May 26, 2012.
Day: 2 Daily Miles: 48.5 Total Miles: 97.5 Hours Hiking: 15 6:40am-9:45pm
Listen to the audio journal above or Download May 26th Audio File Here
Day 2
Morning
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| PCT through the Banner Fire Area. |
May 26, Day 2 about 10:50am. I've been
hiking for a little over 4 hours. I had a slow start this morning on
account of a few things. Last night was fairly miserable. There were
continuous 30-40MPH winds all night, it was about 35 degrees and
raining/misting because I was literally in the clouds, so, wet. The
winds were so strong that I had to purposely partially collapse my
tarp on me so that it wouldn't rip that stakes out of the ground in
the middle of the night while I was sleeping and make a bigger hassle
for me. Because of this, it just wasn't a good night of sleep at all,
tossing and turning and trying to figure out the best way to wrangle
the tarp and keep it around me. And then this morning for the first
three hours, the clouds and wind, well the winds have been constant
the whole time. I finally dropped off the ridge after 13 miles and it
has abated, but hiking in the morning I got soaking wet because the
plants are all wet and I'm still in the clouds and it's still cold.
At least the winds are down to 20-30MPH. At one point yesterday I
thought “why am I doing this?” and then you know you think
tomorrow will be better, and today is 'tomorrow' and it is better,
sunny, nice breeze, its not hot and you just have to take it a day at
a time and know that the next day should be better. As it stands, I'm
about an hour behind my schedule and we'll see if I can make the fire
area that is probably about 5 miles ahead. We'll see if I can get by
or spend the night and night hike it or whatever. So yeah, it's not
going too bad, feeling pretty good still, my left foot is giving me
some issues, a little bit of rub. I'm not sure if it's the fit or
what I just haven't quite gotten the right tightness. I'll work it
out, it's not that bad, not that painful, just some sore spots. It's
a good day, I'll see if I can make it to Barrel Springs, mile 100,
average of 50 mi/day for two days. Have to do some night hiking to
get there but very fun.
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| Just climbing into the San Felipe's after Scissors Crossing. |
May 26, Day 2 it's about 11:30pm {On
the audio log I mistakenly said 27th}. I finished late because I
started late. I had kind of an iffy day, but I did 47.5 miles. I'm
currently spending the night at coordinates 0540063E 3673352N UTM
11S. I'm about three miles from Barrel Springs and decided not to
camp down there because I knew it was going to be really wet. Today
started off wet, cold and terrible and I did not get much sleep or
good sleep at all. It was windy and cold for the first 3.5 hours and
then I finally got off the Mt. Laguna ridge and dropped down into the
canyon, which was really nice. I was worried about the fire {Banner
Fire, burning the trail 1.5 days before I got to the area} but I made
it down there and saw no signs that it was closed. I saw a couple
firefighters rolling up hoses, they were just finishing cleanup work
and didn't say a thing. I got through there real quick and spent a
bunch of time at scissors crossing having to dry out my quilt and
tarp from the night before. That put me a little bit behind, at least
20 minutes extra. Then the climb up the San Felipe Hills was just
long and uphill, lots of in and outs of the canyons and kind of
annoying. But I'm here now. Lets see, today I saw a gopher snake, I
mean a king snake actually. Then I was jogging a little bit toward
Scissors Crossing and I'm not sure what kind of snake it was, but I
surprised it and it surprised me and I jumped four feet to the right
side of the trail. It stood up and hissed at me and tried to get away
from me as fast as possible. I didn't see any rattles but you never
know, maybe a sidewinder? I don't know. It was big, about 4 feet long
and thick. So that was the fun for the day. Otherwise, it's going to
be a little bit of a wet night and tomorrow I'll be heading over
towards San Jacinto. Ohh, I got 2 more blisters on my left foot,
which is my problem foot. My right foot is totally fine and my left
foot has had 3 blisters now, all on toes. The little toe and the next
one up in particular are the worst. So we'll just keep watching those
and see how they go. But for now I just pop them and they get better
(the calloused blistered skin of my left little toe finally fell off
on July 23rd). Alright I need some sleep.
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| Panorama SE of Julian and about 10 miles from Scissors Crossing. |
