Luxury of Time - Tuesday, April 29

Bummer, dude.

We woke this morning, hoping the restorative power of sleep would bring new life to Sally's foot. Not to be. Her first step from the tent this morning was a pain induced wincing one. As we packed up in the dark by headlamp we knew we were not going on today. In the 100' walk back to the trail from our campsite it was confirmed. Every step brought sharp pain to Sally's left foot. At the trail a left turn would take us north up the PCT, a right turn would lead us south back down the steps we had taken the day before. To turn left meant 40 miles of trail before the next services at Big Bear City and irresponsible behavior. A right turn meant backtracking 11 miles to Whitewater Preserve, a doctor and hopefully a solution to the pain. Neither of us wanted to retrace our steps of the day before, but going on put us in danger of being stranded multiple miles from a trailhead, waterless and dependent on outside help to extricate ourselves. So with determination to do the right thing we began the walk back down the trail we had traversed the day before.
We knew our trip wasn't over. We would get out, have a doctor look at it, do the necessary treatments and PT to get it healthy and continue on. The one luxury we have is time. We can wait for it to heal, even a week or two, and then continue on. At least this is the attitude and hope we held as we dejectedly headed south on the trail we wanted to be going north on.

One thing about going south on the PCT is that you meet everyone going north. We passed well over 30 people heading north today as we hobbled south. We saw some familiar faces but mostly new ones. There were vigorous people proudly moving north and eager to talk about their tremendous daily milage, reserved people who shared little of themselves, young people rich with excitement to be out in the wild but all had that bright glow of excitement in their eyes, happy to be pursuing a huge challenge and fulfilling a dream.

When we gained the ridge we had descended the day before. Here we acquired cell service and texted Sue to see if she could pick us up. She said of course and we set 4 pm as the pickup time, giving us lots of leeway to get there at a slow pace.

We expected to run into Far Out and Crotalus as they headed north . . . and we did, about noon. They were about a mile apart, with Far Out in the lead. Crotalus' ankle was still very painful. Far Out was doing okay. We talked with each for a while, catching up on their adventures and then bid each goodbye, hoping it was not for the last time but fearing it was.

We made the trailhead about 2:30 and rested in the shade of the picnic area while we waited for Sue. She arrived about 3:30 and we headed for town.

As soon as we had cell service we used the iPhone to search for sports medicine doctors in the Palm Springs area. We found a podiatrist in a sports medicine clinic and called for an appointment. Trail Magic was working for us as the first doctor we called worked us into a 8:20 am appointment the next morning. We scoured the Blue Cross website to make sure he was in network, which he was. A stop at the 99¢ store for some groceries, pop and vegies and we were back where we started three days earlier.
Sue had dinner cooking in the crock pot after which we played a game of pinochle. Sally and Sue went swimming in the pool at 9:30 while I laid down to watch some Neil Degrasse Tyson explain how the universe works on Netflix on my iPad.

As I closed my eyes I wondered what the fate of our grand adventure would be. A serious injury would perhaps end our walk and cause us to change activities. A moderate injury, taking a few weeks to heal, would see me hiking alone a couple hundred miles while Sally hung with her sister after which she would rejoin me to continue on. The best case scenario would be some doctor magic with a couple days of rest and then back on the trail. By mid morning we would know our fate.