Day 10: PUDs, Muir Magic, and Paradise Burgers

Date: Fri 4/27

PCT Start Mile: 134.8 (on trail camping)

PCT End Mile: 154.5 (on trail camping)

PCT Mileage for Day: 19.7

Off-Trail Hike Mileage: 1

Total PCT Mileage: 154.5

Total Overall Mileage: 162.34

The Highlights: steep inclines, PUDs, Muir Woods magic, Paradise Valley Cafe, and our first successful hitch

Since it was mentioned yesterday in a comment that a friend (looking at you, Katie B.) was unsure of where we were going to the bathroom, let me tell you a story about this morning.

I was up early looking for a place to poop. Bet you didn’t think I’d start an entry with that. At almost 5:30am, only a weak light filled the sky and I brought my headlamp, mostly for looking for animals (primarily rattlesnakes) before I popped a squat. I walked down the trail a ways away from the area where several of us were camping and looked for a place I could duck into the brush.

Proper trail etiquette is to #2 at least 100 feet from the trail. This is almost impossible in most the areas we have hiked through. Half the time mountain is on one side of you and the cliff on the other. The other half, the desert scrub is so dense you could never make it that far from the trail. An added pressure for this morning’s jaunt is that I could barely see anything and I was terrified of finding a rattlesnake while my pants were down and having a City Slickers situation on my hands. All this to say, I did not make it the desired distance from the trail.

Another part of #2 etiquette when in the wilderness is that you dig a hole of at least 6″ to do your business in, and then fill in the hole. Bury your business. So… have you tried to dig a hole in the desert? Sometimes the ground is nice and soft. Sometimes it is hard as a rock. My Duece of Spades was ready. The Duece of Spades is a small lightweight trowel for digging a cathole. I found a spot and started digging my hole. It was like digging at concrete with a plastic spoon. I was going nowhere. “It’s very cold out here, snakes!”, I mumbled to myself, “stay in your holes!” I walked further into the brush and found another spot. Softer… Dig, dig, dig… ugh. I could only get about 3″ before the ground was rock hard again. It would have to do because I had to GO. I finished my business, covered it with dirt, and ran back out to the trail. And by ran, I mean treaded very lightly, scanning the underside of every bush for rattlers. Not as LNT (leave no trace) as I would have liked to be, but sometimes you just have to do the best you can. I like when my #2s coincide with soft ground and nice bushes to hide behind. Better luck next time.

For those still reading, on with our day. With another big mile day ahead and our afternoon break at Paradise Valley Cafe for the proclaimed BEST burger on the PCT, we got an early start. The trail walk to the road to Paradise Valley Cafe was 17 miles, plus another mile down the road to the cafe. So, we had some walking to do.

The morning started nice and cool, with shaded trail, and I shoved Pop Tart crumbles into my mouth as we walked. After some flat and rolling downhill bits, the trail eventually began to climb. The ascents were more steep than any of our previous days. Or maybe I was just tired. No, they were definitely more steep. And after a few hours it was getting very hot.

We had decided we’d take our lunch break when we hit 12 miles, or the closest nice shady spot to that point; however a little after 10 miles in, we found Muir Woods. Muir Woods is a little oasis set up by a trail angel named Mary on a piece of her property that abuts the trail. Three hikers from South Korea were packing up their stuff when we stumbled in.

Muir Woods had an awesome covered shaded area with two picnic tables, a water tank, a large water cooler with clean potable water, a clean outhouse (Taj Mahal compared to Mike’s), a small shower stall (from water jug) with soap, a trash can for us to empty our trash, and even a small library. She even had a rail and buckets set up for anyone that might be doing the trail on horseback, the only other mode of transportation allowed on the trail besides walking.

The best part was the picnic tables in the shade. When you’re out on the trail, you end up doing everything sitting on the ground. Resting, eating, napping, etc. A simple chair becomes such a luxury. And to have a table to eat your lunch? Just icing on the cake.

Several other hikers trickled in, all of whom we’d met over the past several days. Several of them were from our start date, others had started on earlier dates and were taking it slower. As we hike, the bubble of hikers around us continuously changes as people of different paces hike ahead or drop behind or people take different rest days. We are constantly meeting new people. You never know if you will see a particular hiker again in a few hours, a few days, or if it will be the last time you see them at all.

Everyone lingered in the shade. No one made use of the water jug shower. It was nearly pointless, we still had several hours of hiking in front of us and we’d get dirty again immediately.

A little after 12pm, Shawn and I headed out. I was immediately sad we’d left the shade. It was scorching. My umbrella went up, and – like much of the morning – we went up and down a roller coaster of PUDS– Pointless Ups and DownS – before continually ascending. At the top of our ascent, we looked down into the valley and saw the road that would take us to Paradise Valley Cafe. 15 minutes later, we were fruitlessly attempting to hitch the mile down the road to the Cafe. Having come down the trail with two other hikers, it would be nearly impossible. It’s always easier to hitch when you are only one or two people. Four is very difficult. Ugh. We walked the mile down the road to Paradise.

After walking on dirt trails for ten days, it’s amazing how hard concrete and asphalt surfaces suddenly feel under your feet. We attempted to stay along the shoulder. Everyone’s feet pretty much hurt all the time. When will our feet stop hurting all the time? We wonder. Ever? It’s amazing the myriad of ways your feet can hurt. Blister pain and generally sore soles of the feet are the most common, but we are all slowly finding all kinds of other parts of our feet that want in on the pain train. And sometimes these parts – muscles, tendons, even bones – change daily. Today, in addition to the bottom of my feet being sore, the tops decided they wanted to be sore too. And the toes. Nearly all of my toes other than the big ones felt like they had cramps or that the tendons were being pulled on each one. They felt this way the majority of the day and it was very painful. Needless to say, I was happy to sit down at Paradise Valley Cafe.

Taking a load off, literally – all the hiker packs were lined up outside the cafe, we found outside seating next to the rest of the hiker crowd and were soon stuffing our faces. Most people went with giant burgers, though Electro Daddi (imagine a heart for the dot of the “i”) got a burrito that was the biggest most of us had ever seen. I haven’t gotten the story on how he acquired this trail name yet. I was so full when I finished my burger that I hated myself. A few fries remained on the plate when the waitress returned. “Finished with this?”, she asked. Yes, get it away from me.

We all lingered, ordering beverage refills and filling up on water, not yet wanting to leave. In addition to drinking plenty, we also had all of our water bottles and bags filled at the cafe, which they very generously are happy to do for us in their kitchen. This will probably be our last water source until Idyllwild (~30 miles) unless we want to go significantly off trail, which we will if we have to, but would rather not.

From here, some of us were heading back to the trail and others were planning to hitch directly to Idyllwild because they weren’t interested in taking the alternate trail that was necessary to get to Idyllwild via foot. Heading north, after about 15 miles on the trail, the remainder of the PCT to Idyllwild (~10 miles) was closed due to a fire a few years ago. The detour around this fire closure is an alternate route that involves a combination of other trails and some roads. The alternate is about 15 miles. Some don’t consider it to be “part of the PCT”, so skip it. In our personal opinions, this is silly. The PCT changes all the time due to things like fire closures or other reasons, and our opinion is that if a section of the PCT is closed and there is an alternate available, then the alternate becomes the PCT the year you hike it. If you are here to do a “thru hike” then you hike from Mexico to Canada, not hitch because you don’t consider something to be the “real” PCT. There may be some sections in our future that are closed and there is absolutely no alternate route. Of course in this situation we would have to hitch forward, but it is our goal to do a continuous a walk as possible from Mexico to Canada. This said, there is no extra credit for off trail miles into towns. For this, we definitely hitch! 😆

Though I wasn’t looking forward to the mile walk down the road, we head out around 5pm. Luckily for us, we got a hitch immediately, reaffirming my faith in Americans! It turned out they were Germans. Naturally, we had much better luck with foreigners picking us up, even in our own country. Many other countries have much better hitching cultures. What made it doubly nice that they picked us up, other than the fact that they were on vacation, was they barely even had enough room to squeeze us into their car. They were heading to Joshua Tree National Park and on the short drive, we gave them some tips for hikes and scenic points in the park, having just been there in January. We thanked them for the ride and we were back on the trail.

Back on the trail, my belly was happy but I was moving slow. We weren’t going too much further for the day and I was in no particular rush. The first mile of the trail was beautiful, easy flat walking and light rollers with lots shade and nice trees. Nature is neat! Life is great!

After this first mile… or maybe it was only the first half mile… my feet and toes started to hurt again. Life was not great… everything was going uphill and everything was rocky. I was moving like a snail. Shawn had gone ahead to find a tent site and waited for me on the trail after finding one that was a bit more protected from the wind than most. Reaching the site, I dropped my stuff and immediately removed my shoes (always priority #1 for me), before helping set up the tent.

I made quick work of getting myself and my stuff organized and into the tent. Shawn commented that there should be a great sunset tonight. “Take pictures for me!”, I said. I am not getting back on my feet until tomorrow.

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