7th May: Day 17 – Mile 306
My notes say “Bold food and TP assumptions were made when I skipped the last resupply. Will I reach Cajon Pass with any dignity?”
TP = toilet paper
Dignity = a commodity generally in short supply
8th May: Day 18 – Mile 328
I camp in a day-use only park at Silverwood lake with Animal, Pep Talk and Ben.
There’s a much talked about highway pizza takeaway place that’s willing to drive out to here, and also pick you up beer from a gas station on the way. Park rangers arrive, we assume to throw us out, but it’s actually to tell us we should go to the other car park to collect the pizza.
9th May: Day 19 – Mile 342
We reach Cajon Pass. The promised land. A highway crossing that has a McDonald’s, a Subway, and a gas station.
I buy 3 foot-longs from Subway – I explain to the Americans that under the European metric system this is considered perfectly normal and is called a metre-long.
10th May: Day 20 – Mile 359
Cool, windy, rain – nice break from the heat. The news is talking about the odd weather for May we’ve had – quite a few storms. This will continue throughout May – by the time we get to the Sierra, the snow will be at record levels in places. But we don’t know that yet, and still think it might melt.
I leave Animal at Cajon Pass. We assume we won’t see each other again, because he is going slower to hit the Sierra later. In fact, I will see him again in about 1400 miles – he will flip to Canada and come back south, and we’ll meet going in opposite directions in Oregon.
I camp with Pep Talk and Ben, who let me moan on about the pains of hospital administration for a long time before they mention they are both hospital clinicians. I think we’ll be walking together on and off for a while, but actually I never see them again.
11th May: Day 21 – Mile 384
25 miles and 6000 ft ascent to get over Mount Baden Powell.
Hard work getting through the deep snow. Rick – an ultra marathon runner doing 30 or more a day – catches up to me a few miles after the summit and expresses his amazement at how fast I went up. I realise later (but I don’t tell him) it’s because I had full length steel crampons on while he was going up just in trainers.
12th May: Day 22 – Mile 406
Weird day walking along a highway, due to an endangered frog diversion. It’s closed at one end due to snow, so the LA kids with high performance cars come out here to drive up and down it at high speed. Presumably there are bonus points for clipping a thru-hiker.
13th May: Day 23 – Mile 430
I camp with Ramble and Short Sticks. A young couple from opposites ends of the US, who met on the Appalachian Trail last year, and have continued the dream with the PCT this year. They are a bit disappointed with the people/community spirit on the PCT compared to the AT (present company, I confidently assume, excepted).
Our plans seem quite different but I’ll end up seeing them every few hundred miles until Ashland, Oregon (mile 1717).
14th May: Day 24 – Mile 444
KOA campground. First chance to use a washing machine in almost 4 weeks walking under the Californian sun. I’m excited….
…there’s no hot water. The washing machine stirs my clothes around in cold water, marinading them in their own horror. I write in my notes “now everything smells of bad socks”.
These are famous big rocks. But can’t work it out. They’re near, but don’t think these actually are, Vasquez Rocks
15th May: Day 25 – Mile 464
Through a drainage tunnel under a highway and into the town of Agua Dulce. In a desperate attempt to solve my ongoing calorie intake issue, I start eating meat and also a jar of raspberry, white fudge and dark chocolate peanut butter – it remains unclear which was the more immoral.
I also made a film crew in town retake a scene because I stood in their shot and drunk a litre of milk. They’d said to carry on as normal while they shot, just don’t look into the camera – however, think I pushed too far on their concept of normality.
16th May: Day 26 – Mile 486
My notes say “Heavy rain and hail – many stayed sulking in their tents”
Probably another storm adding snow to the Sierra.
There’s more adventure to be had in a rain storm than the desert heat, so I’m sort of happy. I roll the dice on not wearing waterproof clothes – basically, will the rain stop and the sun warm you up before hypothermia. This time I win (just) – next time I roll that dice will be more embarrassing.
Presumably because of the rain, I only take this one photo.
They’ll never find me.
17th May: Day 27 – Mile 503
In terrible pain today. Have been trying not to walk more than 20 miles a day because of injuries I started the trail with, and now wondering if even that was too far. Maybe I won’t be able to do this.
I camp with Renaissance. Things get off to a good start when the person I refer to as his girlfriend actually turns out to be his mum.
18th May: Day 28 – Mile 517
Tomorrow, we cross the Mojave.
Today, Hikertown.
Today, Hikertown.
The story goes something like this.
Richard is an LA movie guy involved in LA county politics. He thinks he has advance information that they will build a city on the edge of the Mojave so he buys up a lot of land there. But then the city never gets built.
He finds a load of hobos on the land and goes to chase them off, but when they turn out to be rich, privileged hikers looking for water (because the PCT runs next to his land), he builds hikertown for them. For some reason he builds it to resemble a highly unconvincing Wild West film set.
This is the world I walk in to today. Richard makes me and Tables blueberry pancakes and tells us that Wee Vill, the other place hikers stay around here, is the meth capital of the county. He offers to drive us to a shop in his Ferrari, but first he has to drive us to Wee Vill to show us the methed our horror of it all (it looks fine). At the shop (which he also owns) he shows us the caretaker of Hikertown’s Emmy… basically, this is a weird place.
There are a lot of hikers here. Most memorable are probably Jay and Silent Bob – a guy and a dog (whose real name is Cairos, I’ve forgotten the guy’s real name). They are planning to go through the Sierra – after I’ve been through I will realise this is totally impossible with a dog – but am very pleased (and stunned) when I meet them again in Oregon and find out they did actually make it.
I sleep in a sort of shed because a storm is coming in. There is a hole in the roof which leaks directly on to my face.
Sage bushes covered in butterflies – 2019 was a big year for painted lady migration.
A storm approaches a leaky shed.
19th May: Day 29 – Mile 549
32 miles across the desert today – with a big storm rolling in, the subject of national news.
I’m in my tent before it hits, but it’s difficult to get pegs into the ground, and there’s not space to get my guys up properly – I have to get out in the middle of the storm to tie one end of my tent to a tree stump. Lively times.
I’ll meet Renaissance again in Tehachapi in a few days – he’s waiting for a new tent to be delivered, this storm broke his previous one.
20th & 21st May: Day 30 & 31 – Mile 559
32 miles across the desert today – with a big storm rolling in, the subject of national news.
I’m in my tent before it hits, but it’s difficult to get pegs into the ground, and there’s not space to get my guys up properly – I have to get out in the middle of the storm to tie one end of my tent to a tree stump. Lively times.
I’ll meet Renaissance again in Tehachapi in a few days – he’s waiting for a new tent to be delivered, this storm broke his previous one.
All you need for a resupply…