- Date: 2023-06-09
- Pct day: 35
- Start: Mile 454
- End: Mile 480
- Distance: 26 Miles
- Ascent: 5200 feet
- Descent: 3536 feet
- Start name: Serenity’s Oasis
- End name: Grass Mountain Road
- Wake up: 04:45
- Start hiking: 06:30
- At camp: 06:45
- In bed: 20:00
- Where I slept: tent
- Shower: no
Key moments
- had my first early morning in a while - always hard to get up in the cold!
- A few of us hikers were milling about the campsite this morning - Diamond Dave was up, he said he wanted to make sure he got to say goodbye to us. He was heading off trail, said he’s got some things to deal with back home, and that he might see us in Oregon. Diamond Dave is 72 years old and a former NFL player. Super nice dude. He has lost 30 pounds so far on the trip, said he was back to his NFL weight. He said it’s been great hiking and seeing us about town and on the trail, and I gave him a hug. I hope he is going ok, he’s a pretty amazing dude. It was very sweet that he got up to say goodbye to us, I could tell it was an emotional moment for him, and it was for me too.
- I am going to hike with the cowboys - a trail family I met in Aqua Dulce, a bunch of really nice guys
- However I couldn’t quite keep up with their pace - they are fast movers,
- Had a nice chat to Clouds about music and he showed me an amazing piece performed by a cellist who later developed MS and couldn’t play anymore, very haunting
- Came across Jeremy and Kristi and Meike and Hannes out on the trail - it was good to see familiar faces. Sometimes you don’t know if that will be the last time you see those people, so every goodbye to me feels a bit like this could be it.
- I did about 16 miles by 1pm and then it was just 8 miles to camp - but I found these last miles a bit rough - hot spots on my feet were turning into blisters and the day was just dragging out
- I made it up to camp just past the fire station up the hill, to a very windy campsite, my friends had actually moved down the road around the corner to get away from the wind but they said that perhaps this wasn’t an ideal spot as it was still windy - so I went back to where we planned to camp and set up in a very windy spot, but it felt nice to be in a sheltered tent
- The cowboys are doing a 28 mile day tomorrow - I’m not sure my blisters are cut out for this kind of mileage. I want to be that good but I also need to listen to my feet
- I even had phone reception! Which was great as I could catch up on posting this blog a bit, and even managed to have a phone call with Katie and do the trivia together.
- My friend Max suggested I take a short day tomorrow and head to the Ostrich Farm - I’m kind of tempted to be honest!
- But also the phone is it’s own vortex, and now it’s late
- Also throughout the day I spent a lot of time wandering on the ways I could cut weight from my bag
Plan from here
- I’m not sure - I’m keen to see if I could pull of a 28 mile day but I think my feet are in a bit of a state so I might need to see how I go.
Animals sighted
Gear thoughts
- I love my FF flicker wide
Physical condition
- left foot inside of foot,
- Left ball of my foot feels like a hotspot is forming
- A bit hungry?
Thoughts and Observations
- it’s hard to stay on top of all this blogging and stuff!
- I think I need to focus on being more present - I spend a bit of time while hiking thinking through my pack weight and ways to cut weight and where to do that and what the trade offs would be
- I also spend a lot of time trying to do the calculus of hiking the sierras - where to maybe skip up to, how long the next sections will take
- I think ultimately it’s about taking things day by day. I want to take more breaks tomorrow, get in tune with my body, do some stretching, meditate. I was expecting the hard part of this hike would be the blisters and the physical pain. Sometimes it feels like I’m just out here surviving. But it is very pretty here, and i think this anguish and these challenges are kind of what make this an adventure. Working through adversity promotes growth, I just hope I can learn from it as I go, and take some of those learnings back with me when I come home.
Some of the bad things
- honestly it’s really exciting to be hiking with a group, but it wasn’t as fun to not be able to keep up. It’s funny, I feel like I have a reasonable pace back home but by PCT standards I am firmly in the middle of the pack here. I guess I am with a relatively elite bunch of hikers who are all keen to crush big distances
- everyone is really nice - which in some ways makes it harder to meet and say goodbye to these awesome people.
Quotes of the day
- every trail shit is an emergency shit
#pct #pct2023 #pctclassof2023
