This morning, my alarms woke me up around 4:30 AM. I made a hot mocha for the first time in ages. Then got to lay there for a while before eventually beginning to pack up. I just wanted to be walking by 5:30 AM, so I had plenty of time to go slowly. I ended up talking to the couple tented across from me very briefly. Fortunately, I didn’t wake them up when I came in last night.
Then right around 5:30 AM I got moving and started the day. The day began with a very long, gradual, climb. In true PCT fashion, I walked for a couple miles and actually found a mountain hardware puffy on the ground. It was super light and in good condition. So I definitely knew immediately that someone dropped it by accident. I strapped it into my pack and figured I was the perfect person for the job of reuniting this with its owner! Because I’m going to be covering so much ground today, it’s only a matter of time until I cross paths with whoever owns it.
The sky looked unreal this morning as I began my first climb!
Not long after that, I walked past a guy who I’d actually heard about. Yesterday two southbound hikers mentioned that there was a Hiker in front of me carrying a bunch of bags in his hands. Apparently he had a regular backpack on, not for hiking. And he was carrying grocery bags in his hands. I’ve seen this on the PCT before actually. When I went by him, he had a Jansport backpack on and a duffel bag worn crossbody. Then was holding one grocery store bag in his hands. He was wearing pretty much plain clothes as well. I couldn’t resist asking him if it was difficult to walk like that.
I got to watch this thick mist roll through the valley below.
He was super nice and said that he was just walking and wasn’t too worried about it. I asked him if he was going all the way through the trail and he said yes. But he also asked me where the trail went to in the end. When I told him Canada, he was pretty excited about that. Even though on the surface, it was a little bit of a strange encounter, the guy didn’t give me any weird vibes and he seemed perfectly nice. I think people come out onto the trails for all kinds of reasons. Just because you don’t necessarily have the right gear doesn’t mean you can’t find what you’re looking for out here.
The trail went by some really neat rock structures over the first 10 miles.
As I continued on after that, I wound up passing at least one or two tents. It was still so early in the morning, I didn’t have it in me to wake the people up. But I really wanted to ask if they had misplaced a puffy. It just made more sense that it would be a person in the nearest tent. Because they probably dropped it last night. And it would be more likely that someone else would’ve picked it up if it wasn’t one of these people. But I didn’t hear them moving around at all, so I just did not want to bother them.
I wound up regretting that choice as I continued on and ran into maybe 15 or so more hikers. None of which claimed the puffy. I was pretty much immediately convinced that it had been someone in one of the tents I passed right off the bat. So I left a comment on Far Out and decided to just carry the puffy to Mike’s place. This is a water refill station just off the trail. Pretty much every single hiker has to go there for water. The alternative would be carrying water for a ridiculous amount of time. And the water tank is just off the trail. I still had a ways to go until I would get there. And I continued asking other hikers if it was there puffy. But at this point, it was pretty clear that I had already passed the person who it belonged to.
It was a really neat section of the trail as I made my way to Mike’s Place.
Mike’s place was about 13 or 14 miles into my day. Along the way I ran into a bunch of hikers and talked to some of them for a little bit. Everyone was super nice and a couple people recognized me off of Instagram or the videos. When I finally got over to Mike’s place, I grabbed some water. I also made the decision to fill up extra water. The next water source was about 12 miles away. But it was almost an entire mile off trail. And past there, it was a few miles to a possible cache. But if the cache was empty, then I would have to carry water 25 miles from Mike’s place to the highway where Paradise Valley Café was. With how hot it’s been lately I knew I’d be going through a lot of water too.
The sign for Mike’s Place. Which is just a short walk off the trail.
At the water source I met a couple of hikers, one of them named At Home. We got to talking for a little while, and he recognized my name and what I was doing. He was super nice and has done the PCT before. He wound up continuing along the trail before I finished filling up water. And it seemed like he had a good pace going. So I was actually excited to try to catch up to him when I left. It took me probably over an hour to catch up to him. Because he was moving at about 3 mph. So I had to get a little pep in my step to bridge the gap between us. Every now and again the trail would curve alongside a ridge. And off in the distance I could see him way out front. This actually helped to pass the time by super quickly for that next hour or so, as I tried to gain on him.
At this point in the day, it was probably already 75°. I could tell it was only going to be getting hotter as the day went on. After a while, I finally caught up to At Home. Then we wound up hiking together for the next couple of hours. The more we talked and I learned about him, I realized I’d heard of him before! He did the eastern continental trail in 2022 with his partner Spice Rack. They finished the trail as a flip-flop, going southbound across Florida. So he ran into Trucker and Sparkle when they were starting there ECT hikes. Spice Rack and Sparkle had stayed in touch so I’ve actually heard about the two of them a lot. He’s done a bunch of other trails too, and it was so cool to talk to him and figure all this out.
Those next couple of hours wound up being amazing. It was warming up incrementally as the day went on. Just getting more and more uncomfortable and hot. But I was happy to have someone to walk with and talk with. We had a really good conversation and it was an awesome afternoon. Though as it got hotter, I definitely felt myself getting kind of punch drunk. Eventually, the temperature had climbed into the mid 80s, and then got closer to 90°.
By the afternoon it was incredibly hot out.
Around this time, I was approaching the next water source. There is a new property and the owners are allowing hikers to come onto their land to relax and fill up on water. That is an amazing resource for hikers and is really great to see. But the property is 7/10 of a mile off trail. So it just didn’t make sense for me to go down there to get water. I’m already doing 37.5 miles for the day and should be getting to Paradise Valley Café around 6 PM. It’s been a really long last four days so I definitely don’t want to add any unnecessary mileage to my day.
Lucky for me, At Home was planning on heading down there to the trail angel house. He wanted to take an afternoon break out of the heat and wasn’t planning to go that much further for the day. He had an extra liter of water and offered it to me! Which meant I could chug a bunch of water now. Plus, if I got to that next water cache and it wound up being empty, I would be ok. Otherwise it would’ve been a very uncomfortable and hot rest of the day to the road.
Right before we got to the junction to that Trail Angel house we passed about 10 hikers. Everyone was planning on going over to this property to get out of the heat of the day and get some water. I felt like an absolute lunatic continuing on into the 90° heat all by myself. But I still had 12 more miles to go for the day. And really didn’t want to waste any time.
One of my favorite parts of the day was when I hiked along this narrow cliff.
The next couple hours actually went by pretty quickly and I was feeling good. Even though it was super hot, I had done a great job hydrating all day. So mentally I felt really good. I didn’t feel delirious or anything like that. And still had a lot of energy. I walked by a couple people hiding out under shrubs to get some shade. But I just kept pushing to get to that next water cache. Once I got there, I would only have about 8 or so miles to go for the day.
When I was about a mile out from the dirt road where the water was supposed to be, I could see something in the distance. It looked like an umbrella, and then I noticed some people standing around. Could it be trail magic? I didn’t want to get my hopes up too high. When I checked the map, I noticed I really wasn’t that close to that road.
When I got up to where the people were, I saw an umbrella, chairs, and a cooler. A couple was set up whose names were Chris and Meg. The two of them were so ridiculously nice! They had done section hikes on the trail and had two guys with them who they were hosting for “warm showers”. That’s a bike packing app to connect bike packers with local hosts. They had cold Gatorade’s and deli sandwiches. Even though I’ve drank a lot of water today, my appetite was definitely diminished by the heat. So it was so nice to be able to take down a sandwich really quick. And the Gatorade was so cold and refreshing.
I wound up sitting there for 15 or 20 minutes talking to them. The two of them were so nice and were blown away by how quickly I’ve made it to here on trail. Originally they assumed I was section hiking when I said I started four days ago. Meg and I actually talked a lot about her line of work, and some potential collaboration I might be able to do with her. I hope to have more to say about that in the weeks to come. The whole interaction just felt divine.
By the time I was leaving there, I felt so much better and energized. I had just drank a bunch of cold Gatorade and they gave me a couple to fill my bottles up with. So now I didn’t even have to bank on that next water cache. Plus I had a really awesome time chatting with them and the guy who they were hosting! The whole interaction really made my day.
From there, I only had about 9 miles to go for the day. Which would hopefully just take about three hours. That meant I would be getting down to the road right around 6 PM. I also double checked and confirmed with the people who are supposed to be picking me up at the road. Then for the next hour or so clouds rolled in and there was a light breeze. It was super comfortable walking and I was feeling so good.
When I was about 6 or 7 miles out from the road, the sun came back out and it was just ridiculously hot. Luckily there was that occasional cool breeze. The day would’ve been absolutely brutal without it. But the next hour or so was pretty exhausting. I’ve also just come a really long way today and over the last few days. It’s day four on the PCT and I’m going to be ending the day at Paradise Valley Café, which is over 151 miles in. Not too shabby for my first four days. That means I’ve averaged about 38 miles a day over the past four days. Which is pretty awesome. I’m planning on doing another big day tomorrow as long as weather allows. I’ll be going up towards San Jacinto, and there’s a chance of some bad weather.
I definitely have to check tonight to be sure that it looks safe. But if I do a big day tomorrow, then I set myself up for a shorter day the following day to get into Cabazon.
At this point I was getting super close to the highway. That’s where you can walk down to paradise valley cafe or hitch into Idyllwild.
I am thinking I’ll probably do 20 something mile day into Cabazon and then staying at a motel for the night. I have a bunch of video editing and stuff that I really need to get done. It just isn’t possible to do it at the end of a 35 to 40 mile day every day. Even when I’ve ended the day in town, it’s still been very late at night. So I basically have just enough energy to eat, get situated, and do my regular daily blogging and video work. But I have additional long form YouTube content to film an edit too. Luckily I’m so ahead of schedule that doing a “shorter” day would be completely fine. I’ll still have averaged 35 miles per day even with a “Nero”.
By 5 PM some more clouds had rolled in and the breeze picked up a little. It definitely felt a lot better than I had the previous hour. And I was getting close to the road now. I probably had only another hour or so to go. And it looks like Ryan and his girlfriend were going to actually hike in with their dog, so I might be seeing them before I got down to the highway. I’m excited to have a relatively early night tonight! Plus Ryan said that his girlfriend has a hot tub! My body could really use a hot soak.
I listened to a podcast to wrap up the day. And the trail through this section was really cool. I was walking along a narrow sandy spine. I could even see some hikers up in the distance. Then when I was about a mile out from the parking area, I saw Ryan and his girlfriend Cori. She had her cute dog with her too. The most wild part was I almost immediately recognized Ryan. Then he introduced himself as Detour. I actually met him in Idyllwild on the PCT in 2017! What an incredibly small world.
Super comfortable in bed at Cori’s house. Her home was this amazing 70s style which I really liked.
I continued onto the parking lot and they went for a short walk. Then when they got back, we headed into town. Cori actually lives right in downtown Idyllwild, which is so convenient. I went to the grocery store and got a few things. Just a couple snacks to tide me over until Cabazon. And a half gallon of chocolate milk for tonight, of course.
Then we headed back to Cori’s house where I could get comfortable and hang out. I got all of my stuff sorted and then took an amazing shower. I was even able to do a load of laundry, which I was in desperate need of. I don’t think I’ve done laundry since I was back in New Hampshire. And it’s been pretty hot the last few days. Detour and Cori made a delicious dinner for all of us. There was this incredible salad, loaded with greens, veggies, goat cheese, and all kinds of other goodies. And Detour made some brisket. It was an absolutely perfect way to finish off the day.
All of us hung out and talked for a while. Then when it started to get late, I decided to head to the room to get some more video work done. Lately I’ve had very little energy at the end of the day to get work done. Even when I’ve been in town the last few times, I really haven’t had the energy. I’ve been doing such long days that that makes a lot of sense.
I drank some chocolate milk while I laid in bed. And I managed to stay up for an hour or so getting some writing and video stuff done. Eventually, I couldn’t keep my eyes open anymore and decided to just wake up early tomorrow and do it. I tend to be a lot more lucid in the mornings than I am in the evenings.
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