Solo-Thursday, April 24

We have seen many PCT hikers taking a few days in a row off to let injuries heal. Injuries range from large and bloody blisters to strained liniments and tendons from overuse. We have now joined that club.

Sally's left foot has been quite painful the past three days. She has had to hike about 17 miles on it to get to Palm Springs and her sister's house, but now that we are here we will hang out until some healing occurs before we venture out again. We suspect hiking in her sandals, which offer minimal support, caused the overuse injury. We were switching between her Keen boots and her Teva Sandals on the trail to minimize blisters caused by her boots. But, regardless the cause we will give her feet a rest and try to find a better fitting shoe in Palm Springs before heading out.

Last spring a large wild fire burned across a 15.4 mile section of the PCT, from milepost 162.6 to 178, closing that section of the trail. The only workaround requires walking a heavily traveled narrow winding road or crossing private property, so except for the purists who are trying to walk every step from Mexico to Canada most hikers are hitching a ride around the closed area from the Paradise Valley Cafe to the small mountain community of Idyllwild. From Idyllwild one must hike a side trail (2.7 miles and 1800' of elevation gain) back to the PCT at milepost 178. This puts the hiker on the ridge of Mt. San Jacinto at about 8500'. For the next 13 miles the trail winds along near this elevation before plunging 8000' down to Interstate 10 just a few miles west of Palm Springs.

Before her injury Sally was considering skipping this section due to the long decent and the possible overuse injury she might inflict on her artificial knee. So when the foot pain appeared skipping this section became a certainty. But, while she nurses her foot back to health and visits with her sister she insisted that I hike the section. No complaints were heard uttering from me, so this morning she drove me the hour and 15 minutes to Idyllwild to hike the 32 miles across Mt. San Jacinto, Fuller Ridge and down to Interstate 10.
Our hiking companions Backup and Event Horizon were staying in Idyllwild so it worked well that we could pick them up in town and deliver them to the trailhead a few miles out of town in Sue's car at the same time.
Sally dropped the three of us off about 8:30 and we hiked together for the next 14 miles through tall timber of Lodge Pole and Jeffrey Pines, firs and protruding granite very reminiscent of the Yosemite area. A very welcome change from the previous 150 miles of chaparral desert hiking. The temperatures were very cool, in the 50's which made for excellent hiking. 8000' below us in Palm Springs the temperature hovered in the mid 90's.
I really enjoyed hiking with Backup and Horizon. They are both very kind, resourceful and sharp kids. Horizon and I share a scouting background, both Eagle Scouts, both in Explorer Search and Rescue and Horizon even tried to apply to be on staff at Sheppard during our efforts to revive the program a few years ago. He is a solid, steady soul. Backup tried the PCT in 2012 but had to quit after about 400 miles due to injuries. This year she is applying all she learned on that attempt to guarantee her success. She is starting at a slower pace, paying close attention to pains and potential repetitive use injuries and taking zero days to let muscle and sinew heal and toughen. She is fun to talk with, has a great sense of humor, is kind and considerate. Not to mention very smart. I will miss hiking with them as they pull ahead of us in the coming days.
At mile 14 I left Backup and Horizon. They were to hike another two miles and then set up camp. I needed to make about another 6 miles to get closer to my 10:00am scheduled pickup by Sally at the bottom of the descent the next day. So I hiked another 6 miles, putting me within 12 miles of the pickup at Snow Creek Road. I pulled out my earbuds and listened to an audiobook for the rest of the descent.
As I descended I realized I was on perhaps the worst conceived and most poorly maintained trail in the history of trails. It wound all over the mountainside barely dropping and oftentimes climbing instead of descending. Switchbacks a mile long with little elevation change made me feel like I was in that "Ok Go" video with the treadmills-doing lots of walking and getting nowhere. The trail had not been brushed and was therefore overgrown with spiny desert bushes. I had to put on long pants to stop the laceration of my legs. And often the trail tread disappeared and I was sidehilling. Regardless, I reached a spot to camp 20 miles from my start of the day and 12 miles from my pickup point about 6:30, laid out my Tyvek ground tarp, munched a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for dinner, slithered into the sleeping bag I had borrowed from Far Out and called it a day. I listened to my book for another hour as the sun set, then drifted off to sleep.