White Pass

Wow. It was wet, wet, wet this morning, after 13 hours in my tent. It rained all night, with some thunder and lightening thrown in for good measure. When it started to get light I looked out and saw raindrops all around. Not so much falling from the sky but from the trees. When a big one would go splat on the tent, the spray from the moisture on the inside of the tent would drift down. While the fabric kept the outside rain from coming in, it also gathered condensation from my breath and the wet ground. Let's just say, everything was kinda wet. 

Deciding what to do next was tough. Two flexible people, with a tendency to think positive, have a hard time evaluating risk.
Or wanting to intertain the idea of heading south (to the car) instead of the planned trail north. What cinched it for me was the fact that while my gear was damp, L's was wet. If it continued to rain, which was entirely likely, then she would be doubly wet, with the danger of hypothermia lurking near. Plus, I was mostly dry and warm but my own margin of error was narrowed since my "just in case" gear had been offered to L. So I voted for a return to the car and, as it turned out, it was the right decision. 

So we retraced our steps of the day before. The cool thing is that it all looks different going the other way, plus it was more clear and we could actually see the terrain.  It took a bit longer to hike those ten miles today, probably since it wasn't raining cats and dogs, but we managed to get back to the car near 4pm with a new plan of getting a room at the Inn here and drying out all our stuff. 

We did get lucky and got a room, soon to be strewn with wet gear...

And leisurely beers on the deck. 

Now it's time for sleeping and I've opted for the bottom bunk. What could go wrong?

Section I, Washington PCT

It is strange to be picking this blog up after so many months of absence. I won't spend time now talking about this. Instead I'll jump right into the description of this section hike. 

My Washington hiking buddy L met me at Chinook Pass this morning at 9:30. She had driven down from Bellingham and we were to leave her car at the pass, take my car south to Highway 12 and hike back north to her car, taking three leisurely days to hike the 30 miles. When I arrived the pass was socked in and the fog was so thick I couldn't see across the street. 

Fortunately I had looked at the forecast and Mt. Rainer was supposed to get rain, snow flurries and lightening today so I had thrown in some extra gear. A wind shirt, buff and wind vest. It was hard to imagine it being cold since I had been sweltering in Yakima with 103 degree days. 

We donned our packs at 11:15 and off we went, in a beautiful swirling fog. We walked for an hour then stopped for lunch, in the shelter of some trees. The fog had started to go 3-D on us and began to turn into droplets. It turned out that L had also been unable to imagine rain, since it hasn't rained in Bellingham for three months, so she didn't bring rain gear. Over the next few hours the fog turned into rain while L got wetter and wetter. I gave her my extras and we managed to walk the 10 miles needed to get to Snow Lake but it was full on raining when we arrived. 

All of the established campsites were inhabited by others so we walked along the lake shore till we found some relatively level ground under some trees. L put up her tent, which unfortunately is kind of like a big, roomy bivy tent. She can't sit up in there so she's stuck in her tent, with her wet gear, till morning.

I made her some miso soup with seaweed, which was quite yummy, and she finished off my dinner of Thai Chicken. A big deal since she is a vegetarian.   

It's only 6:45PM and we are both ensconced in our sleeping bags and tents. It continues to rain and all around us is damp. A novel thing since it has been bone dry around here for months. I think I will be able to get warm tonight and hopefully stay dry, but if it is still raining in the morning I wonder if it is a good idea to continue on. L has no rain gear and most of her stuff is wet, except what she is sleeping in. I guess only time will tell. 

Spring is here

One hard thing about spending lengths of time away from home on long hikes is that I don't get to garden. For decades now I've loved to make environments that grow plants, flowers as well as good things to eat. For two of the past three years I've spent six months away from home, making it impossible to do summer plantings. This year I've decided to go for it but first I had to build garden beds that will protect plants from the mauruding gophers we have up here on the property. My previous gopher wired beds only lasted a couple of years so this time I built some with hardware cloth that should give me five or so years of gopher proof bliss. I added climbing trellises to both planters so I'll be able to grow gourds and peas, sweet peas in fact.

The biggest box above is 4 x 8 and contains one big cherry tomato plant, dalias, basil, radishes, beets, sweet peas and sunflowers. Some of which did well and others did not.

The small box here has done very well with loose leaf lettuce, radishes, beets and a bumper crop of gourds... birdhouse gourds. I love those and I should have tons by late fall.

So you can see my spots for protected planting are small but I hope productive this year.  I'll be gone some early this summer (vacation to Mexico) and will attempt to finish hiking the state of Washington in August. I hope there is some food left for me when I get home in September.

I am a gear head

There I've said it. Isn't admission the first step in recovery? Well I certainly hope so because I have more gear than any reasonable person needs. Multiple packs, tents, tarps, sleeping bags, quilts and hammocks, I'm always looking for the lightest kit for any given situation, even though I generally only backpack in the high season. Having said that I am working on a new shelter/pack combination for next summer and I've posted the detailed info on my Gear 2015 page. I'll also be selling some of my gear in order to make room for the stuff I am keeping and I'll post that info here soon. In the meantime, get on out there... the weather is grand.

Eleven Mile Jaunt

I always forget how my sleep is affected at elevations of 8,000' or above. True to form I didn't sleep much but I was out in the woods so who cares? Oh yes, and that moon spotlight was an extra bonus. But I did sleep some and didn't get up till after 7 am. That's a first. 

I slowpoked around and got to hiking at 8:15 or so, only to climb up to 9,000' in the first couple of miles. The trail was nicely graded so it wasn't too difficult, even for a flat lander. This was my view all morning. 

I had an early lunch/snack at Saddle Junction where the Devils Slide Trail makes a sharp right turn and switchbacks 2.5 miles down to the trailhead at Humber Park. Another hour or so and I was back in "civilization", such as it is. 

I attempted to text Trail Angel Stacey but couldn't get through so I took off walking down the road. In less than five minutes here comes Stacey with her dog Scout! They were planning to hike up to meet me but I got there early so no hike for them. Off to the Red Kettle for a salad

and a bottomless glass of iced tea. My favorite all service resturant in Idyllwild!

Some good news is that my shoulder had improved overnight and it continued to stay that way all day. Carrying less food and water helped I reckon. So hopefully it will continue to heal, as long as I'm not carrying too much weight in a pack. 

The not-so-good news is I am back in the lowlands now and the temp is projected to be 105 today. I'm sitting outside in Mom's golfcart, having a cup of coffee and enjoying the cooler morning air, but soon it will be too hot to be outside at all.

It is amazing to me that people can live with these temperatures. They move between inside airconditioning to car air to store air, trying not to bake in between each environment. I've only been back here for a couple of days but already I've got cabin fever. I can't wait to get home to moderate temperatures where I can be outside whenever I wish. 

Here are a few random images from my two day jaunt. 

The oak gnats were trying to get into every facial orifice. I foiled them with my trusty head net!

Pine Trees and Boulders

I do believe the San Jaciento Mountains are one of my most favorite places to backpack, at least in Southern California. The backcountry is remarkably close to civilization (I'm only four miles from a road) but I'm 2,000' higher than that road and it takes a bit of effort to get here. Just that factor alone thins the crowd out a bit. 

Plus, there are these junctions. Who can decide which way to go? Up, down, around...it's very hard to pick which way to go when all of them lead somewhere beautiful. 

The pine trees and boulders are amazing here. Tall, tall trees and rocks the size of small houses. 

Certainly much bigger than my home for the night. 

It's been 20 days since I had a pack on and it feels wonderful to get back into the quiet again. No billboards, auto sounds, loud human voices. Only the distant, almost imperceptible sound of a far off plane now and again. 

What doesn't feel good is my shoulder where the strap on my pack presses against the front of the joint. Humph! While I was home in Santa Cruz I got an X-ray so I know nothing's broken, but X-rays don't show soft tissue damage. I wonder how long this is gonna take to heal? I hope it feels better in the morning. 

In the meantime it'll be a bright night tonight as the moon is just past full. Too bad I don't have those little eye thingies to keep out the light!

Outside

It's been threatening rain here for a couple of days. Unfortunately it has rained everywhere but here so we are stuck with humidity and heat, but no rain.

The good news is that cloudiness has helped keep the temps down into more tolerable levels and I don't want to jump off a cliff into an abyss to deal with the heat. 

Tonight after dinner I took off in the golf cart to see if I could find some nice images but I'd passed the sunset hour. I went all the way over to the horsie area where the wealthier folks hang, just to smell something earthy for a bit. Riders were finishing their evening rides and I chatted with a young woman leading a beautiful, and very large, horse. I guessed the horses size as 17 hands and was only a couple of inches off. A silly kind of pride I feel in being able, after all these years, to guess a horses size. Big, really big. 

Not the same horse but another going back to the barn. Lucky critters. 

The story of my life right now. A full moon rising over some power lines. I'm thankful for Mom's golf cart which allows me to get outside and feel the wind on my face. Soon, very soon, I'll be in the woods for a few days.