Crap sleep! Air conditioning and Jim’s snoring (4 shared the double room) kept me awake most of the night. Never mind. Used up all the valuable time in the motel until checkout time at 11am. Resupplied and went into town for lunch before Sandra gave us a lift back to the trail-head. Still beautiful weather, forecast for the next few days is very warm. Back on the trail by 2pm, we only did 10kms before finding a gorgeous campsite by a creek in the deep forest. Who walks past such an opportunity? Dinner, plenty of time for unwinding before hanging the bear bag and going to bed.
A 16km gentle climb followed next day taking us out into the open and past huge rock formations with fantastic views. The thick lush forest had given way to less dense pines. This meant less shade and hotter temps. The forecast had been for 104 degrees F (40 Celsius) and so it seemed as we climbed. We passed above gorgeous alpine lakes, we wondered why the trail avoided them, but the views of the surrounding area were lovely. Along the tops we walked until finally deciding to go a kilometer off trail to camp by another lake. Wow! Warm swim, lovely camping and wee fire to enjoy and keep the Mozzies away.
Most of the next day was spent sidling along ridges not really gaining or losing much altitude. The forest is definitely thinner with large meadows, lots of snow melt seasonal creeks and plenty of stunning views. We managed to do our 20 Miles again and camped by another creek. Nice sunny spot, an early enough finish to the day. We seem to be able to do our kilometers quick enough to finish walking before 6pm. Nice!
Strange, super cold overnight. Actually zipped up my sleeping bag. Breakfast and packed early, 15 Miles (24kms) to the trail head and our exit for resupply in Etna. The trail rushed by, an early lunch with coffee by a creek and so after we found ourselves at the main road. A lucky coincidence found us in a car 5 minutes after arriving and 30 minutes later we’re in Etna having lunch. May take a zero day tomorrow if possible…….let’s see what happens.
Up early and a treat to have a picnic table to sit at on the trail. What a beautiful place to have jumped to. No tent fly required, super warm, forest and rivers – no worries about access to water like in the Southern Californian desert. We left early and spent the entire day in beautiful mature forest, lots of green undergrowth likely an outcome of the huge snow and rains – not complaining though, very nice to walk under the canopy on a hot sunny day. Along with the warmer temps and wetter conditions are the little beasties. We’d sprayed the tent with some bug spray which seemed to keep them at bay.
Apart from beasties, this is an area we need to be more on the look out for ticks, some of which carry Limes Disease which apparently is pretty nasty. We met a hiker, who although wore long trousers got a tick anyway on his arm. Had to get it surgically removed and then was on antibiotics for a week. This four day stretch would include some snow again. We had a lovely morning on the 2nd day, 16kms by lunch time. Lost Grant who had carried on past an intersection with a forestry road which we would take as an alternative to the snow filled trail. The snow in places had 7 meter high snow banks – I don’t understand how this snow is staying with temps of 28 degrees Celsius in the shade. It was so hot in the sunshine and a battle to gain a footing in the slush – it all became a bit of a mission.
Deep snow banks, hot weather…
We’d eventually walk 33kms including the snow section. Had a lovely dinner at a spring slightly off trail, also a freezing cold bath before carrying on another couple of kilometers before camping. Super tired but pleasantly surprised we’re now quite capable of doing much longer days. The following day we eventually met up with Grant again. Walked together down to a large river where we had lunch. Grant got there first and saw a bear plodding down the road. Woohoo!
We climbed in the heat all afternoon through thick lush forest eventually having dinner at a creek then camping at 8pm. 40kms is a very long way, we seem to have gone from averaging 20kms per day to 20 Miles per day – 12kms a day further.
We spent the majority of the 4th and last day of this section walking through the forest gently down to a camping ground and out onto the intersection with the highway which would get us to Dunsmuir. Super hot and tired, it took us almost 2 hours to get a hitch just to a Service Station after walking 32kms. Beautiful forest again, but sitting at the side of the road for so long was a bit painful. From the Service Station (after ice cream and cold drinks) a lovely lady called Sandra took 5 smelly hikers into Dunsmuir where we eventually ended up staying at a motel. Shower, Pizza, bed. 82 Miles (131kms) in 4 days. Tired.
Never really thought about having a road trip on the PCT but that’s certainly what we had to do. We’d gotten a really good deal on a 2 day rental (thanks Grant) and picked it up on the Sunday afternoon from Ridgecrest (80kms away). Big flash planet hating thing it was but the only car available unless you wanted a huge SUV.
Fare-welling Judy
Goodbyes to Judy, we will miss her but will see her again….we left stuff there to make sure we would come back. Drove through Lake Tahoe as we had sent bounce boxes there to be collected with spare gear. We drove the rest of the day and camped at a cute riverside camp ground.
Camping on our road-trip
Strange to be in a car driving all day after only being in cars for short hitches coming and going from the trail. The following day we drove through a really cute town called Quincy and stopped at an organic store to get anti-mossie stuff. Drove up to Redding where we had arranged a trail angel to take us to the trail head. We resupplied at the local Walmart (traumatised again) and dropped the car at the airport.
A small section of Walmart
Melissa, out trail angel was fantastic! Drove us to Burney Falls campground, around 160km round trip for her – and she also stored our excess gear at her place to pick up on the way back. What would we do without such generous people. Thanx Melissa!
Thanks Melissa!
Nice campsite, picnic table, Bear box, flat site, super hot and no need for our tent fly. Lots of Mossies here, sprayed the tent with anti bug stuff. Visited the actual Falls later in the evening which were quite impressive.
Apart from the issues Grant has been having with the altitude over the past 3 weeks, the last sections brought home to us that continuing through the High Sierras would be difficult, not impossible, but difficult. A number of people have already gone through ahead of us and been successful, early starts (4am) and early finishes crossing passes with reasonable weather has seen people make progress. The huge snow falls over winter coupled with spring storms bringing even more snow right across the Sierras has now been even more complicated by the start of very warm summer temperatures. This means in many places it’s now too warm overnight to properly freeze the snow to give good purchase for microspikes in the morning.
We’re heading up here….
Navigation is already proving cumbersome with 90% of the normal trail covered in snow (they don’t do trail markers like in NZ) which means this becomes more time consuming. Added to all this is the shear volume of snow melt flooding many of the rivers we will need to cross daily making travel even more dangerous and again slower than we would like. With our time in the States limited by our 6 month Visas (we could pursue extending them and our flights out of Vancouver), we have decided to jump to northern California to a place called Burney and rejoin the trail there. To date we’ve made it to Mile 767 (1234kms) and have a further 3000kms to go if we want to complete the entire trail.
Snow hiking with head torches…
We are jumping to Mile 1411 (2270kms – we are skipping roughly 600 miles) and hopefully can continue at a far great rate of knots than if we struggle through the Sierras in their current condition. There is still snow up there but the altitude is way lower (around 5000 feet/1500m) and the snow is melting pretty quickly. We are hiring a rental, picking up our boxes that we forwarded to Lake Tahoe on the way and starting again in 3 days times back on the trail. We plan to cross continue across Oregon and most of Washington until we’re about 100 miles from the northern terminus. After that we”ll return to Burney, grab the gear we store there and potentially do the Sierras southbound (SOBO) until we return to here in Lone Pine.
No need for alpine boots and micro spikes
Things will be tight. We will need to do at least 20 miles/32kms per day instead of our current 20kms per day average. If things get too tight we’ll just skip stuff. It’s becoming quite obvious that we are more interested in the quality of experience rather than quantity. Our discussions around jumping past the Sierras included a conversation about “doing it hard no matter what”. We’re happy to go through an acceptable amount of suffering but grinding out pass after pass in soft snow no matter how spectacular the views is no fun and eventually would take away from the experience.
The magic portal to Nth California?
So the next time I blog will likely be from northern California around Mt. Shasta. Keep ya posted!
Absolutely lovely staying with Judy again but time to go further into the snowy High Sierras. In Lone Pine a local bumped into us and gave us a “blessing” to send us safely on our way, this was followed shortly afterwards by a gift of $100 to help us as well. We finally got a hitch up to Horseshoe Meadow by a fantastic guy (40 mile round trip to drop us off) who works for an environmental non-profit organisation (he finally agreed to do it when he heard we were Kiwis – his colleague is from NZ and would not have been happy to hear he hadn’t helped us). A huge thumbs up to “Landslide”, a PCT hiker from 2014, for making our day.
We crossed the meadow, totally snow covered with snow bridges across the creeks. Climbed back up a steep gully and back onto the trail proper. 7kms from the car park we finally stopped, we’d walked through snow the entire way, had a few hail showers but camped in sunshine directly on the trail in the only flat snow free space available. Nice spot between high snow banks. We hoped that it wouldn’t be like camping in a refrigerator. Dinner, cooked away from our tents, bear barrels sealed and Bear bag hung from a tree and off to bed. Unfortunately Grant was again not feeling well, we were again at altitude and he wasn’t coping.
Next morning it was certainly cold but surprisingly dry, even the tent fly was frost free. No bacon and eggs for breakfast, just peanut butter wraps and coffee. Left at 7am, Grant still crook but we continued into the mountains. Very slow going even with microspikes. Climbed up and over 11600 feet (3500m), our highest altitude yet. The scenery was fantastic, snowy covered meadows, mature pine forests with snow underneath, Marmots, Squirrels, Chipmunks, all flavour of birds – just wonderful! The only downside to the wilderness experience was the constant loud rumble of fighter jets buzzing the area all day – America is definitely at war – our quietest day saw only a dozen planes overhead, the worst day we counted over 30 sorties.
We managed to do 12.5 miles (20kms) but it was hard going. Back down to 9600 feet (3000m) to camp, lovely spot to put up the palace. Was drizzling when we arrived but suddenly the sun came out as we pitched the palace. Camped by our first potential larger river crossing. The next morning it was again cold but dry. The river crossing was uneventful, microspikes on and across a slippery log keeping the feet nice and dry. In fact, its boots and microspikes all day everyday at the moment. 90% of the trail is covered in snow making for difficult navigation unless you want to follow other footsteps which can be both helpful and a curse if those in front of you can themselves navigate.
Unfortunately Grant was getting worse each day. By Whitney Creek we began the discussion about exiting at the next opportunity. Easier said than done. We managed only 7 miles today (11.2kms) and camped just pass the turn-off to the Whitney Portal at 10600 feet (3250m) again next to the snow drifts in a tiny clear area. Dinner and coffee, the usual bear barrel and bear bag hanging ritual before bed. Grant off to bed early, not very well at all. The decision tomorrow morning will be between continuing or bailing. Carrying on the 7 miles to the base of Forester Pass, up and over the pass, up and over Kearsarge Pass and hopefully out at Independence to re-supply. Or, 2 days out over Trail Junction at Mt. Whitney and back to Lone Pine.
Grant still not well in the morning. Very disappointing to miss a chance at Forester Pass (the highest point on the PCT) and complete the section but not the wisest option with someone with what appears to be an altitude related illness. With heavy hearts we changed direction and walked towards the base of the climb up to the Whitney trail saddle. In fact the saddle is even higher than Forester Pass and potential more technically demanding but would only take 2 days. The other route in Grants condition could take us 4 days. Only 6 miles today but super hard work in the softening snow and the ever increasing altitude. To add insult to injury the weather has also changed so that it’s super hot. We managed to camp on a rock outcrop sticking out of the snow in the basin before the climb.
Breathtakingly beautiful in the snow bowl plus with the added view of numerous mountains we could now almost look down upon. The photos certainly do not do it justice. We camped at 11,500 feet (3500m) and apart from a very brief late afternoon shower the weather was stunning. At one point in the afternoon it was 28 Celsius degrees in the shade. We spent a surprisingly comfortable night on our little rock outcrop. The alarm went off at 4am, we needed to start climbing early before the potential for snow melt. Tent again surprisingly dry, a quick snack, everything packed and off we went just after 5am when it started becoming light.
Sunset over the basin
Crispy under foot for the climb up to what the map said was a series of zig-zags up the mountain. In reality only the first zig was any use, the remainder of the climb was straight up on a very steep snow bank. Using the footsteps of previous climbers (those intending to climb Mt. Whitney had passed by our tent in the very early hours of the morning in the dark), we inched up the snow bank. Anna had the ice axe, Grant and I only our poles with snow baskets. Scary would be an understatement, this was mountaineering, one slip would see you falling 100’s of meters, bouncing over jagged rocks to eventually land quite dead, or worse, severally injured back at the base of the bowl below. But the views were stunning, the experience exhilarating – this was truly an adventure of epic proportion.
We summitted, at last a flat area to rest weary legs. We sidled around to the top of the saddle and now faced an even bigger challenge…..going down an even longer snowy slope that appeared even steeper than the one we’d climbed. Oh shit! The sun had been on this side for a few hours already, the snow was getting slushy, we were already a bit buggered and only had one ice axe between us. Anna in particular didn’t think much of the adventure on the way up, she certainly wasn’t super keen on doing the downhill. We had no option but to continue, so over the lip we went and descended the snow bank – 600 meters of almost vertical snow bank, the map showed a series of zig-zags, these were covered in meters of snow. The saddle sat at 4122m – shit! that’s higher than Mt. Cook back home (NZ’s highest peak).
Two hours later, we eventually made it down. Anna inched down backwards like descending a ladder using the steps created by those climbing up the slope. I managed to go down by the walking down the steps. Enough said about that. At the end, Anna slid down the remaining 100 meters on her butt as she was wearing her rain pants, I slid down as well totally soaking my undies, long johns and shorts. Was worth it! Took no time at all to dry given the high temps we met on the way down the rest of the mountain. Another 8 miles (12.9kms) of steadily melting snow and a final section of dry snow free trail saw us get to the shop and carpark at Whitney Portal. Woohoo! What an accomplishment!
Grant survived the up and over, weakened by days of little food, Anna certainly had a new experience that I’m sure she will remember for many years to come and I had a pretty wonderful time. Apart from the fear and anguish of the mountaineering required to exit over the portal, I think we made the right decision to exit as we did. We eventually got a lift from a lovely couple from Reno who took us to the Pizza place in Lone Pine. John from Elevation Outfitters was really very kind to take us to Judi’s place (15mins from Lone Pine in Alabama Hills) in the early evening during a break from work – thanks John! And so we were back “home” again.
Next up is deciding what we’re going to do next……the huge snow year in the Sierras coupled with the sudden change to mid-summer temps means we need to decide whether to skip forward up the trail somewhere northward…..where would we skip to? Check out the next blog post to find out.
The second little twist was my visit to the Emergency Department at Lone Pine on the same day. I’d started getting pains in the area around my Appendix mid-morning while walking out to the road-end. By the time we got out the pain had worsened, after 2 hours waiting to get a hitch it was even worse. The ride down the winding road to get off the mountain made things even worse to the point where I was particularly pale and in a lot of pain (“or green” added by Anna). The driver took us directly to the tiny hospital where I went through the admission process, had my insurance checked and filled in the numerous forms before getting assessed.
I must confess that I felt incredibly uncomfortable to be asked on the form my race. I originally crossed it off the main form then was provided with another form outlining the options; black, hispanic, white etc…, to receive treatment I had to fill it in. I consider this to be institutionalised racism, they believe this to be normal and acceptable. The pain could have Kidney Stones, Appendicitis or even a pulled muscle or for that anything.
Love the gown and boots look…
I had to slip into a hospital gown, give a urine sample and had a Canular inserted to take bloods. Some questioning, prodding around the effected area and other places, and urine and bloods results later and it was clear I did not have Appendicitis. I couldn’t continue the PCT if that had been the case so I was very much relieved. After a few hours I was released with some pain meds and told to drink more water. The care was really professional, the people were lovely and it was overall a very positive, yet novel experience.
Leaving the Emergency Department
I’ve now tramped another 5 days since the abdominal pain issue and I’m fine. Next up, snow, altitude and big decisions…….
First and foremost on getting a WiFi connection in Lone Pine at the end of the last section was the news that my Dad had passed away. He’d been bed-ridden for over a year and lived in the hospital wing of a Retirement Village back home in New Zealand. His battle with Cancer finally came to an end on 1 June 2019, 26 days short of his 91st Birthday. I’d visited him weekly for the year or so he was in the hospital and had said my goodbyes before leaving for the PCT. We had discussed the fact it was highly unlikely I would race back to New Zealand for the funeral as I would be spending so much time in the wild without communications. He had jokingly said it didn’t bother him as he’d not be there to notice.
RIP Ģijsbert Duindam 27 June 1928 – 1 June 2019
One of the things you get plenty of time for when walking long distance trails is time to think. Long distance trails are similar to our lives, we start at the beginning, unsure how things are really going to work, you have ups and downs, good days and not so good days, make friends along the way, have trail families (if that’s your thing) and eventually you make it to the end, or wherever you end up finishing. Trails, as in life, is about making the best of everyday no matter how things are playing out, if you’ve got to climb that mountain, do it slow and steady and really enjoy the view from the top.
I feel Dad had a pretty full life, born just before the Depression in the Netherlands, lived through the occupation during the second World War, spent a couple years in Indonesia with the Dutch Army and then eventually emigrated to New Zealand. Later married to another Dutch immigrant and had a family, in fact he ended up supporting the upbringing of almost two families after he remarried. He was successful in business, a staunch church member and a very smart academic eventually teaching students at Polytechnic and University.
I’m a bit bummed at not being there for the family to help with the funeral arrangements and be there for the send-off but that wasn’t possible given my current travels. Thanks to the family for coming together and giving him a good send-off.
And so it was, back to Laura’s place after a night in the Traveller’s Lodge at Ridgecrest – thank goodness as the weather was again very unpleasant in the mountains. Laura took us to Walmart to resupply, she had another 6 hikers staying already so things were busy. We spent the day getting ready to go back on trail, updating the blog, recharging batteries, packing, eating, celebrating Laura’s daughters 18th Birthday and hanging with the other hikers.
Had to use a New Years hat…
Next morning after a lovely breakfast, Laura took us up to Kennedy Meadows after dropping other hikers at Walker Pass. Some last minute shopping at the outfitters and goodbye hugs with Laura, we were off again on our next leg of the trail. The task ahead the more daunting with the Snow year being as big as 2017 but with the added problem of on-going snow storms which they didn’t have to contend with in 2017. New snow reported daily with dire warnings of hikers being trapped further north over high passes makes for interesting preparation.
General store – Kennedy Meadows
A very late start coupled with a need to camp at lower altitude and Grant still being unwell saw us tramp only 10kms. Gorgeous in the Sierras, pine trees growing where they’re meant to in there native environment (unlike in NZ), snow in patches underfoot, no need to carry huge volumes of water with creeks every few kilometers – brilliant! Lovely campsite for the Palace, a fire pit, a small creek nearby, just lovely! Altitude tonight is 2065 metres.
Up at 5am, potentially 30+ kms today to get across a couple of higher sections. Unfortunately Grant was still a bit crook and unable to eat properly plus climbs up and over 3150 metres meant we only did one up and over and camped at 1pm at around 2750 metres. Cold, had hail and snow showers early afternoon – no problem while napping in the Palace in our warm sleeping bags. The weather improved to become quite sunny and enjoyed a nice warm dinner by the fire – snow country means having fires is much less of an issue.
The “Palace” and Grant’s Tarp tent
Exciting day today, we climbed up the valley and onto the proper snow field. Wow! How fantastic to walk beneath pine trees across banks of snow. Saw plenty of squirrels – cute! Up and over the pass, hard work with my new boots and the effects of altitude, micro spikes on eventually making the travel easier. Shame about the buzzing of fighter jets across the wilderness area. Luckily none came too low today.
Travel in the snow is certainly not quick. We managed 20kms today and climbed over a 3300 metre saddle. The weather was certainly better, even the sinister clouds didn’t look so sinister. Had the campsite to ourselves, lots of hikers grouping together to cross the Sierras but luckily they all stayed at different campsites along the way. Today was definitely spoilt by “the bloody planet hating, war mongering US Airforce” – all day, every 10-15 minutes, low flying fighter jets screaming across the skies, so angry that these people think it’s ok to behave like this in a wilderness area – pathetic!
An ex-Marine also hiking the PCT jokingly explained the planet hating behaviour as “The Sound of Freedom”. He did admit it took away from the enjoyment in the wilderness but said they had to train somewhere and this was a sparsely populated area……that’s all I want to say about that. We walked out to a road-end to get a lift to Lone Pine to resupply and stay with Judy at Clark and JoAnn’s place. But then there was a little twist, actually a couple of twists…..more about that soon.
Camino PCT 