Journal Entries

Laundromat and spinning laundry in Idyllwild.

I got behind on my daily journal while I was in Idyllwild for a double zero (no hiking) so I'm still trying to write them. I did laundry, ate food, watched Guardians of the Galaxy 2, ate some more food, resupplied, and then it snowed on us the night of the first zero. It was snowing all the next day so Karma, Nirvana and I got a cabin so we could be warm and dry our stuff out. We had a bunch of hikers over for dinner, then got a ride back to the trail head the next day. I'll be updating it soon when I finally write it up, but for now here are pictures so I can post the rest of the entries!

Nirvana singing Jude at Karaoke.

Erin aka @arrowbear

May 5th- Day 14- miles from before Fobes Saddle at mile 165.8 to San Jacinto Campground in Idyllwild. 16 ish miles.

My alarm blares in my sleeping bag at 5 and I dive down to find my phone and turn it off. We get out of camp while the sun is still right on the horizon and there's still the remnants of sunrise. My right knee feels all wobbly when I walk like it's going to give out, my calf and muscles on the top of my knee are tight. I stop to stretch my quads a couple of times per Karma's suggestions and as my muscles warm up I feel better (she is a massage therapist and knows all of the muscle things).

They quickly lose me on the switchbacks and soon I'm down on the valley floor walking along Fobes Saddle Road, a little stream running beside it. I put my sunglasses on to fend off the miserable early morning rays. I cry for the first time while hiking. It's hard to be the slower person in the group, the person who only sees everyone else at breaks and camp- I feel lonely, am I actually their friend or am I just a random person who's attached themselves to the group? I run through all of my insecurities, in a low mood. Finally I stop to blow my nose and wipe my face dry with my dirt-stained hands and feel better.

I follow the road for maybe another hour, Highway 74 coming into view below. I see two dayhikers with their dogs below me as the road is going down an incline, and try to walk faster than my slow mope so I can maybe meet their dogs. As I get closer to the road I see more people stopping to let their dogs run around, probably road-trippers. I catch up to the two "day hikers" as they're getting into their car. They ask when I started and offer me a ride into Idyllwild. I say no, but thank you, continuous miles and all that, but secretly I want to ask them if I can pet their dog.

I cross the highway and let myself through a gate. As I'm following a small use-trail that connects to a forest service road, a fox walks across the path ahead of me and runs off.

I hurry down the road walk, under power lines that give off their oily, dry-heat electricity smell. I want to catch Karma and Nirvana at the Hemet Market. I see them starting the road walk as I reach a barbed-wire fence. There's a sign asking people to close a gate behind them, but there's no gate, so I swing my pack over the fence and carefully step over the crotch-height barbed wire.

Then I'm off, trying to walk as fast as I can on lumpy soft grass, shaving off inches so I can catch up. Karma and Nirvana see me and wave, then keep on walking; oh. I'm in my funk again, not trying to catch up anymore. I'm only 30 seconds behind, and they wouldn't wait for me to catch up? I want to cry again but don't. I'm a little bit quiet as we set our packs on the patio and go into the market to get some food. I get an ice cream bar dipped in chocolate and a Hershey's bar and some orange juice and sit with them on the patio. The chairs are tied to the tables so people won't take them, but it makes it impossible to have more than one person sit at a table. We huddle in our chairs against the strip of shade by the wall. Then I squeeze into a chair at their table and we discuss Idyllwild plans. They're going to stay at the campground tonight to save money, and I'm not going to pay for a hotel room just by myself so I'm going there too. The store allows hikers to fill up their water bottles with the hose out back so we fill up and head off. The water tastes rubbery and chemical-y like hose.

I'm the only one with my phone not dead, so I navigate, walking through Herkey Campground, then down a nature trail that parallels the highway. It's the middle of the day and hot so we stop often in the shade, delirious and laughing, drunk with heat. The alternate goes along a broad, sandy-white road with no shade, and we're sweaty and hot and not making much sense and cracking ourselves up. We come upon a lone pine tree and run to the shade. I play music and we eat food and talk about first drinking stories. "My first drink was amniotic fluid," I say. I said we were in a weird mood, right?

Then we pull ourselves up from the shade and Nirvana and Karma use their long legs to power into town while I stumble up the road lined with lilac bushes and grassy meadows that look perfect for a nap.

I find my way through a maze of wide, empty dirt roads until they spit me out onto pavement. Locals have posted friendly hand-painted signs pointing hikers in the direction of the road into town. There aren't any sidewalks and I walk on the side of the curvy road, stepping onto the side whenever cars come by. Cute little houses with shingles line the road. I stop in front of a Christian Camp to put my poles on my backpack and walk some more, reeling in the sights of so many things as I start hitting the center of town, my eyes wide and glazed, stumbling past the Post Office and shops and restaurants.

Eventually I get to the campground and go into the Ranger Station to pay my 3$ fee for staying in the PCT section. I feed a dollar into a machine to get a shower token. The ranger points me in the right direction, to the back of the campground. There are RVs and palatial car-camping tents, and then I see a familiar and welcoming sea of UL tents. Twerk is there charging his things, so I stop and say hi.

Karma and Nirvana aren't here yet; I set up my tent underneath a big manzanita bush, grab my town clothes, and head to the bathroom and showers. It feels unbelievably luxurious to have a room all to myself; concrete walls and a toilet and a mirror and a trash can and a sink. I wash my hands and face and feel clean, then go over and take a shower.

Karma and Nirvana are setting up when I come out. They got their packages at the post office, which I kick myself for not doing. While I wait for them to take showers I hang out at the picnic table where hikers are getting ready to make kebabs over the fire. I find out it's Cinco de Mayo. They also have a big 20-gallon tub that they're making Sangria in. I ask what Sangria is (apparently wine and fruit juice and fruit) and someone hands me a cup so I sip it. It tastes very good, and afterwards I go to drink some water and talk to some hikers at the spigot, Tawny and Catch 'Em. Catch 'Em grew up in Russia but doesn't have an accent, since his household was English, and he was born in Italy. He is a self-proclaimed nerd and loves Pokémon.

A cool lady named Erin aka @arrowbear who I follow on Instagram and who hiked the JMT last year and summited Whitney a few days after I did is in town, so she walks up to the campground and we get to meet, which is super cool. She's up here doing a Wilderness First Responder course. I think her trail name is Long Spoon.

I'm starving and once Karma and Nirvana are showered we head out with Twerk and Baby Jesus to The Lumbermill for dinner (and drinks for them). There's karaoke and I order fish tacos. I get most of the way through them before realizing how full I am. Watching everyone else eat makes me want to barf a little bit. Erin joins us, Nirvana sings Jude by The Beatles, which he's been humming for days. The karaoke is fun but I'm tired and they start playing a bunch of songs I don't know and it's a little bit boring since I'm the only person not drinking. I pay my bill and head back to the campsite in the dark.

I go to the bathroom and organize my stuff in my tent. Everyone comes back and there's lots of talking by the campfire; I put my earplugs in and go to sleep.

May 4th- Day 13- 19.4 miles on the PCT from mile 146.4 to before Fobes Saddle at mile 165.8. +2 miles to and from Paradise Valley Cafe and +0.6 miles to and from Tunnel Spring= 22 total miles.

The alarm I set last night doesn't go off (I set it to PM instead of AM) and instead a mosquito is the one to wake me, flying into my face until finally I'm cognizant enough to wave it away. The campsite is much more welcoming in the daylight, ringed by cheery, oval-leafed manzanitas. I go to pee; it's nice not to have to search for a semi-private spot among mass campsites. Solo camping for the win!

I pack up quickly. Down in the valley somewhere there is a ranch and a dog barks. Once, twice. The morning is bleary, the sun low so I have to keep my hat brim down and my head tilted to avoid blinding myself, even with sunglasses. I only went 2 ish miles last night from where everyone else camped, but that means I am 2 miles closer to Paradise Valley Cafe and Food!

The trail winds along the top of some sandy cliffs, then up the side of a ridge until I can hear cars moving somewhere ahead. I try to not think too much about how hungry I am. I fantasize about lemonade.

Finally the road is right there. I see a hiker walking back up the road to the PCT and say hi. He's hiking the alternate. I want to, too, but I don't want to do it alone.

I don't feel comfortable yet hitching alone and there aren't many cars heading down the road, so I walk the mile to the Cafe. I can see it a full half mile before I get there, taking an incredibly long time to come into full view. It's only 8 and it's already hot. I come up to the porch, where there are a ton of thru-hikers. Rachel, Nirvana, Tarantino, Baby Jesus, and a bunch of others I recognize but don't know by name.

I sit down with a hiker I've never met before, and the waiter gets me my a menu and some water right away. I try to order my omelette with a side of eggs. It's already been a hot day and my brain is fried. While I'm waiting for my food I talk with my table-mate, Octane, who is originally from Germany but moved to the states 20/30 years back with almost nothing. He started a plumbing business and has traveled all over the world. The omelette is good but the hash browns are a bit soft.

Karma comes up and she and Nirvana and Rachel say they're doing the alternate, so after washing up and texting Colleen our plans (she's still a couple of miles out from the Café) we walk the mile back up to the trail. A guy in a red truck with a bed-cover pulls over and asks Karma and I if we need a ride. "Umm..." pained, quick thinking "No, we're good, thanks though!" We say, and then immediately regret it as the car pulls back into the road and we turn back to our long road-walk. Nirvana is waiting in the shade at the trailhead, looking at his phone. He was in the truck... Dammit. Thruhiker regrets.

I keep up with their pace for a while before slowing down. I can keep up with them when they're not trying to be fast, and when I'm feeling good enough to hike without my little 5-second breathing breaks. When I can it's good because I can hike faster. I know when it's not worth it, though. As they disappear up the trail I feel my internal anxiety-pressure to keep up with them fade. Whoosh.

It's hot, my sleeves are rolled up, my forearms glossy with sweat. I pass Beast in the shade. We're planning on taking a break together at a "shady campsite" 4 miles in. I stop to breathe in a green meadow crawling with ladybugs. They swarm like flies in the air and land on my feet. I catch Nirvana and Karma at the aforementioned shady campsite and immediately spread out my foam pad and lie down. I study the maps for the alternate. There are big black flies everywhere and it's dry. The shade is spotty. "Why didn't we stop at the ladybug meadow?" I say.

"I don't know," Karma says.

I fall asleep and when I wake up I'm sweaty where my body was against the sleeping pad. We get going and Karma and Nirvana both quickly disappear again. The trail is climbing up the side of the ridge around giant granite mounds. The sky is blue and below a valley full of pine and green manzanita stretches out back to the Highway, which is hidden behind rolling hills. It reminds me of Desolation Wilderness and the northern Sierra: home!

I continue the climb, head down and cruising in between breaks to look around and take the scenery in. I get to the signpost which marks the two side trails to water- Karma and Nirvana were planning to go down to Tunnel Springs so I hope I catch them there. I drop my pack and head down with my filtering kit. Beast comes up as I'm starting and goes down with me. It's steep and I almost trip a few times.

Karma and Nirvana aren't there- I don't think I was being that slow so where are they? The spring is a PVC pipe streaming clear water down into a battered metal trough. The water trickles out where the rim of the trough has been bent down (there's a sign asking people not to sit on the trough) and as Beast and I filter a bird takes a bath in the runoff. Butterflies flutter at the water's rim. We talk about hunting. He asks if I have a trail name yet and I say no; I say I'd like someone to name me Quickbeam, after the ent in the Lord of the Rings, because he is one of the youngest ents- Beast decides to call me Quickbeam from now on, but I still feel like I should wait for a name to come to me. I'm being so impatient! But it sucks to have to say that I don't have a trail name yet when people ask. And I want one! But I want it to be right!

I hobble up the climb, clutching my dirty water bladder and smart water bottle to my chest. Then I head off. I'm definitely slow, the trail here is steeper than it's been, winding up the sides of mountains. Far below is the milky brown desert floor, patterned with washes, and a marching row of coffee mountains. I come up to the top of a ridge and just stop to take it in. From here I can see both the desert behind me, incomprehensibly distant, and rolling green mountains on the other side of the ridge. I stuff food in my mouth, a stiff but warm pleasant breeze blowing the thick green grass, making it brush against my ankles.

I walk through this ridge-top Shire, grassy meadows cradled by pine groves as they gently slope down towards views. I'm going slow and I'm tired but it's beautiful. The sun is getting low in the sky. I look for Karma and Nirvana's footprints- i can see Karma's Altra tracks clearly, and can almost see Nirvana's. I try to hurry as the sun becomes a ball of orange in the sky, with Saturn-rings of pink. I've entered part of the opened burn area, and the sunset paints the bare white tree husks gold. I stop seeing Karma and Nirvana's tracks on the trail at this point, but I don't see them off trail either.

The sun goes down below the horizon, and I wait as long as I can before getting out my headlamp, the corners of the forest filling up with shadows and the bumps in the trail losing their clarity. There's a campsite half a mile ahead, the last one before the switchbacks down the mountains and the Fobes Saddle Junction, where we all said we'd meet to camp. Everything is getting black now, and I'm getting jumpy. I check my Guthook's app and I've just passed the campsite, so I head back up the trail 20 feet and stumble down to the campsite. It's by a big creepy granite rock with a witch-cave. I play music as I set up my cowboy camp by the light of my headlamp. Below, a city has lit up the darkness in the valley.

I'm sitting in my sleeping bag with my headlamp on, getting ready to sleep. I hear trekking poles and look up and see headlamps! "Hello?" I call, sitting up.

"Amelia?!" Karma says. "Is that you?"

"Yah!" I say. "Come down, there's room!"

"Is it an actual campsite?"

"Yes!"

Nirvana is with her- they didn't get water at Tunnel Springs and tried to find a trail down to a spring a couple miles back. There wasn't a trail and there wasn't water. I have plenty to share, though, and I'm super happy I don't have to sleep alone next to a creepy cave.

We stretch and talk for an hour. For the first time I don't have the heart or energy to write out a journal post, so I write notes about the day and mileage, set my alarm, and then put my phone in my sleeping bag. Then, sleep.

May 3rd- Day 12- 17.2 miles from mile 129.2 to mile 146.4.

I'm asleep when Colleen leans over me in my tent. "Amelia. Amelia. Wake up!" I am awake now, my sleeping bag is toasty hot even though the sun has only just risen. I take my time in camp, learning how to pack up with a different tent. I'm going to try putting the poles on the side of my pack today, I think it was too rigid inside yesterday and was hurting my back, not too mention poking into my butt.

I'm out after everyone except Twerk. The trail is in the shadow of the opposite ridge at first, the sun just brightening a spot on the horizon. 6 ish miles in I stop to take an extended bathroom break, finally changing my socks, which are stiff like cardboard from the salt and sweat pounded into them. Everyone is ahead of me now. It's very hot, even though the sun is still low and the side of the ridges that the trail follows are still mostly in shadow. It was forecasted to be 100 degrees today. I pass Karma, Colleen, and Twerk just before the trail down to Tule Spring and fire tank. Kathleen is there, and she decides to walk the quarter mile down with us to wait out the heat of the day. It's 10.

I grab my water filtering ziploc, food bag, maps, and sleeping pad and shuffle down the road. I set up in the shade as the crew filters in. I try the fire tank pump but it's empty. Laziness defeated, I scramble down a steep bank to get some water. Then we sit around in the shade, talking, eating food, napping. I make Mac and cheese and my fuel runs out halfway through. Karma lets me borrow hers. I welcome people and point them to the water and shade. Everyone looks beaten by the heat as they come down the road for water. Scissors is here, as well as Twerk, Karma, Colleen, and Rawhide. We talk with Toby, who is a gender and queer studies professor, and Shipwreck and Iguana. We finally start out at 4, after 6 hours of waiting for the heat to die down.

I'm now ahead. I see my second rattlesnake as I'm pulling myself foot-by-foot up a hill. I hear something rustle by my foot, and look down to see the zebra stripes and supple, muscular curves. I quickly step back. It doesn't rattle, but begins making its way up the hill, then changes its mind and goes across the trail again. It hides behind a granite rock, peeking its head over to watch me. Iguana and Shipwreck come up and it decides to head down the slope.

A few minutes later, Twerk sees me coming from his perch up by a behemoth granite slab. He says there is another rattlesnake by the trail. I step around and join him on his slab and watch as the snake meanders its way along the rocks. The sun is hiding behind a cloud so it feels like dusk, even though we have a few more hours of light. It's still hot as heck. My sleeves are rolled up and they gleam with sweat.

I've decided I want to try and walk the fire-closure alternate into Idyllwild tomorrow instead of hitching down, and want to get as close as possible so my day isn't so long tomorrow. I join Twerk briefly at the Sandy Road Water Cache, then head across the beach-sand road at a clip. I get to the campsite where we were meeting tonight at mile 144 and call out Karma's name. She replies, and I find her and tell her I'm going to go ahead and night hike, and that I'm trying to get into Idyllwild tomorrow on the alternate.

I stop to pee and stuff my hip belt pockets with snacks and get out my headlamp. Then off I go, weaving in between views of the valley and the twinkling lights of houses, and dark manzanita. It's light out, but it starts getting darker as the trail bends back into the folds of the ridges. I start to think of all of the horror movie commercials that I've ever been forced to watch on YouTube because there's no skip button.

Finally I stop and pull my ear buds out, and turn on Jack Johnson's album, Brushfire Fairytales. If I walk fast enough and focus on the music, which is happy and bouncy and brings me to a sunny beach in Hawaii, I'm not too freaked out. I think about yetis and cougars. My right trekking pole rattles like a rattle snake with each step and the squeak of my backpack sounds like hissing.

I come upon a picnic area called Walden. There's a library box and the group of guys camped there invite me to stay, but I shake my head no. They seem impressed, but I want to keep going and I had caffeine Mio from Rawhide during the break today so I have energy.

I'm sweating, jumpy from being alone in the darkening maze of looming manzanita bushes. Finally it gets dark enough that I decide to stop at the next campsite. For sanity's sake. The sun is now just a slightly lighter-colored red smudge on the dark horizon. I set up a cowboy camp alone, with Jack Johnson still playing. The Big Dipper is upside down across the horizon. Everything is dark but I feel safe with the music playing and with the routine of setting up camp. Goodnight.