Pacific Crest Trail: 2014: Big Bear to Cajon Pass

I didn't sleep the night before I left for the trail. It wasn't nerves. It was resupply packages. At three in the morning I was still shoving little Ziploc bags of maps and q-tips into boxes labeled with Sharpie, hoping that in my delirium I wasn't making any mistakes. My dad and I left for the airport at 4 in the morning, pre dawn. I wore my big straw hat, a gift that I never thought I would have cause to wear, from my sister's wedding in Mali almost a decade ago. I was in my town dress too, and Chacos. Arriving at the airport, I felt uncomfortably aware of how cartoonish I looked, of how different my trip was from that of the other people in their business suits and pajama pants. I didn't wear deodorant (why bother?) and felt conscious of it in the air-conditioned sterility of the airport.

My flight was delayed. That's okay, I'll sleep on my sleeping pad, I thought. I have the patience of a hiker. I have waited eight years to hike the PCT. I can wait three more hours. But then the three hours stretched into four, five, seven, until finally the flight was just cancelled. I was teetering on the edge of hallucination from the lack of sleep. I kept seeing familiar, distorted faces in the strangers at the airport. "George Clooney," I thought, and then, "is that my brother?" I was ushered to the ticket counter to rebook my flight for the fourth time. And I started crying, contorting my face to try and hold back the sobs. Embarrassed, I squeaked out a "I'm just...so...tired" to the airline employee. She didn't make eye contact, instead booking me on first class for the next morning.

The next day, all went smoothly. I sat in first class in an oversized seat while the friendly stewardess brought me coffee and a hot towel. I don't think I have ever been so exhausted as the last six months of chaos. My friend Ren from the Appalachian Trail is a wonderful poet. She wrote a poem this spring that especially resonated with me. One line read, "You the one with icicles for bones / hoping for a shower the strength of hot lava." Backpacking curdles my bad parts, stills my nerves, and breaks and rebuilds me time and time again, and I was ready to experience those feelings again. I may not be good at science, but I am damn good at backpacking.

Two flights, a bus, a train, another bus, and a hitch later, we arrived at the trail that would take us to the PCT. As we ascended from San Bernardino to Big Bear, the temperature dropped from a terrifying 100 degrees to a manageable 70. The bus left us at the hostel, where all of the thruhikers were busy doing their own things, watching the TV sunk deep in couch cushions, sporting through food bags. Already we were too clean to be seen as fellow thruhikers. After getting directions to the Cougar Crest Trail, we got a ride from a retired man and his two little dogs, kind enough to go out of his way to take us to the trail. It was dusk, but we wanted to at least touch the PCT, so we strapped on our headlamps to hike the two miles up the trail.

We set out early with 5 liters of water apiece, unsure how much we should have. In San Bernardino, we had actually googled "how much water should i carry in the desert." THAT'S how unprepared we were. Five seemed safe and reasonable. As we hiked, we ran into thruhikers waking from cowboy-camping on sheets of Tyveck. At a little stream, we took a rest in the shade. We had way more water than we needed, but it felt sacrilege to dump out extra water in the desert, even if it was heavy. I offered one of my squished Subway cookies to a hiker filtering water. His name was Space Age, and he was friendly and passed along some advice from the last 280 miles of his hike. He left his job at NASA for this hike. We stopped early, 14 miles in, by the Holcomb River. It was big enough for us to swim, and we read by the shore until dark. We felt sore, but overall it was a good day.

The next morning, I discovered that our Steri-pen (a wand that sterilizes water with UV radiation) wasn't working correctly. The light would blink on, then off. Never having used one before (and not taking the time to read instructions), I didn't know that this wasn't normal and drank the water anyways. Craig, on the other hand, had used one before, and knew enough to realize that something was wrong. I also discovered a hole in my new Thermarest, a slow leak that deflated overnight. I had read enough to know that other hikers had this problem, with all of the sharp parts of the desert threatening to puncture air mattresses. But not me, I figured. Only novice backpackers make those types of mistakes. I was an experienced thruhiker, with 3300 miles under my belt. Of course, my first days on the trail (literally) deflated my bloated confidence. The Thermarest incident was just the first of the mistakes.

We hiked through Deep Creek canyon, beginning with a morning swim in the river. Upstream, a German thruhiker was swimming. "How is it?" I called up to him. "Vonderful!" He yelled back. On the other side of the canyon, a sign directed us to a pavilion for trail magic. At Splinter's Cabin, three flamboyantly gay men and an older couple were drinking martinis out of stainless steel glasses. They offered us bowls of homemade chili and corn bread baking in a little camp oven. We don't have the real hiker hunger yet, but two days into our hike, real food still tastes amazing. I feel like such a novice, but my body is beginning to respond to the miles, already switching into hiking mode. My feet are blisters, legs are tight, knees swollen, and lips chapped, but I am happy.

We met some more thruhikers: Dylan, Apache, SoWay, Little Diablo. They told us about a full moon party on its last dregs at the hot springs ahead. Hot springs sounded nice, but our maps warned about meningitis in the vicinity, so we were skeptical. In addition, we were trying to get our trail legs, and not in the mood to party. Nearing the hot springs from a ridge, our decision was solidified. Directly on the trail were little piles of human feces. Below were groups of young people in neon bikinis who called to us. We hiked on, to dark, descending to another bridge across the river, making it a 18 mile day. We set up in a sandy flat spot, and began to boil drinking water. Since our Steri-pen is out of commission, we are grateful to have bought a giant fuel canister (another rookie choice).

The desert is in bloom. Even the yucca stalks and cacti are blooming. But my favorites are lupine, with purple flowers that smell like lilacs. All day we hiked on sandy cliff trails in the creek gorge with little relief from the sun, but it was beautiful. You could see the trails miles ahead...

In the morning, we walked along a massive dam, holding back the Mojave River. We spent most of the day at the little Grass Creek, basking in the shade. Water Bug, a solo woman hiking the trail, napped near us too. She kindly lent us some bleach to purify our water, so we wouldn't have to boil it again. We left Water Bug sleeping under a bridge by the hydro power plant to hike on farther at dusk. At a road crossing, we found a cooler filed to the brim with with fresh fruit and eggs. There was a note from Team Turtle. As we ate strawberries, the team, a man and his older mother, came walking down the trail. They were as delighted as us. I guess they rarely actually run into the hikers they feed with this cache, just see our notes and the food disappears. "That's snapping turtle!" The son said, referring to the little dog with them. "Careful, he does bite."

We left the road side to climb up the hill to an electric meadow, under power lines. We packed out four eggs to poach them for breakfast. I fell asleep to the chatter of bats and buzz of power lines on my deflated sleeping mat.

The next morning, we descended to the reservoir. At a picnic table, I cracked the eggs to poach them. Something was weird. Turns out, they were hard boiled. Which in retrospect, makes a lot more sense as trail magic than raw eggs. Lost and Found, a thruhiker from Spain, was at the shelter too, packing up his tent. He had stayed at the lake for a few days to rest his knee, and was finally moving on. Craig swam in the lake, but it was too cold for me. We had 18 miles to get to Cajon Pass, passing through more desert. The day was hot and exposed and incredibly windy. The highlight of my morning was watching a snake eating another snake.

The last five miles to Cajon Pass seemed to last forever, as the wind grew more and more powerful with each gust. We hiked along the edge of cliffs, on catwalks made of nothing but sand, blowing all around us. It was terrifying and exhausting. I am scared of heights, especially exposed drop offs. The last mile to interstate 15 was a wind tunnel through a canyon, with gusts of 60 mph wind blasting us with sand. With a gleeful yelp, we arrived at the road and its McDonald's a mere 0.4 miles away. Craig ordered two double cheeseburgers, a spicy chicken sandwich, large fries, and a giant soda. I got a sandwich, large fries, and a large McFlurry. We definitely got some stares, with our electronics plugged into the one outlet behind the trashcan, sitting in a hiker corner of the restaurant and sunburnt dirty and smelly. I don't think that I will ever appreciate fast food as much as this moment.

We left the McDonald's late afternoon to hike on, packing out sandwiches for later. We hiked until we felt like we were a safe distance from the WOOOOOO of the trains that passed through the valley all day and night.