Everything is going great except I hear that the “herd” is only a day away. Apparently they aren’t moving too swiftly so it may be possible to get in front of them.
Month: May 2007
Hey from Cajon Pass (mile 342)
The trail is great! I think I should do this every summer, it makes me so happy to be here.
The weather has been great but I usually find some shade and take a long nap during the hotest times and hike early in the morning and late into the cool night.
Water has not been a problem; the regular water sources are all flowing.
I lay out under the stars most nights to sleep. Some nights, I find a hiker to join me in good conversation and lots of laughs.
The desert is blooming with sweet smelling flowers.
Yesterday, a woman at a road crossing gave me a root beer float.
I have been trying hard not to get sucked into the towns, but the wonderful Best Western at Cajon Pass has sucked me in for a night of hot baths, iced feet, tv and a big bed.
I always feel at home on the PCT. It’s 2700 miles of great views, fun people and a beautifully built trail that a person can just hike, hike, hike.
I take every break right on the trail and often long naps yet only once have I had to move aside to let a person pass. The world is lucky to have such a fine unpopulated trail.
Hey from Julian (mile 78)
I arrived in Campo, Monday, on the evening bus, and started my hike. About 11pm, as I was happily hiking along, an aircraft flew over me and turned it’s spotlight on me. I waved.
The trail is beautiful and I’m very happy to be here. Despite the drought, everything is green and the desert is blooming.
The weather is great and I have been able to sleep under the stars every night without any bug problems.
My feet are doing fine. The two pair of shoes idea is working out great. I hike mostly in Chacos but when my feet get tired I switch into running shoes and give them a break.
I hitched into Julian this morning, and plan on hanging out here until evening, then start hiking the San Felipe hills tonight.
Not many hikers out here, but some. The guy at the Mt Lagna store said that he had thrown the hiker box away because he thought that all the hikers had gone through already.
Why did it take me so long to get back here?
Goodbye little cabin
I left my cabin Friday and headed to Portland. Besides going in to the little nearby town, it’s the first time I went anywhere in about 7 months. That’s a long time for me and I was happy to be going.
I’m staying at my son’s place. He lives on the tenth floor of a downtown apartment building. It’s a big change but it has a surprisingly tranquil feel to it. Having the use of a bathtub has been a nice treat.
Tomorrow morning I fly to San Diego and if all goes well, I should make it on the trail by evening.
No Trespassing signs
Just because someone nails up a no trespassing sign, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you can’t legally go there. For one thing, they may not even own the land. Often federal and state land is leased to people. Often these people begin to see the land as their own. These leases are really cheap, for instance to lease 640 acres may only cost a thousand dollars a year, but it doesn’t mean that they get to keep hikers out. I have been told by a guy who leases state land in Washington that it doesn’t give him the right to keep hikers off of it… it only gives him the right to run his cows on it and he can also restrict vehicles from coming on to the leased land.
Another thing to check is the how the land is taxed. Most of the time people who own large tracks of land have their land put it open space or forestry. This is so they pay very little taxes on their property. My neighbors chose to go with forestry because they said to go with open space would mean that anyone could come on their land. Also, even if you don’t have the right to come on private land you may have the right to use private roads that go through private land.
Resupply schedule for the Sierras–how to get through the Sierras with a 4-day bear canister.
The section through the Sierras is supposed to be rife with hungry bears. For this reason, there are lots of rules about food storage . In 2001, there were lots of rules too, but most thru-hikers ignored them and instead lived by their own rules which were: 1.Don’t cook where you camp 2.Don’t camp in established campsites, and 3. Sleep with your food. I didn’t see any bears in the Sierras that year, although I did see lots of bear poo.
Apparently the bears are more plentiful and aggressive this year and so there is a lot of persistent and emotional scuttlebutt flying around saying that you must absolutely have a bear canister. This is no small problem for people. Since many people carry 10 days, or more, worth of food through the Sierras because to resupply at
Independence means hiking eighteen off trail miles.
The bear canisters are heavy. The lightest ones are made by Bearikade. They weigh 1lb 15oz(878 grams) for the 6 day model and 2lbs 5oz(1048 grams) for the 9 day model but 
they cost 250.00 and 275.00 dollars. They do have a rental program, but that isn’t cheap either.
The other one is Bear Vault. Bearvaults weighs 2lbs 1 oz(935 grams)for the 4 day model and 2lbs 9 oz(1162 grams) for the 7 day model and cost between 60 and 80 dollars. They have discontinued their rental program but they will sell you a 7 day Bear Vault canister for 65 dollars and ship it free to Kennedy Meadows, Echo Lake or Tuolumne Meadows. Bear Vault purchase program for PCT hikers.
If I decide to go with the four day model, here is how I could do it without putting in a bunch of off trail miles and backtracking to resupply:
- Leave Kennedy Meadows with 2 days worth of food in bear canister (mile 702.8)
- Hike down Trail Pass(744.8) to Horseshoe Meadows campground and hitch hike out to resupply at Lone Pine. Get 6 days of food–4 days in the canister, 2 days in food bag.
- From Horseshoe Campground take Cotton wood pass(749.6) back up to the PCT–this way there is no backtracking.
- The first night, camp either at Wallace creek(770.4), (774.3), or Tyndall Creek(775) and use the bear boxes there, to store food in.
- The next night camp at Rae Lakes(794.8) and use the bear box there. (Actually, by the end of this day, I would only have four days of food left so I could camp anywhere)
- Hike the next 4 days using my bear canister.
- Resupply Vermilion Valley Resort(877.2)–get 1.5 days of food
- Resupply Reds Meadow (906.6)or Mammoth Lakes.– get 1.5 days of food
- Resupply Tuolumne Meadows (941.6) get 3 days of food
- Resupply Sonora Pass(1018.3)Either at North Kennedy Meadows or Bridgeport. If I go to Bridgeport, I think I could send the food canister and ice ax home. Get 3.5 days worth of food.
- Mail bear canister home or back to rental place from Echo Lake(1094.5).
Update: I made it the whole 200 miles from Kennedy Meadows to Reds Meadow with a Bear Vault 350. I was able to pack 20,000 calories into it. I also met a guy carrying a map entitled, “Sierra Nevada Wilderness food storage requirements” using that map he was able to legally make it through the Sierras without carrying a bear canister.
Related Post: Figuring out how much food to bring on a hike
Still waiting……
This is getting painful–sitting here waiting for the day I get on the trail, while reading journals of everyone who is already out there. I’m going with a late start to avoid the crowds and because I don’t want to hit the Sierras too early. It’s not really late but it seems like it because everyone else is so early.
Even though I have lots of thing to do, like clean my cabin, go to the dump, and wash my sleeping bag, I just laid on my couch all day and thought about all the things I still need to do.
Someday, I hope I will be so together that I will just wake up one morning, pickup my pack, walk out the door, and go on a long hike without obsessing over the details or making a to do list.
My GPS
I bought the Garmin60c GPS to hike the CDT(Continental Divide Trail), after being told by a past thru-hiker that I would spend days lost if I didn’t carry a mapping GPS. The difference between a mapping GPS and regular GPS is that you can load it full of topo maps and then see where you are on the map. I wouldn’t have wanted to be out there without it.
It comes with a non deletable world map with all the major roads shown. Then you can add what maps you want, to it, from either a topo cd or you can go more urban and go with city maps. The topo maps show all water sources including wells. They show the mountains, contour lines, elevations, trails, roads and public institutions such as schools and fire houses. I have never had the city maps but I think they tell you about services in the cites like restaurants and stores. I don’t know if you can put both topos and city maps together. The map CD’s don’t come with the GPS and are an additional expense.
I was able to put all the topo maps for the entire CDT, plus about a fifty mile radius around the trail in it and still had room to spare. Right now, I have the topos for the entire state of Washington and most of Oregon it it. You can easily add markers on the unit and then push the goto button and it will navigate you there, either on roads or as the crow flies, which ever you choose. You can zoom in and out for more or less detail.
Garmin claims a 30 hour battery life. I used lithium batteries and got much longer then that. It was so efficient that I often hiked with it on all day . There is a model that has a compass that doesn’t have as long a battery life, but I think you can turn off the compass. This model has a compass but it doesn’t work unless you are moving.
I haven’t had any problems with it from getting it wet. I hike with it in the rain and strap it to the top of my kayak when I go out for a paddle.
It also tells you lots of other information like elevation, moving speed, timed stopped, etc.
I now have a little case for it. When I was on the CDT I didn’t have a case so I just taped some clear packing tape on the screen to protect it from getting scratched, which worked great, is light, and cheap.
It comes with a little strap and a clip. On the clip, you push a button and the unit comes unclipped from the clip. I loop the GPS through my backpack strap with the strap and then clip it my backpack using the clip. That way if the one of them should fail the other will hold it on.
It weighs 6.75 ounces(192 grams) with lithium batteries, 8.05 ounces(228 grams) if you add the case and clip.
After a month of constant use, the zoom button quit working. I sent it back to Garmin and they replaced the unit.
As is the way of electronics, now Garmin makes one that gets better signal in trees and canyons and has removable storage: the Garmin 60cx. It also looks like Garmin started making my model in a gray scale version, the Garmin 60, that will do everything mine does except without color and is considerably less than what I paid.
I’m not bringing it on the PCT, but when I hike the CDT I’ll definitely bring it. Since on the CDT the trail is often just not there.
One day on the CDT, on a hill, with the wind blowing about 35 miles an hour, I got out all my navigational aids: Jonathan Ley’s maps, Jim Wolf’s guide book, the National Forest Service map and my GPS with a past hiker’s way points in it, and tried to figure out which way to go. I knew that I wasn’t following the “official” CDT but until that moment, I didn’t realize that Jonthin Ley’s route, the guide book and my way points were all following different routes…and at that moment, I wasn’t on any of them.
I saw on my GPS, a place ten miles away that was in my guidebook so I just pointed my GPS towards where I wanted to go and took off hiking. As I set out on my own route, walking over the grassy hills, I thought, “I am happier, now, than I have ever been in my whole life.”