Day 20: Mile 328 to 342   (14 miles)

Last night was a windy one! Crawled out of my tent and quickly got packed up. Was excited to get into Cajon Pass today. Started hiking and it was one of those days where the sun came out for a little bit and then was covered up by the clouds for long periods of time. Once I got up in elevation a little bit, I was able to look back at Silverwood Lake which I hadn’t seen the night before. Early in the afternoon I spent a lot of the time walking down the backbone of the hills where you don’t want to fall off the left or the right side of the trail. It was super windy all day and it felt like a day I didn’t need to wear my hat with all the cloud cover as well.  I would walk at an angle with my body leaned into the wind just so I can walk straight down the trail. I quickly got down off the ridge and through Crowder Canyon and reached Cajon Pass which greeted me with a PCT sign that pointed to McDonald’s. I need to get a lot of calories so I headed to McDonald’s which is where almost every single hiker goes once arriving in Cajon Pass.

(Coming down the backbone towards Cajon Pass)

I joined a bunch of hikers at McDonald’s and enjoyed a few things off the dollar menu. Finally had reception again and noticed that there was a weather advisory in place for Wrightwood and the mountains in the area. There was talk about a bunch of snow or rain coming in depending on your elevation. From what we heard others were doing, everyone was getting hotels at either Cajon Pass or Wrightwood to wait out the storm. I decided to call around and found out that every hotel but one was booked full. I managed to find an opening at the Cedar Lodge in Wrightwood. When I said I would think about it and call them back because she made it sound like the snow wouldn’t happen. Seth and Malia arrived in town a short time later and was surprised to see how I had gotten so far ahead of them. While I was talking to them about the weather, the owner of the Cedar Lodge called me back to inform me it had actually started to snow up in Wrightwood and wanted to give me a heads up, specially after telling me it probably wont snow. When Seth and Malia discovered I had got one of the last rooms in the area, they quickly decided to join me in Wrightwood to wait out the storm.

We went to the highway to try and hitch a ride up to town and it didn’t take more then two minutes and we had a ride from a really nice guy who works on creating new electric car motors. He didn’t believe me about it snowing up in town and was completely shocked when he saw snow falling as we approached the town. We quickly checked in and went out for dinner at a Mexican place in town. I know there are some people stuck up on the mountain about 1,400 feet above us and I can only imagine what it’s like for them.  (BTW – no hat backfired a little. I got a nice sunburn across my whole neck!)

(In Wrightwood)

(Top down? Umbrellas can fix that in the snow)

Day 21: – Zero miles

Today I took my first zero which means you don’t hike at all.  Seth and Malia where planning on hitching back to Cajon Pass to get back on the trail this morning. I am going to wait as I need to pick up a couple packages including my DSLR Nikon camera which I forwarded to myself up the trail to save some weight early on. Crunchmaster and Stonefoot came in this morning. They were stuck up in the snow last night and they were freezing. I offered them to come in and warm up. They had mentioned how they were interviewed by the news as they came off the mountain and we were able to find the interview online. (You can watch it here, skip to about 00:45) I hope to get pictures from them but they had some epic pictures of what they looked like the day before in the snow. Imagine a huge beard and one half of it completely frozen and snow covered from the blowing snow. Looked awesome!

(Some of the snow about 500 feet above us during the melt)

It was a nice relaxing day getting a few things done that I needed to and not rushing to get back on the trail yet. I plan to slack pack from Cajon Pass to Wrightwood so I can go much faster and get back on the trail and not be to far behind most of the hikers. I want to keep ahead of the big swarm of hikers who are about a week behind me still.

Day 22: 342 to 369   (27 miles) 

Stonefoot and Crunchmaster took off today back on the trail and I packed up and got out of my room.  I got to slack pack from mile 369 back to mile 363 and town the Acorn trail back into Wrightwood early on which took almost no time at all. I decided to head over to the public library where I could get internet and watch the Sultan boys team play their playoff game which was a home game vs Meridian! They stream all their home games live so it was a great chance to watch them play. I had already secured a ride for the rest of my slack packing and was ready to go. The high school game was a roller coaster and after a 0-0 first half, I watched Sultan fall behind early in the second half. Thanks for a PK awarded to Sultan with nine minutes remaining, the game was tied up and went into overtime and a shootout. Sultans keeper made a huge save on the first PK and the all of the shooters converted to give Sultan another playoff victory and send them into the bi-districts.

I got in touch with my ride and quickly got back down to Cajon Pass where myself and my two water bottles quickly started the run up the mountain. The 21 miles did not come easy as that was a steep climb! But with no pack, it seemed so much easier had I been hiking with the pack. Once back in town I was offered a place to stay for the night by a guy named Curtis. He had never hosted a hiker before but himself and his kids have always wanted to. I decided to take him up on the offer and thought if he got a good impression on hikers on the PCT, he might enjoy helping out other hikers who may be in need. I went over to his house we had a couple beers and talked about the trail and lots of hiking in general. His kids were awesome and it was nice to get to talk to them a little and get to know them and what its like living in a small mountain town. I had a nice futon to sleep on and Curtis also had offered me a ride up to the trail in the morning. Ready to keep on moving.