange way. In the morning I thought I was imagining it until we saw a hiker who asked if we saw the lunar eclipse that … Continue reading »

With the anticipation of starting the PCT, I didn’t get much sleep on April 2 so it was good that we decided not to get up too early. By the time Jacob and I picked up Eric and drove the hour to the start of the trail, it was 9 am. There was a group … Continue reading »

With just hours to go before starting, emotions are running high here. I’m excited, nervous, a bit anxious, and ready for it to be here. With my bag completely packed, including five days of food and four liters of water, my backpack weighs 28.5 pounds. That is just under my personal limit of 30 pounds … Continue reading »