This morning I woke up around 4:30 AM and turned my stove on to make my mocha. I was feeling pretty dang tired this morning and did not want to get going. But it’s pretty critical that I do a big day today and tomorrow. But especially today. I need to make it to Kennedy Meadows south as early as possible on Monday afternoon. Currently my ride is planning on picking me up at 3 PM, but if I can get there earlier than that’s even better.
I slowly packed up this morning as I drank my coffee. I always get all my snacks out to eat over the course of the day so I don’t have to be going in and out of my backpack a lot. Then had everything situated and was walking just before 6 AM. Of course this morning I forgot to set my watch when I started the day. So I didn’t begin tracking until I was about 2 miles in for the morning. Which is totally fine! I just made a note of it so that I would actually know how far I went by the day by the end.
The sky was unbelievably beautiful this morning as I left camp.
This morning the trail was heavenly. There was hardly any elevation gain at all. I was just walking along this soft dirt path surrounded by a lot of pine trees. Surprisingly I went by multiple natural water sources over the first few hours of the day. Overall, it was just absolutely perfect. I wasn’t even really going downhill or uphill, it was just some of the flattest trail that I’ve done in a long time.
I was thinking a ton about 2022 this morning, because this section of the trail is very close to where I camped the night of the snowstorm. So the miles I’m walking this morning were the initial miles that I walked the morning when I woke up in the snow. It’s just funny how easy and beautiful this section of the trail is. And how incredibly different it seemed when it was covered in 4 to 5 inches of fresh snow. It still wasn’t the most difficult thing in the world. Luckily it didn’t obstruct my visibility too much and I was still able to make miles and get through. But it certainly wasn’t as nice and easy of a morning as my morning is today.
I’ve been enjoying the PCT markers being on trees, rather than posts recently.
First thing this morning I got a little bit of service and posted a YouTube video. I’m going to try to post one at least every other day for the next week or so just to get slightly more caught up. I don’t mind being a few days behind on them, but recently I was over a week behind, which is pretty far. All my other content is so up-to-date, I would just prefer everything to be on a similar pace. Lucky for me I have about seven or eight YouTube videos completely ready to go. So the only thing standing between me and posting them is whether or not I have service.
I swear I’ve been using a different KT tape method every day just to see if I like it. I should have been taking a photo of every different style I’ve tried.
I’m hoping that at least at some point later today I get some service too. If I have service this evening, I’ll probably buy my plane ticket for Monday night. If I don’t have service this evening, I’ll probably send a detailed message to my dad and see if he can buy the plane ticket. Then I can just pay him back for it. I just don’t want to wait too long. Though luckily flying from LAX to Boston is the type of flight where there are many different options. I just don’t want to risk it if I don’t have to.
A few hours into the day, I walked past the tent site that I camped at in 2022. It was very easy to recognize because I camped at a beautiful flat site right next to a huge pile of boulders. It was a really cool site honestly. When I walked past this morning there was someone else tented right where I had camped in 2022. It’s just been really funny to think about that wild experience and how different it is from the trail this year.
The calm before the storm!
It was a really quiet first part of the day. I don’t believe I saw anyone on trail other than tents for the first 14 miles. I was making my way toward Kelso Road were the first water cache of the day was. As I began descending down toward the road, I got some pretty good service. So I very quickly booked my ticket for Monday night. Which is actually a nonstop flight, which could not be better for an overnight flight. I texted Mike to let him know that instead of getting there at 3 PM on Monday I would definitely be there by 1:30 PM. I figure I’ll get there a little earlier than that, but I never want to make anyone wait. And if I’m very lucky, I might even have time to shower before he arrives. Which would just be very nice to do before flying.
Then I called my dad to let him know everything. Because he’s picking me up Tuesday morning at the airport in Boston. Honestly, the overnight flight has everything working out perfectly. From Boston it’s only a couple hours to get back up to Hanover, New Hampshire. So I’ll get there early enough in the day that’ll still be able to probably get some solid miles in. I’m also having my dad bring some of my new Nightcore electronics. Nightcore sent a box with all kinds of goodies. But I was waiting to have things sent out because when I was at Cajon pass, I didn’t think I’d be able to mail stuff home. I’m so glad I waited, because now I can just trade out my power banks for brand new fully charged banks. That way I don’t have to charge within the first few days if I don’t need to.
Passing over the 1,000km marker. A fun reminder of how many hikers out here are from a wide variety of other countries, and not from the states.
After that, I continued making my way down to the next water source. When I got down there, the couple who manages the cache was there filling water. They also had a cooler with some drinks. I got to drink an ice cold cherry Coke, which was amazing. And I talked with a couple hikers who were there. One of them was named Wolverine, and it’s funny because a bunch of hikers have been telling me about him. A few guys I ran into yesterday were talking about how cool this guy was and telling me all kinds of stories. I thought that that was so wholesome. So it was nice to put a face with a name. I actually didn’t wind up getting water at the source because I had hardly drank any yet for the day. I still had 2 1/2 L and it was only 15 miles to the next water source. It’s nice and cold today so I haven’t been drinking as much.
When I was leaving there, the woman who manages the cache let all of us know there was some high wind coming in. Last time I was hiking through the section of trail there were gusts above 70 mph. I remember getting whipped around and literally lifted off my feet. So of course I get to have a repeat of that again this time around.
I had service briefly around this time and attempted to open and respond to some messages on Instagram. If I don’t check them for a few days, they can get pretty out of hand. I think I have over 30 messages right now. I opened one from a Trail Angel named Mike who’s up in the New Hampshire Maine area. He has reached out about supporting me when I come through. I had mentioned that I was flying back the beginning of next week, so he sent me some weather updates. And it’s not looking good. Of course I literally bought a plane ticket today, and just a couple days after I get back to New Hampshire there’s some bad weather rolling in. It looks pretty rough on Thursday of next week. And it might possibly trickle into a day or two surrounding that. Obviously it’s hard to tell this far out and will probably be depending on exactly where I am on trail.
Even though it was brutally windy, at least the trail was really lovely today.
This obviously got me pretty stressed out, and I wound up spending the greater majority of the day thinking about that and attempting to make plans to pivot around it. Of course I could probably cancel my flight and change my plans entirely. But this next week in the sierra isn’t going to be great either. The temps are going to be low even though it’s not going to rain. The highs are around 50° most days and the lows are in the high 20s and low 30s. It’s probably not going to rain, but it’s not going to be amazing conditions. Plus, it’s going to be super slow going on the snow.
When you’re hiking through the white mountains, though, even the rain can be incredibly dangerous at higher elevation. But I tried to just be optimistic and also realistic. The nice thing is I’m taking an overnight flight which means I’m not burning a day due to travel. So, worst case scenario, if I have to take a whole day off because of bad weather, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. I’m incredibly ahead of schedule and I definitely have the time to do it if I have to. Also, this is pretty typical in the whites. I will say this particular batch of weather is really bad. And the weather last week was fantastic. But even when I was going through the white in 2023 in the middle of summer, we had to take a day and a half off because of bad weather. That isn’t abnormal whatsoever. A few weeks ago when I was on the east coast I had it in my mind that I’d likely have to take a day in New Hampshire due to weather. So it isn’t as big a deal as it seems!
I am grateful that I have a lot of friends in the area, trails angels, and other people who want to help and support me. If you’re in that area and you’re available this upcoming week between Wednesday and Saturday, definitely leave a comment below. My main goal is going to be getting some mileage in every day if I can. I think it’s very possible that I’ll be able to do short sections of trail and then bail out at trailheads and stay in town for the night. It’s just going to depend on exactly how the weather rolls out.
As I continued hiking along the wind wound up picking up almost immediately after leaving that water cache. I would guess it was around 50 mph most of the time. And every now and then there would be a stronger gust. I can usually gauge how fast the wind is based on how much it literally whips me around. If it’s throwing me to the side of lifting me off my feet then it’s definitely more than 50 mph.
Those next 15 miles to the following water source were pretty tiring. There really wasn’t a whole lot of elevation gain, but the wind really never let up. Fortunately, because of the way the trail switched back, there would be times where the wind was better. And also sections where the wind was particularly crazy. It seemed to balance out in the end, though. Some sections of trail would have the wind at my back, which actually was helping me move quicker. And other sections of trail would have an extreme headwind which slowed me down a lot.
The final water cache of the day. The wind here was brutal. Props to anyone who decided to set up camp right by here.
Surprisingly, I still managed to make good time and actually got to the next water source earlier than I was expecting. There were a ton of people there when I arrived, but it took me a little while to see them all. Everyone was hiding in the shrubs or behind something. It was just before 4 PM, but people already had their tents up to hide from the wind. It did not seem like it was going to be a great place to camp for the night though. The wind was really bad.
I sat there for a few minutes and filled up on water. At this point, I was almost 30 miles in for the day. My goal is to go about 10 miles further and just tent somewhere near the upcoming dirt road. There was a cabin up ahead, just off the trail, which is open to the public. But it’s a Saturday, so I figured there would be a lot of truck and ATV guys there. And that just sounded like a nightmare to me.
Because of the temperatures I just packed out 3 1/2 L of water. If I drink a ton over the next few hours, then I could go a bit further to the next spring. Which is by the cabin. But if I don’t drink a wild amount of water then I can just dry camp tonight and do 10 miles in the morning to the next water source, which is right on trail. I figure that’s what I’ll probably wind up doing.
Heading up the final climb of the day. I experienced some of the worst wind of my life up here. But fortunately it didn’t last too long.
I remember last time I was in this area that the wind didn’t really start until I came down this next hill and dropped down to the water cache which I was at right now. So I was hopeful that once I climbed off and over this next mountain that maybe the wind would let up. Though, there’s a really good chance that the wind just hadn’t started yet when I was on the other side of this mountain previously. Because today the wind wasn’t bad at all until later in the afternoon. I figure it just starts and stops similar to the way that rain does. And that it’s not necessarily isolated to one particular area.
For the next 3 miles I had a pretty long climb up to the top of the next mountain. There were tons of switchback though, so it was super gradual. The hardest part was probably the wind as I made my way up. There was one particular area where I had to round over a switchback, and the trail was very exposed. The wind was so fast and hard that I had to grab onto a rock next to the trail so that I wouldn’t get whipped around. Luckily, when I got about 50 feet further down the trail the area was a bit more protected and the wind was less crazy. And that didn’t happen again for the rest of the day.
Heading through a nice wooded area to end the day. That boded well for the wind at least.
When I got up to the top of that climb, there were a bunch of protected tent sites where the wind wasn’t too bad. Which was nice because that meant all the people behind me would have someplace to camp for the night. They were hoping to go a little bit further and find something with a bit more wind protection than there was down by the road. But I still had another seven or so miles to go for the day.
As I got further down to decent, the wind definitely picked up again. It never got as bad as it had been earlier. I would guess that it was somewhere between 40 and 50 mph for the rest of the day. At this point, it was just a little annoying, but not too bad. I began gradually descending for a couple of miles. Then I had some super gradual rolling climbs to make my way to camp for the night.
As I got closer to the road, which I had intended to camp near, I began looking for sites. I figured the road would be a little higher and more exposed. And the wind was still whipping like crazy. So when I was .4 miles out from that road and found a pretty protected campsite, I decided to just call it a day there. There were still a lot of wind, but the site was surrounded by some trees. It made for a pretty decent wind block. It was just hard to imagine that the shrubs up by the road would provide significantly more protection from the wind.
The sunset was just exceptional tonight. It’s been such a gift being able to watch the sun rise and set every day of this year for the most part.
I got my tent set up and got situated for the night. Then made a mountain house meal for dinner and ate some snacks while it cooked. I didn’t have service so I couldn’t really do much of any writing or editing done. I just used my editing app to draft up tomorrow’s video. Then clipped together the vlog from the last couple of days. I wound up dozing off while I was doing that so I eventually just called it a night.
It just got better and better as the sun continued to set!
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