Fortune cookie

I've been carrying this fortune around for months. Is the message clear? I think so… It'll be my mantra for this event, both the training and prep period as well as beyond.

In that vein, yesterday I bumped my training miles up to 13.5 with a jaunt in Nicene Marks State Park. I added a trail to my usual loop which included some steep up and downs with three water crossings. I doubt if I would have wanted to cross these trickling streams had we not been in the worst drought in California since 1849. The trail would have been slippery and slick with steep drop-offs, had it been wet and rainy. Plus the water would have been hip deep. This was good for me but terrible for the state as a whole. If this trend continues there will many liters of water hauling in my future and trouble all over the state with the extreme fire danger facing us.

Speaking of extreme fire danger it appears that alcohol stoves will be banned throughout the state of California this coming season. I think this comes from irresponsible past users who were clueless as to the dangers of alcohol stoves in the dry climate of California and have damaged property, including starting fires, in the past. Too bad as I don't like to use canister stoves - they are loud, the canisters are wasteful and they are heavy to carry. They are however, much safer in the hands of the foolish. Though, with some of the folks I've seen out there, any stove could be made dangerous. I'm sorry to say it but sometimes it appears as though there are many candidates for the Darwin awards on the trail.

Given all this, the current plan is to take a super small stove called a Pocket Rocket. The stove itself weighs 3 ounces and each small canister weighs in at 3.5 ounces so just the stove/canister itself weighs more than my previous cook system all told. Add in another 5 or so ounces for the pot and other stuff and it almost makes me want to go stove less. I'll have to consider this…

I spent a couple of hours last night working on my resupply plan. I'm using Craig's PCT Planner (http://www.pctplanner.com) which is a great tool for the planning of mail drops and milages. It is the perfect way to organize food drops and manage distances between those drops. Lots of good information on this site. Next week I'll take my plan to my friends house to see if we match up on our schedules and make any adjustments necessary. They've already started making meals for their boxes so it will be interesting to see what they've got going. I'm not sure what I'm waiting for but I reckon I'd better get on the stick asap.