Day 84: Hot Steep Climbs
Date: Tues 7/10
PCT Start Mile: 1207.3
PCT End Mile: 1232.1
PCT Mileage for Day: 24.8
Total PCT Mileage: 1232.1
The Highlights: lots of climbing
Today was not my favorite day.
As usual, plenty of great scenery – especially in the first half of the day – but between the heat, the long steep climbs, the overgrown sections of trail scratching and itching my legs, and the biting flies, I was not loving the day.
I know, I know… in the words of our friend Dead Zone, “waah, waah, nature’s too beautiful”. I’m surrounded by beauty and all I can do is complain. But, hiking day in and day out, I think it’s safe to say that not every day is going to be a favorite.
We had a very slow start to our day. While we got started at 6am as usual, after just over three miles of climbing, we stopped when we got cell service to take care of a few things – like ordering new shoes to towns up the trail – and some other online stuffs.
Before we knew it an hour had gone by, so we were 2 hours but only 3.1 miles into our day.
Later down the trail, we spent extra time bushwhacking to find a spring, and then half a mile later Shawn discovered he left his trekking pole at the aforementioned spring, and had to go back and get it.
All this and a few other slow ups, and we’d only hiked about 10 miles by the time we stopped for lunch around noon. Back in the desert, this would have been normal, or even above average some days, but since leaving the Sierras, we’ve been pushing bigger miles and typically aim for positive miles for the day, getting more than half of our miles in before our lunch break. This was not happening today.
This in mind, we kept our lunch break fairly short. The afternoon was a rollercoaster of steep climbs – mostly short – from 1-2 miles, but they seemed to just keep coming. The heat was not helping.
The weeds and wildflowers spilling into the trail itched my legs, but it was way too hot to put pants on. Flies bit my legs. I was not happy. Waaah.
Along a descent between punishing climbs, we stopped in the shade and talked to a few guys that were our doing some trail maintenance. They had hiked the trail many years ago and asked how our hike was going. Nice guys and we thanked them for their work maintaining the trail.
Just ahead, there were several nice, clear miles just recently cleaned up by them and the rest of the maintenance crew. We saw them again at the next water stop, a small stream trickling from the mountainside, and they asked us about our water filters and other gear. They didn’t bother filtering their own water.
Continuing on, there were two more 1.5-2 mile climbs to tackle before a short downhill to the area we planned to camp for the night.
I worked hard on the first, keeping up a good pace and powering up the climb; trying to keep a decent pace through the steep sections. All of this hard work must have completely toasted me for the second climb, because I’d slowed to a crawl.
Shawn went ahead to secure a tent site for us while I wilted in the background. Even after topping out on the climb, I continued to move slow. My legs were waving their little white flag. Surrender.
About half a mile from the tent site where Shawn was setting up, I ran into Conflicted with a few other hikers. We had actually leapfrogged all day, Shawn and I attempting to avoid drawing him into any lengthy conversations.
He was a nice enough guy, but man could be talk. He had also been dragging on the last climb, not far in front of me, so he talked about that. Then, I can’t quite remember how he phrased it, but it basically boiled down to him saying that he was impressed with how fast we hiked for how old we were. Jeez, we’re in our mid-thirties, we aren’t fucking ancient!
He continued to chat a bit more until I could finally explain that Shawn was waiting down the trail so I should get going. I got the names of the other hikers and said I’d probably see them all tomorrow and finally made my way down the trail again.
Just half a mile down the trail, Shawn was relaxing in a tent site, tent already set up. I quickly set up my air mattress and sleeping bag, wiped down my legs, changed into my sleep clothes (thermals), and started cooking my dinner, all while recapping my last few miles with Shawn and telling him that Conflicted thought we were dinosaurs.
I was so exhausted, but feeling much better now that we were done for the day. While I was organizing myself, Upstream came by. She is a tiny fast little hiker, and always has a smile on her face, super friendly. She told us how she was going to go a a bit further up to a fire road she thought would lead to a nice camping spot. She was super excited about it. Her enthusiasm made me feel bad for hating the afternoon so much.
Another hiker eventually joined us, camping across the trail. We’d seen her several times, but hadn’t gotten her name until now: Sprinkles. She is from Arizona and her hiking partner had gone home for a wedding so she was happy that others were camped here because she didn’t like camping alone.
Annoying flies abound, I hurried through my dinner and into the tent. So tired. Tomorrow will be a net downhill and should be much easier than today. Hopefully those aren’t famous last words.
