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Day 158: White Pass. 350 miles from the Northern Terminus.

Gosh, it is nice to be home! I’m about to head back out on trail, so I’ll make this one kinda quick.

I had no trouble going from Cascade Locks to Trout Lake. There was a lot of uphill, which was an adjustment, but I’m feeling a lot better about it now. I got some excellent views of Mount Adams, not so much of Mount Saint Helens. Oh well.

Getting into the town of Trout Lake was easy, getting out proved to be much harder. A thunderstorm rolled through and hit a tree, which subsequently exploded into a 4500 acre inferno overnight. I got out before it got too bad, and only had to miss about 20 miles, so I still got to see the goat rocks wilderness. It was a little smoky, but that’s okay.

I know I say that I have 350 miles left, but I actually have a lot less than that to do. With the fires in Washington, significant sections of the trail are closed, so I’m going to have to skip up a fair bit. The border is still open, fortunately, but that could change at any time. I’m keeping my fingers crossed. Anyway, I expect to finish in 2 weeks or less.

I ran into something pretty cool in the goat rocks: the spot where the photo I’m using as my banner was taken! It’s not quite the same with all the smoke, but you can still see mount Adams in the background.

Okay! Peace out.

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Day 151: Cascade Locks. 500 miles from the Northern Terminus.

I’m done with Oregon! Only Washington remains. I’m home.

Leaving Big Lake Youth Camp, I ran into some pretty bad smoke, the worst I’d ever seen on trail. I still got some cool views of Three Fingered Jack, though. I ended up making camp pretty late that night, I was lucky to stumble across the ideal campsite before it got too dark.

Past that, I really started to get into the area close to Mount Jefferson. It was gorgeous, and there was no smoke. Definitely the highlight of this last section.

I could make a whole post just based on pictures I took of mount Jefferson.

Recognize this lodge? They used it when filming The Shining! It’s the timberline lodge. It doesn’t have a hedge maze, and it’s not next to a lake like in the movie. They just used it for establishing shots. Still very cool though. It’s located right in the shadow of Mount Hood, and they have a famous lunch buffet. I ate 4 plates worth of food.

I had to take a slight detour because of a fire, the eagle creek trail. I was probably going to take that detour anyway, it promised incredible waterfalls and did not disappoint. There were some pretty significant cliffs, as you can see in the video. I was glad that the trail crews had taken the liberty to install handrails in some of the sketchier parts.

The fall in the video is Twister Falls.

There are a lot of things I could talk about regarding this last section. I saw little crater lake, a very deep pothole. It was really cool, but it didn’t photograph very well. I saw a young wild turkey that I might have traumatized a little bit on accident (sorry dude). I got awesome trail magic from some horseback riders and then a sobo (southbound hiker) did some literal magic tricks for us. I got rained on really bad a couple days ago. It was very persistent, humid, rain. Just misting eternally. Not super pleasant. Lots of stuff going on.

I’ll probably be posting less in Washington. The trail gets pretty remote up there. I might also have to skip some more due to fires. That’s far in the future though. Okay, until next time.

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Day 143: Big Lake Youth Camp. 650 miles from the Northern Terminus.

It’s been a bit smoky, unfortunately. Lots of fires, as I’m sure y’all know. Oregon is famous for its mosquitoes, they’ve been quite the nuisance. The upside of that is that I’ve gotten GREAT at swatting mosquitoes. I can snatch them out of the air now.

Getting out of Crater Lake wasn’t too bad (thanks mom and dad!). I even got to slackpack a little. The highlight of that day was definitely staying in the Maiden Peak Cabin. It’s a little backcountry cabin ski cabin that hikers can use in the summer. Very cute and very well maintained.

Past that, I started running into tons of lakes. Super nice, and the mosquitoes were surprisingly not that bad at most of them. We also got a little bit of fog, and some rain too. Hopefully it helped get those fires under control.

Probably the coolest part of this last stretch has been the mountains. The three sisters wilderness is incredible. I took a little video of this one view that I had.

I guess the three sisters are technically volcanoes. They’re incredible, anyway. I also passed though the obsidian limited entry area. It was really cool. The ground was littered with little chunks of obsidian.

Well, I’d stay at big lake youth camp for days if I could, they feed you for free! But I have to make miles, so I must March north. Until my next post, peace!

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Day 138: Crater Lake. 830 miles from the Northern Terminus.

I’ve been in Oregon for 120 miles now, and the psychological change is enormous. Oregon is only 450 miles long, compared to California, which is 1700 miles of trail. I’ll be back home in Washington before I know it!

Siead Valley was really small. To call it a town would be an exaggeration; there was a general store, a restaurant, an RV park, and that was it. Nice enough place, though. The walk from there to Ashland wasn’t bad, although it was smoky as heck with the Shelly Fire.

Ashland was nice, a real proper town with a Safeway and everything. I got a pack of day old cinnamon rolls for $1.50, stayed at a somewhat grimy motel, and set out the next day into Oregon proper.

The trail in Oregon is generally flat, and it doesn’t have a ton of great views. It mostly looks like the picture up above. It’s nice forest, but it’s just forest, so you end up walking pretty fast. I’m touching 30 miles per day now.

I did get some very nice views of Mount McLoughlin. I also bagged my first peak (i.e. took a side trip to go up a mountain), Holbart Bluff, so I can scratch that off my bucket list.

I spent some time at the brown mountain shelter…

Saw a sunset at Fish Lake…

And finally got to Crater Lake! I learned all about it’s formation and history. If anyone doesn’t know, there was a big volcano that exploded 8000 years ago, it collapsed in on itself, and now there’s a lake there.

I got to see my family at Crater Lake, too. My parents came down to visit, and my brother works here. Unfortunately, my trip has been derailed again. The Red Fire, Trail Fire, and Lemolo Fire have closed the trail for the next 70 miles, so I’ll have to skip up.

Little skips like that don’t bother me so much. I don’t view the trail as a checklist, it’s an adventure. You don’t have to hit every it of the trail, you just have to get as much as you can. And if there’s a fire, you get out of the way.

What does bother me is the Easy Fire. It’s up in Washington, near the Canadian Border, and it’s already closed some of the PCT. I told myself that if I couldn’t make it to the Northern Terminus for some reason, I would be okay with that. I was definitely lying to myself. I want my adventure to have a satisfying conclusion, but unfortunately I don’t live in a book. It’s entirely possible that a car will come pick me up at some deserted road in Washington, take me home, and I’ll be done with the trail without touching the Canadian Border. I could come back next year, but it wouldn’t be the same. I don’t know.

Well, enough doom and gloom. Washington is still a ways away, and I’m going to enjoy Crater Lake while I’m here. Peace!

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Bonus Post! Signs with Absurd Distances

This a pretty common thing on the PCT. I’ve been cataloguing them for a while, but I recently hit the crown jewel of all ridiculous signs.

Drumroll please…

I’m in Oregon now! California is behind me, and I have less than 1000 miles to go until I reach the Canadian border. Yahoo!

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Day 127: Etna. 1050 miles from the Northern Terminus.

Almost to triple digit miles left! Almost to Oregon! Hooray! We’re getting into fire season, hoping it won’t be too bad for the rest of the trip.

Going from Burney to Dunsmuir wasn’t super interesting. Kinda just walking in the woods. I did pass by the famous Burney Falls, but some of the trails were closed, so I wasn’t able to get the best views. Still cool.

I saw a lot of deer, too! Loads of deer. They don’t give you much trouble, but they really want the salt from your pee, so you have to be careful about where you go.

I was lucky enough to land in the town of Mount Shasta for the 4th of July parade! After that, it was back on trail, into the Castle Crag’s Wilderness, which was definitely super cool.

I jumped in a lake for the first time this trail! There were actually a lot of very cute little lakes in this area.

Unfortunately, we were dealing with the smoke from the Shelly Fire for this leg. It only got worse, and a somewhat significant chunk of the trail (about 50 miles) has been closed. We’re going to be skipping up to Siead Valley tomorrow. It’s a bummer, but nature is the greater force. Not much we can do.

This last segment has been a little rough. My sleeping pad got completely destroyed, so I’ve been sleeping on the ground for the past 2 nights. Don’t ever do that if you can avoid it, I wouldn’t wish a lack of sleep on my worst enemy. Anyway, I hope I won’t have to skip any more sections due to fire. Peace!

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Thoughts-We’re in Northern California NOW, Right?

It might seem like kind of a silly question, but I swear the answer is interesting. For anyone who doesn’t know, the PCT is divided into 5 major sections: Southern California, Central California, Northern California, Oregon, and Washington.

There’s no question about Oregon and Washington; Oregon starts when you leave California and ends when you get to Washington, which ends when you get to Canada. Southern California starts at the Mexican border, and Northern California ends at the Oregon border. But what about Central California? Where does it start and end? There’s no consensus. You would think there would be some official source on this, but there isn’t.

Opinion 1: FarOut

FarOut is a digital map, it uses GPS. Very useful for navigation. Basically every through hiker uses it, it’s like our bible. It says that Central California starts in Tehachapi (Mile 550) and ends in South Lake Tahoe (Mile 1090). From a “Vibes” standpoint, this makes sense. You feel like you’re out of the desert when you get to Tehachapi, and you feel like you’re out of the mountains when you get to South Lake Tahoe.

Opinion #2: Geography

You might argue that Central California is defined by the Sierra Nevada Mountains, and so it should start and end with the Sierras. In that case, it would go from Ridgecrest (Mile 650) to Belden (Mile 1290). This is a sort of a “erm actually 🤓” answer to the question. I don’t think many hikers really care about where the mountain range technically starts and ends: they care about trail conditions.

Opinion #3: The Pacific Crest Trail Association

The PCTA is the body that issues permits, coordinates trail maintenance, and puts out the latest information about trail closures. They define Central California as going from Kennedy Meadows South (Mile 700) to Truckee (Mile 1150). The point of view on this is kinda similar to FarOut. You’re not really in the mountains until you get to Kennedy Meadows, and you’re not really out of the mountains until you get to Truckee.

Opinion #4: The PCT data book

This is an unofficial guidebook, but it’s been going since like the 90s. They update it every few years, you get the idea. It says that central California goes from Kennedy Meadows (Mile 700) to Belden (Mile 1290). I don’t really get this? They might be basing it mostly off geography and a little bit off hiker needs and common sense.

Opinion #5: Hikers

We’re not a hive mind, obviously, but I have heard some common opinions. Pretty much everyone seems to regard Kennedy Meadows South (Mile 700) as the start of the Sierras. Some people view South Lake Tahoe (Mile 1090) as the end. One opinion that I heard a lot that wasn’t mentioned by any official source was that Kennedy Meadows North (Mile 1020) is the end. This is probably because that’s the first place where you can reasonably send your bear can home, which is a big deal for hikers.

Opinion #6: What do I think?

I agree with the PCTA. It’s personal for me: there was still plenty of snow up to that point, and I didn’t get rid of my bear can until then either. I didn’t want to have to rush through the desolation wilderness. Plus, there are some new restrictions in place. A bear can is gonna be required for more of the trail next year, so I think Truckee is gonna be the new spot to ditch your bear can.

Okay, I’m going to bed. Good night. 🌙

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Bonus Post! Flowers 3: Out From the Mountains

I didn’t realize how much of a flower picture backlog I had until I started making this post. I’m gonna have to do another one at some point, haha.

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Day 118: Burney Mountain Guest Ranch. 1240 miles from the Northern Terminus.

Hey, I’m back! It’s been a while. If there’s one thing you can say about Northern California, it’s that there’s no Wi-Fi. It’s been nice though, very flat.

Sierra City (mile 1200) was awfully small, but the Old Sierra City Hotel was cool. Always nice to find a hotel in a small town with an eccentric owner. The trail out of town featured a 3000 foot climb up to the Sierra Buttes, before it dropped down into the Plumas national forest. I’ve been seeing lots of little lakes and ponds on this section; it’s like Southern California, but not so dry. It’s very nice.

The only bad thing about this section has been the bushwhacking. As you can see, I’ve really had to fight my way through some vegetation in some places.

Belden Town Resort (mile 1290) has a reputation for being hiker friendly, but when I arrived there was an EDM festival going on. Belden is really in the middle of nowhere, so they can be as loud as they want as late as they want and nobody’s going to complain. When we left at 5:30 in the morning, the music was still going. I got surprisingly good sleep though? Leaving Belden, I passed the sign that marks where the Sierra Range ends, and the Cascade Range begins. I ran into Bohti, too! He’s feeling better, heading south now. I also reached a big milestone: the PCT midpoint! Halfway done, although I think the second half is gonna go faster than the first half.

I eventually got to the Highway 36, which leads to the town of Chester, but I didn’t stop there, instead pushing on to Lassen National Park. It’s a bit of a burn area, unfortunately. In fact, a lot of Northern California has been a burn area. I still got some cool photos though!

After Lassen was the town of Old Station. Like the last couple towns, it’s very small, and in the middle of nowhere. There’s an RV Park, a post office, a gas station, and that’s it. I was lucky enough to run into a nice family that fed me, and let me stay at their campsite free of charge. (I sent them a link to my blog, so if y’all are reading this, thanks again!)

I made this video after I left old station. It’s a cute lookout. One correction though: I say that Shasta is to the south, it is actually to the north. Lassen is to the south, and you can see it’s north face, Shasta is to the North, and you can see it’s south face.

I’ve been staying at the Burney Mountain Guest Ranch, I took a day off to recover. I was complaining that I hadn’t taken a day off in 200 miles back in South Lake Tahoe, but I hadn’t taken a proper day off in 300 miles for this last stretch! The terrain is a lot easier though, so it really wasn’t that bad. I’m gonna head out soon. My next stop is Dunsmuir, which is about 90 miles from here. Until then!

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Day 103: Truckee. 1495 miles from the Northern Terminus.

I’m not technically in the town of Truckee right now, I’m at a place called the Donner Ski Ranch. I hitchhiked down into Truckee, bought groceries, and hitched back to the trail. Everyone in town was very nice, lots of people asked about my hike and wished me well. I guess it’s been quite a while since my last post, I have a lot to update y’all on.

The section from Kennedy Meadows North to South Lake Tahoe wasn’t particularly interesting. The coolest thing about that section was that the trail finally started to get consistently snow free! We were also at 10,000 feet for the last time. The trail never goes higher than that again.

We were visited by a huge herd of deer one night, there must have been at least 15 of them. I tried to get a better picture, but ended up scaring them off.

We spent two and a half days in South Lake, I desperately needed the rest. We hadn’t taken a full day off in 200 miles! I saw a bear in town, which is funny, because I’ve yet to see one on the trail. After South Lake was the desolation wilderness, which was unbelievably cool.

The only bad thing about the desolation wilderness was the amount of times I headed down a side trail by accident and had to backtrack. I also got split up from my group, so it’s just me now. Maybe I’ll catch up to them. My pack is certainly lighter than it used to be, but they’re moving pretty fast. I have phone numbers, so we’ll keep in touch.

Past the Desolation Wilderness was pretty cool, too. There were some awesome ridge walks, beautiful valleys, views of South Lake Tahoe, all kinds of cool stuff.

One last thing: on the way out from Kennedy Meadows North, our driver told us about what they used to do with dead bodies in the old days. When someone died in the mountains, they would try to be respectful with the corpse, even though it was pretty much impossible to carry it out for a proper funeral. What they would do is they would stack rocks over the body so wild animals wouldn’t get to it. Well, we were 2 days out from Kennedy Meadows, got a little off trail, and stumbled across this:

I can’t say for sure that there’s a body buried here, but the stack sure looks man-made, and I don’t know why else it would have been constructed. If there is someone there, I hope they’re resting easy, whoever they were.

I’ll leave it here. Peace!

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Thoughts-Art and the Lack of Art

I don’t know who originally said this, but there’s a quote that goes “the only thing worse to an artist than creating art is not creating art.” Basically, making art is hard, but not doing so is unbearable.

When I first started this blog, I was always really excited to post on it. Everything felt so new and fresh, and I had so many different things I wanted to put on here. But as time has gone on, it’s gotten more and more difficult to write meaningful stuff. Sometimes I just want to write “I walked from point A to point B. Here’s some pictures.” I wouldn’t be happy with that, because it’s not interesting. It doesn’t have any value beyond just saying what happened. I want to give my posts a little juice, tell what I’m feeling, etc. I don’t know if that counts as making art, but it feels that way to me.

Don’t get me wrong, I love doing this blog. In fact, I have to do this blog. I couldn’t stand not doing it. I’m saying that doing it is difficult, because I want it to be GOOD. Not just for everyone reading it, but for me too. I hope that makes sense.

I’ve been inspired to some other artistic endeavors since I’ve been on trail. I wrote a bit of poetry, although I don’t think it’s all that good. Most of it is me complaining about how cold it is, or the snow, or whatever. Maybe I’ll post it on here someday.

I’m not normally the type of guy to write poetry. I guess the trail brought it out of me. I want to make more art, and I feel more confident about doing so. Maybe I’m just more confident in general. I didn’t believe that I would be changed by the trail in any significant way, but I think I was wrong about that.

I know this post has been rambling, it’s late and I’m tired and I should definitely go to bed right now. I have to hike from point A to point B tomorrow, haha.

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Day 94: Kennedy Meadows North. 1630 miles to the Northern Terminus.

This last section of the trail was hard. Less big mountains, sure, but a lot of creek crossings. Yosemite is might be beautiful, but it sure is wet.

We left the big group behind, so it’s just me, Peter, and Lt. Dan again. Going from the town of Mammoth to Tuolumne Meadows was pretty easy. Donahue Pass wasn’t much of a challenge. I even had the time to take a little detour, and go see Devil’s Postpile, a national monument.

Tuolumne Meadows and Yosemite in general we’re really cool. Huge granite domes, beautiful rivers and water falls, little cabins in the woods, all kinds of awesome stuff. I’ve got too many pictures!

We’re at the time of year when there’s still a lot of snow, but it’s hot enough that it’s melting really fast, and the rivers are all swollen. This makes the crossings a little bit tricky sometimes.

We’ve had a lot of struggles these last 70 miles. There weren’t anymore huge passes, but there were a bunch of smaller ones (Benson pass, Seavey pass, and Dorothy Lake pass) that were still physically challenging to go over, even though they weren’t technically challenging. Lt. Dan lost his sunglasses in a creek, which can be dangerous for snow blindness. Everyone’s feet were wet all the time, which is really not fun. There was also a lot of up and down in this last section. Go up somewhere really high, go down, and then go up again. Thankfully, it seems like it’s gonna get easier for us. Hopefully less snow on the ground in our future. The next stop is South Lake Tahoe, which will be really cool. I’ve been there before, so it’ll be interesting to return as a hiker. Until then, peace!

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Bonus Post! Sierra Critters.

I’ve seen some marmots and stuff, but the photos didn’t really fit in my main posts, so I’m putting them here .

The marmots weren’t scared of us at all-people definitely feed them, unfortunately. We saw and heard a lot of Pika, but they’re pretty elusive and don’t photograph very well.

I also saw this little rodent on the snow. Maybe some kind of weasel or marten? I’m not sure. There were some ducks up in the mountains as well, pretty high up too.

I haven’t seen any bears yet, but I’ve seen their poop.

Okay, I gotta go. Bye!

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Day 85: Mammoth. 1750 miles from the Northern Terminus.

Hiking like crazy right now! Big things are happening in the world of hiking.

The passes are really easy now. I didn’t need crampons for Piute or Selden Pass. I did use them for Silver Pass, but I didn’t REALLY need them. Selden Pass was named after Selden Stuart Hooper, a topographer.

I took a 360 video from the top of Silver pass, really nice views. While the passes have gotten easier, the river crossings have gotten more frequent.

As I mentioned in a previous post, and as you’ve seen in the pictures, it’s a party of 3 again now that we’ve got Peter. Yesterday we ran into a group of 5, so all 8 of us went into town together and got an Airbnb for super cheap. I don’t know if we’re all gonna stick together for this next section, but it would be cool if we did.

The lack of big mountains is more noticeable now. Sometimes I look off in the distance and see something other than a massive chunk of granite, which doesn’t sound that weird, but that’s all I’ve been seeing for the last 150 miles.

I’ll be leaving tomorrow, not going all that far on the first day. We’ll just be getting out of town. There’s still one big pass to go over, Donahue. After that, no major passes. I’m gonna end it here, I don’t have much else to talk about. Peace.

(This was supposed to be posted yesterday, oops!)

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Day 80: Bishop(again). 1820 miles from the Northern Terminus.

I’m back in Bishop! For anyone confused, the last time I was here I came off the trail via Kearsarge Pass. But that drops you off in the town of Independence, which doesn’t have much in the way of anything. So we got a ride up to Bishop. This time, we came off trail via Bishop Pass, which is near Bishop (unsurprisingly.)

I realized that I haven’t been talking much about these passes. They were definitely the focal point of this last stretch of trail, so I want to give a little more insight about what it’s like out here. One important thing to note is that to get on and off trail, you usually have to go over a pass. That side trail might be pretty far! For instance, the Piute Pass trail (which I’m doing tomorrow) is 17 miles! No joke. To get back on trail last time, we went back over Kearsarge Pass. It was named after the nearby Kearsarge mine, which was named after the USS Kearsarge, a US warship that sunk the CSS Alabama during the Civil war.

After getting back on trail, we decided to go for Glen Pass on the same day, which was a bad move, because the snow was really soft that time of day. We still got over it though! Glen pass was named after Glen Crow, a Forest Service Ranger. I have no idea why this ranger in particular got a pass named after him, but whatever.

The next day, we reached Pinchot Pass, so named for Gifford Pinchot, the first director of the Forest Service. We didn’t get as far as we would have liked on the first day, so we had the same problems with soft snow on the second day by the time we reached the pass. Worse still, as we were getting down from the pass, a thunderstorm rolled in. You don’t want to be in a thunderstorm when you’re holding a steel ice axe, so we took shelter under a tree while we waited for it to blow over.

Pinchot and Mather pass are kinda “twin” passes. It’s only 10 miles from Pinchot to Mather, and it doesn’t get that much lower when you’re between them. Mather has a reputation for being scary/dangerous/technical/whatever, but it really wasn’t that bad. We got there in the early morning for once, so the snow was rock hard, and we got over it no problem. Mather pass was named after Stephen Mather, the first director of the National Park Service. I took a 360 degree video so you can see the full view from up top.

To get back to town, as I previously mentioned, we went over Bishop pass. It was a piece of cake compared the other passes.

That’s pretty much it for major passes. There are still 4 biggish ones left for me: Piute, Selden, Silver, and Donahue. I would be doing Muir Pass next, but unfortunately there is a bridge outage, so I’m doing Piute Pass instead. There are some other passes, but they’re pretty small and not really worth mentioning.

We’ve lost a party member. Due to health issues, Bohti will be flipping up to Northern California to continue his hike. But Peter, another hiker who was with us briefly, will be joining up with us tomorrow. So that’s pretty cool! Alright, I should start thinking about bed. Peace!

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Day 74: Bishop. 1860 miles from the Northern Terminus.

Well, I’m in the mountains. It’s cold at night, I’m always walking on snow, there’s not as much oxygen up there, I can never find the trail because of all the snow, I have to wake up really early so I can walk on the snow while it’s still hard, I’m getting sunburned on the underside of my nose because of the light reflecting off the snow, the snow melts and then I have to walk through rivers of liquid snow, there’s lots of snow, you get the idea. At least the views are good.

I’m just joking around, don’t worry. Yes, this section of the trail is presenting me with new challenges, and I’m having to be more of a mountaineer. But if there were no challenges, my journey would be pretty boring. Plus this stuff will make for a great story in a couple years.

I’m hiking with a couple of people now, Lt. Dan and Bohti. You definitely don’t want to be walking up into the Sierras alone.

The first 50 miles or so out of Kennedy Meadows were pretty easy. It got quite a bit more difficult after that. Forester Pass, the highest point on the trail, was challenging physically, mentally, and emotionally. But we got through it, that’s what counts.

We were fortunate to get a ride into town, and I’ve been staying at a hostel for the last couple days. Tomorrow, me and Lt. Dan will be back out on trail, Sans Bohti. He hurt his leg and needs a little time to recover.

I have to go to bed, early start tomorrow. Much love to y’all.

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Day 62: Kennedy Meadows South. 1950 miles from the Northern Terminus.

I ended up not doing a post in Onyx, I was have some trouble with my blog and I wanted to get back on the trail. So I’m doing one now!

Getting out of hiker town was a little rough. It was very hot, flat, and exposed. There was some kinda cool walking, like this metal pipe and the aqueduct. I camped near a wind farm, which was unsurprisingly windy. After that, I got more up into the hills before dipping down into the town of Tehachapi.

Tehachapi was really cool. Everyone was very friendly, and I stayed at the hiker hut. Incredible place, it’s a shed that used to be an apple juicing operation. They had everything: complimentary food, beds, a kitchen, even bikes to ride around town on. My favorite stop on the trail by far.

The 100 miles from Tehachapi to Walker Pass were really cool. It started in the desert, then it moved into a wooded area, then a pine forest, then a desert full of Joshua trees, then another pine forest, but with different pine trees. Very cool. The only bad part of this section was when I got hailed on. When I got to Walker Pass, I went into the town of Ridgecrest, not Onyx, because Onyx doesn’t have a grocery store.

Getting back on trail after that really felt like the start of the Sierra Mountains. Great big exposed granite faces, big trees, more water. Kennedy Meadows is beautiful, although it isn’t much of a town. It’s just a store in the middle of nowhere, basically. Still a very nice place staffed by very nice people.

For anyone who isn’t aware, the PCT is divided into five sections: Southern California, Central California, Northern California, Oregon, and Washington. I’m thinking about doing something special on here, since I just finished the Southern California section. I’ll be headed into Central California soon, so the blog might get a little quieter. It really is the high country, and it might be a bit harder for me to get internet connection. I’ll be here for a while, so I’ll throw so stuff up before I leave. Until then, peace out!