The Adventures of...: Days 17-18

Day 17, 11 miles, endpoint PCT mile 277

We left the ski resort town of Big Bear Lake and were shuttled 20 minutes up to the trailhead by the hostel owner Grayson. After hiking about 100 feet, Josh realized he was missing a ziplock bag with supplies--his headlamp, a very small multi-tool, and a couple of toiletry items. We both searched our packs, the trail, and the trailhead, but had no luck. That meant it was in one of two places: the hostel, or our bounce bucket that we dropped off at the post office that morning. We had to go back to Big Bear Lake.

We stuck our thumbs out and began our attempt to hitch back into town. After about 10 minutes, a guy across the street jumped out of a VW van, said he was shuttling hikers and could give us a ride back to town. We hurried over and were introduced to Rock Ocean, a 34 year old former professional zamboni driver for the NHL's Tampa Bay Lightening, who now spends his time surfing, hiking, and operating a one-man shuttle business. He planned to follow the hikers north over the course of the summer, living out of his pop-top Westie which had a small kitchen and living space. The ceiling of the van had three dimensional maps of the Great Smokey Mountains. The van was immaculate; it was obvious Rock took excellent care of it.

Rock drove us back down to the hostel, where a quick trip to the post office revealed the missing item was in the bounce bucket all along (phew). Rock drove us and a few other hikers back up to the trailhead, his long hair flowing in the air from his open window. He drank tea from a pint glass as he drove.

For the second time today we began hiking, two hours later than before. I started in shorts, and we both contemplated sunscreen. However, a few hours in, the weather took a turn and it became quite cold. The snow started as small, wispy flakes barely bigger than grains of salt. But it grew in size and scale; soon the snow was coming down in droves and we were in a full-on winter wonderland. We put our rain pants and pack covers on and marveled at the scenery. It was absolutely beautiful. It is hard to believe it was only a couple of days ago that we had temperatures over 100 degrees in the shade.

Josh and I made camp in the snow, and Josh ran up a neighboring hill to take photos at the top of Bertha Peak. Dinner tonight was fresh veggies, hummus and blueberries from the Big Bear Lake grocery store, which was a nice change. We drank hot chocolate in the tent and called it a night. There is a slight chance of more snow overnight; it will be interesting to see what we wake up to in the morning!

The ride.

Hostel chill in'. - Brady H on the photo. Rock on the far left.

Trail views... and new terrain.

We thought this would be all the snow we would see so we hurried to take a picture.

Carla loving the PCT in winter wonderland.

Trail views.

Sweet pants.

Trail views.

Snow camp.

Day 18, 24 miles, endpoint PCT mile 301

When we woke up we found that no new snow had fallen. The snow from yesterday was still there, however, and formed a crunchy white layer over everything. The air was icy, and the rainfly was covered in frost. For the first time, I hiked in my wool leggings under my rain pants and my wool beanie on my head. It took a few hours, but the snow on the ground slowly dissipated as the sun came up and we dropped in elevation. Eventually, all that was left were huge water droplets melting off the branches above.

We had a long, gradual descent today. We left the higher elevation mountains, entered yet another burn zone, and followed a large creek through a twisting, rocky canyon. We hit mile 300, another milestone.

The recommended date for starting the Sierra section (around mile 700) is June 9th. We would like to be there by June 2nd so we can beat "the herd" and go slow through that area (the Sierras are considered by many to be the PCT highlight, so we want to take our time and really enjoy it). What this means is we need to slow down or we will get to the Sierras too soon (when there is still too much snow on the ground). We will probably try to take some days off and do some shorter days to pace ourselves. The Sierras always seemed so far away, but now they are starting to feel much, much closer.

Tomorrow we will roll by a "clothing optional" hot springs, which just sounds too good to pass up.