Poodledog bush

I have not spoken about the poodle brush yet because it has been manageable. Poodle brush is ridiculous, hence its name. You could compare it to one of those poodles that come out of a pet salon with its hair all puffed up and ribbons flowing everywhere. This is supposed to be an animal. Similarily, poodle-brush is supposed to be a plant but it looks a bit prehistoric and out of place amongst the other plants. It looks like the character in a Dr. Seuss book and smells like sativia. Unfortunately if touched it is extemely poisonous, somewhat like poison oak. Unsuspecting, uneducated PCT hikers have merrily walked through it and then unmerrily been admitted to the hospital. We have a lot of poodle brush coming up. Dirty girl came up with a brilliant solution. She's going to buy some long dishwashing gloves and some kind of pruning tool to cut off the leaves that make the path impassable. She wants to be a trail angel.... Let's see how that goes. More to come. 

Wrightwood, CA 4/30/14 (zero day #4)

Starts with a big breakfast. 

Hi people,

We are in yet another mountain town. Oddly enough one mountain town resembles most mountain towns. Think Truckee, Tahoma, Mariposa. Don't think Tahoe - that is too nose to nose touristy. For all of you non-Californians think small-town quiet and slow. Wrightwood is built amongst the lodgepole pines. The lilac trees are blooming like crazy and they are everywhere. Quail aren't afraid to live in the front lawns of peoples houses.

      Dirty girl keeps nagging at me to tell you about another corner she turned a couple of days ago. Silverwood Lake, pretty enough to be mistaken for  a downsized Norwegian fjord setting. The lake was huge and nestled at the feet of small sized mountains jutting into its' peaceful Waters.

This lake was created by a dam which by normal standards are not this beautiful. Dirty girl, tidy camper and topo stood beneath the other side of this dam, a 200 foot wall of boulders which was not at all pretty. One side exquisite,one side gray and barren. Kind of like everything. 

     Southern California's impressing the hell out of dirty girl. The five Saints are here: San Jacinto, San Gorgonio, San Gabriel, San Felipe, and one more. These are impressive mountains worthy of being called Saints.

     In her search and observations of kindness dirty girl is not being disappointed. Yesterday friends of topo's drove one and a half hours from Pasadena to meet the dirty group at a place where the trail intersects a  highway. They drove them into Wrightwood where the Motely Crue (Pasadenians not included) are staying at topo's girlfriends family cabin. After dinner Chris and Lisa drove the hour and a half back to Pasadena. The three hikers were no fun at all. As usual after a 10 or 11 hour day of stairmaster workouts they could only stare into the distance and wonder where they were and who these women were. Beer seems to revive topo and bring her back. Nothing really revives dirty girl and tidy camper just sways in the breeze. A lot of yesterday's hike took place in the jetstream. The winds were strong enough to ground all birds. Apparently topo loses her mind in strong winds and refuses to go where the map tells her. Dirty girl becomes slightly maniacal, railing against the wind screaming, "Is that it? Is that all you have for me"? Dirty girl thrives on excitement and adversity, sticking her chest out like she's some kind of bloodthirsty Braveheart. She has been knocked senseless a number of times. Perhaps that's the problem. Tidy camper, not really fond of strong winds is just happy she's cool and not hot. Her relationship with the wind is changing. Her relationship with being dirty is not. Just this morning Dirty Girl caught her  washing part of her sleeping bag. Dirty girl was speechless.

      Dirty Girl's theory, the one she is testing on this trip, that humans are basically good and their initial impulse is one of kindness and helpfulness, is gaining more support every day. This morning walking back from breakfast by herself she got a little lost. (this is very normal) She asked somebody where Lodgepole Avenue was and she discovered two things, no, three things : people will go out of their way to help you; her cellphone angst maybe on the way to being solved; where Lodgepole Ave was. Her cellphone angst is this - people talk to machines and not to each other. This morning she realized that if she never has a cell phone she'll just go up to someone who has one, talk to them and then they have to talk back to her. She gets to benefit from their technology and talk to them. (PS this from tidy camper she is using a cell phone to create this blog-but don't tell her)

She can communicate with people with cell phones by looking them directly in the eye and asking the question, then watch them while they use their cell phones, and wait for them to look at her and relay the information. In that brief moment of eye contact there may be a chance for a soul to soul rub-a-dub-dub. DG will keep you updated. 

TC gets her 1st of several b-day massages, starting a day before May Day. 

Can you believe the finish to this day?

A day in the life. Mile 350 - 370

Pre-dawn start, looking back at Cajon pass & high desert. Still serenaded by trains and cars, day & night for the last 4 days as we thread our way near the city that never sleeps. 

Barely enough light to see. 

Looking back at our last 2 big Mtns. Foreground is Gorgonia & more distant San Jacinto .

Back at 8000ft, quiet, trees & snow, I love that!

Our first spring water in 18 miles. Drop-drip sweet!

Lunch time at Guffy's deserted campground.

Selfie of all 3 of us digesting. It was 50 degrees & blowing like crazy on the trail (felt like 35 degrees)

Resting before the last 2 mile push, where we will be picked up by trail angel's: Chris & Lisa and shuttled from resupply pick-up, to grocery stop, to Gleason's cabin & out to dinner & back to cabin.

(Topo's girlfriends family cabin)

Dinner at the Grizzly. 

And back to cabin where we fall asleep immediately after our shower at 8pm. 

Up, up and away

We had a short day today as we climbed out of a valley back up to 5,000 ft. It was one cardiovascular event - up all the way. We had a  perfect view of interstate I-15 going eastward to Las Vegas and southward to L.A separated by the imposing San Andreas fault ( ie a lot of mountains). The ridges we had already surrmounted were behind us, hazy in the spillover of L.A. Smog. These mountains are not like the Sierra. They are lower and covered by green foliage. From a distance they look velvety and strokable. The green is mainly manzanita and low brush, definitely not strokable up close. I love the manzanita. They are smooth and muscular and when they age they look as gnarly as bristle cone pine. Half the bark is alive and the other half is dead. I saw one like this that had been cut back and it looked like the angry head of Medusa, branches entwined and twisted around each other. The Sierra, above treeline will be white with rock.

     About those chem-trails...This is what I have observed : Big Bear seemed to be a testing ground for them. They were everywhere. They were shot into a blue sky from who knows where ( perhaps a nearby airforce base) and the sky turned white not with puffy clouds. Just white. Sometimes I saw these trails being shot into a cloud connecting them and making everything white. Are  'they' tampering with the weather? it? Between Warner Springs and Idyllwild I didn't see any. They seem to be where people are. I could be wrong. What I can say for sure is that a perfectly blue sky changes into white. There are also more on windy days. Since I don't know anything about them I'm done with them for now. Honestly when I'm out here experiencing this beauty the last thing I want to be thinking about is someone experimenting or tampering with mother earth. "They" are doing something and we are not hearing about it. You guys research it and let me know. 

       Initially I thought I might learn some Chinese out here but it turns out I can't  bare to not be present to every sound and sight Inmight encounter. If I'm learning Chinese I'm not present to my surroundings. I tried it one night in the tent but then I couldn't hear the silence and I was missing it. 

      Tomorrow we will continue on the stairmaster to heaven... Or is that Wrightwood? 18 miles closer to "Oh Canada" Got to go to sleep now. Topo has her alarm set for 4:30am. 

Going under the I 15. 

What a glorious color!

Thanks to trail angels!!

Sleeping out under the stars. 

The Best Western

Blogosphere by DG

Hello gang,

Here we are at the best Western on I 15 somewhere north of San Bernardino. We are close to El Cajon Pass. Yesterday we hiked 22 miles and so you can imagine how delirious we were coming out of a valley smack onto a major highway linking Los Angeles to Las Vegas. It was Sunday night about 5 o'clock and the traffic was incredible. Rush-hour on a Sunday night. What's interesting to me is that people from LA the city of stimulus, lights, glitter, craziness need to go to Las Vegas. Can they not find what they need in Los Angeles? It was bumper-to-bumper to Las Vegas and bumper-to-bumper from Las Vegas. Tidy camper and dirty girl stumble up the hill onto that freeway exit and head toward the Best Western and McDonald's which is about half a mile away. They walk toward McDonald's and dirty girls stands before the menu board in the drive-through section like it was the holy Grail. Cars were driving around her and everyone was staring at her. Everyone. Tidy camper was not interested in the McDonald's menu and was laying on a bench outside the restaurant. People were also staring at her because she looks even stranger than dirty girl - a high-tech hiking geek on the Safari. After dirty girl reads the menu they MoveOn and what does dirty girl run into next? A young boy running a fruitstand stall - pineapples mangoes apples cucumbers. It was all she could do to restrain herself from digging into her pack to find her money. Tidy camper was patiently waiting. The fruit was not organic she was not interested. Dirty girl no longer cares about organic. In order to reach the best Western they have to cross the I 15 on a bridge. Underneath are millions of cars and open farm trucks loaded with unidentifiable things. White things. Dirty girl turns to tidy camper to ask what she thinks are in those trucks. Tidy camper looks terrified. Cement, onions, I don't know. She was having a panic attack. The bridge was shaking too vigorously and the cars were too loud. Dirty girl was laughing. She thrives on excitement. Actually she was slightly frightened because every time she crosses a high bridge or is in a high place she feels like she's going to throw herself off. So far it hasn't happened. They finally reach the peace and solace of the Best Western, built to keep out the noise of multipe freeways intersectiing and a major train route passing through. The best Western... Sheets with the threadcount of over 300 which is a hell of a lot better than the Motel 6 hair shirts we slept on. There were amenities like shampoo and a very large flat screen TV. This was a definite upgrade from the Motel 6. Dirty girl and tidy camper got a room with two queen size beds. After sleeping in a dwarf size tent they now need  their space. Each of them can now take up the entire queen size bed all by themselves. 

      Dirty girl immediately took a bath but she had forgotten how. Somehow she decided to sit in the hot water with her dirty clothes floating in the water beside her. What was she thinking? Obviously not about getting clean. 

      The closest eating place was next-door -Dell taco. It's comparable to a McDonald's but Mexican-style. Dirty girl loved her vegetarian taco with curly fries but tidy Camper was less than happy with her eight layered vegetarian burrito. Honestly she prefers her nuts. She must of been a squirrel in a previous lifetime. After eating they waddled around for a while, took a Jacuzzi, and then dirty girl gave tidy camper an acupuncture treatment. Tidy camper has a slight foot problem, that same old neuroma thing. It is being kept under control with needles, herbal patches and a gel pad. Dirty girls feet are mainly bruised and swollen at the end of each day but they seem to recover by the next morning. The bones feel bruised and mutilated. She's discovering ways to trick and out-smart them however.

      All in all a pleasant stay at the best Western. We are getting ready to climb up 6000feet starting in about an hour. Pray for us! 

Next stop Wrightwood California in 1 1/2 days.

 One last shout out to my brother who turned 63 yesterday. Happy birthday and keep living. Bye for now

On our way to mile 342 & El Cajon

Yeah! More water!

Looking downstream on Deep Creek, north toward San Gabriel Mtns. (Where we are headed. 

Just part of our urban landscape. 

Silverwoods Reservoir. 

Mile 333  Fresh spring water.

Last few miles to our next Best Western. 

Life is good!

Corners

We are at mile 320 and it's cold. The last three days have been  chilly. We had just about every piece of clothing we own on this morning. Dirty Girl's hands were frozen and she was unable to use her poles; she did not use them all day even when they thawed. She thought she would change something up. There are so very few things you can change out here.

      After a couple of hours of hiking we arrived at Deep Creek Hot Springs. It was a bit trashed and mainly populated by young men looking for their weed or smoking it. Never mind. DG and TC found a vacant pool and disrobed. It was glorious inspite of the information dispensed by Topo. She said that getting any water up your nose could cause encephalitis or some such catastrophe. DG wondered if the  boys diving into the water knew this. She and  TC , to play it safe kept their noses out of the water. Had they not been on their way to Canada they would have stayed longer. Do not think harshly of us for not being leisurely. Leisure means more food, more food means more weight. Topo did not enter the encephalitis infested water.

      We walked  by the Deep Creek most of the day. What a gorgeous valley and creek. We ambled along and at every corner something unexpected  would greet us like a hill covered in flowers; the San Gabriel Mt s. covered in snow  and so stunning they could have been mistaken for the Himalayas; a snake sunning itself while waiting for lunch to pass  by; a mountain lion (not yet); a bear (in our past); a  bicolored lizard-whizzing by like a formula one race car; a convex bridge that someone decided to paint bright primary colors (apparently recently done), what a kindness that was  to create art where once was only ordinariness. Someone looked at that. bridge and was inspired to carry a lot of paint, many miles to make people smile. A corner might turn into a hillside of California  poppies. You never know if your heart is going to stand still in fright or fill with joy. The first responder is the body quickly followed by the heart and lastly interpreted by the mind. It's nice to stay with body and heart for as long as possible.

      We are now approaching the Mojave. Fortunately we are encountering a cold spell so we are not sweltering in the heat but the heat is lying in wait for us somewhere nearby. Somewhere just around the next corner.

Descending

The last two days we have  been gradually descending from Big Bear City. We are at 4000ft, dropping from 6000ft. We've done 19 mile days but since the temp. has been cool and our cardio work-outs have  been next to nil the days seem like "gimmes" although Topo might disagree. Check out her blog. 19 miles is a lot  but when the terrain is suave so are we.

     Everywhere we go it's springtime. I can't really name most of the flowers   

and I'm not even a flower girl per say but they are so making my days. It's like getting hundreds of bouquets a day. Every corner I turn a new  color greets me. Today there were lots of golden- yellow and always a multitude of purples and pinks. We were traversing areas of gray-white gravelly scree and speckled through-out were tiny bright yellow daisies. Later in the day the hillside beside me looked like it had been spray painted in patches of apricot. I was seeing Miner's lettuce in  various stages of decay. The entire plant including the stem changes color. This plant was sometimes apricot sometimes red and sometimes orange. I did see some healthy dark green lettuce  but the various other shades stood out  because they were odd colors. We saw lupines and a million types of buttercup looking things. The flowers that break my heart are the tiny tiny ground cover plants that hold their own in brightness and brilliance. They are as minute as the head of a needle but just as astonishing as a full size in your face rose. They are as important and necessary as any other thing in the universe as are all the stink bugs that cross the trail and the busy ants that scurry over every chance they get. I'm out here with all these plants and creatures appreciating their beingness. The woodpecker whose tapping reminds me of a wooden block being hit in a Zen monestery to call people to meditate. At first there is one hit followed by others at determined intervals and finally there is the roll down which is the final call. Woodpeckers have a roll down!

I'm digging the stink -like looking  bugs that have red velvet  covering half their body. Tidy Camper calls them "fancy pants". The birds never fail to amaze me when every morning, even when it is below freezing, they sing as soon as the daylight comes. They are so reliable.

      Today we woke up to frozen bottles of water. Thanks be to all gods that TC's bowels knew how cold it was. Even they refused to come out until the sun appeared. Got to sleep now. Love to you all.

Deep-creek river

        

Big Bear Part Two

Big Bear Lake

Dinner on the trail is usually soup and cheese. We found a lighter dinner to be better for our digestion at night.

     Our final ritual of the day is to knead each other's feet. That used to be done sitting up-one person sits up one person is laying down. Dirty girl discovered a better way to do it. Usually she is too tired at night to sit up in the tent. The other night she lay down beside tidy campers feet, picked up one of her feet and lay it on her chest and started massaging. It was perfect. It could be done with all parties involved laying supine. One problem arose however when dirty girl fell asleep holding tidy campers foot in the air. .

     So that's the rhythm of our days... Probably for 5 1/2 more months. Stay tuned. DG signing off

Zero day in Big Bear

Breakfast at the Grizzly Manor café. 

Friendly folk. 

Pancakes mondo-size. (This as an addition to the omelette & biscuits & gravy. )

Hitching for our next meal.... No success.

Maybe it's because we do look like the Teletubbies.

Big Bear City

Here we are in Big Bear City. We hiked a 16 mile day in a respectable time. (7.5 hours). Nothing too strenuous today-not too steep and not too hot but it was windy and cold. It is supposed to get down to 32 degrees tonight. Somewhere it will be snowing. We got off the trail where it meets a highway going to town and we we're picked up within minutes by someone who was a trail angel last year. Well, apparently he is still acting in that capacity.

Jack Jackson was his name (JJ for short). We had called another angel who was on his way. JJ knew him and told us to call him back and cancel. I got my first ride in an old 4 cylinder jeep.

       Priority after Motel 6 room check in would be...yes, FOOD! I wanted green vegetables and lots of them. We settled on a Nepalese/Indian place because they had spinach with garlic. We went with Topo and 2 other hikers. TC and I surprised everyone  by ordering about 4 plates of food while everyone else ordered one. What?

          We have met many hikers on the trail. Some we will probably never see again and some we will keep crossing paths with. Some people walk at roughly the same speed as you do but if they start an hour earlier or two hours earlier than you, you may not meet them until they take a day off somewhere. It's best to walk your own pace and not try to keep up with somebody faster than you. (HYOH) Hiking your own hike is really important. There are people behind us who we have met who we may not meet again and there are people ahead of us we have met that we may not meet again. So far all our relationships have been transient. For some reason because we are all doing the same thing, sharing something in common, it's easy to become friends quickly; quicker than going to camp or being on a basketball team. We are all in this together and we all want to make it to Canada. It definitely does not feel like a competition, more like a shared vision quest where everybody's vision is slightly different and everybody's motivation is different but the goal is the same... Friendly Canada.

      We do get to keep an eye on each other because all along the trail are sign in books. You can see who is ahead of you and by how many days. As for the people behind you, you do think about them but don't really know where they are. There are some people I've met who I wish I could travel with the whole way or at least get to know a lot better but inevitably people hike their own hike. If you're coming on this hike to meet people you will meet people but from what I have seen so far the hike is the thing.

      Here is a typical day for us: TC's bowels wake her up at about  4:30.am. It is still dark. The  birds are still sleeping. She has created a hole for this offering because her bowels wait for no one. It takes time to dress and get out of the tent so this must be taken into consideration, hence, the pre-dig. DG remains unmoving and silent until tidy camper leaves the tent. Normally her tendency would be to whine and complain about the earliness and the coldness but having spent years assiduously training her mind she remain silent  and lets her thoughts bang about inside her head. She puts her clothes on and folds up the air mattresses puts away the sleeping bags and gets ready to depart while tidy camper is outside boiling water. Breakfast is eaten and camp is broken apart. This takes about one hour. We are usually hiking by 6 o'clock in the mornings. First break is about two hours later. We begin eating our various snacks which comprise of nuts dried fruit, raw coconut balls, cookies and the occasional bar. If we're walking uphill we usually need to take a break every hour and a half to drink water and eat, all other terrain we usually break every two hours. Lunch happens about 4 to 5 hours after breakfast and is usually rehydrated dehydrated food. We found about five companies who produce dehydrated food and so we have quite a variety. So far we have not had to repeat a meal but, that won't last for too much longer. Later in the day we have more snacks usually nut butters and crackers or meat sticks and turkey jerky. We are actually eating our way to Canada. Food is an absolute necessity. No food means no energy. Eating back home in Santa Cruz is all about pleasure and more pleasure. Food is keeping us alive in Santa Cruz but we're not aware of that as much as out here where we're burning it up like a wood burning stove. It is all about food. TC's favorite foods are nuts. Not so with DG. Her favorite foods are fresh fruit and veggies. TC is in heaven. All the nuts she can eat all day. Not so with dirty girl. She often gives her nuts to tidy camper. Once again her mind training helps her not to hurl those nuts up. You can see why coming to a town is of utmost importance to dirty girl. She goes to the grocery store and buys pounds of apples and grapes and carrots and sits around eating all day like a rabbit. 

      Tidy camper and dirty girl have both lost weight. One week ago they had both lost 4 pounds each. By now they have probably lost another 2 pounds. That's a safe amount. Pretty soon they'll stop losing weight and gradually start to lose their minds. 

    

Dirty Girl thinks she may be getting sick. Her tongue is a bit black.what do you think?

Up high

Here we are back up at 8000 ft right beside some highway. We were too tired to have another workout on the stair step machine. Our life has been reduced to approximately 8 cardiovascular workouts per day of one hour duration each. It's like we are going to the gym 8 times per day. We couldn't face our last workout so we're camped close to a road. Traffic should die down soon. 

     Well we appear to have lost Topo again. Her leg and lower back we're hurting her so she cut out early to hitch a ride into Big Bear City. We will arrive there tomorrow and hook up again. 

       Today hiking conditions were perfect- breezy, with some shade and a fair amount of traversing. The only problem was we had to carry  an added 6 liters of water each. No more rivers or springs after mile 239 until mile 266 in Big Bear. After TC's little scare yesterday we overcompensated. She drank like a sailor all day long, happy to be urinating every 5 minutes. Four liters each would have sufficed. 

Looking back at Jacinto.  60 plus miles for us ...probably only 25 as the crow flies.

Toward Gorgonio

Faking it...TD is cowgirl camping

First real running water in the desert. 

Mile 235. Thank god for some water!!!!

Mile 243. View of San Gorgonio. 1st highest peak in SoCal.

The Path

Today we made a slow 3400 ft.ascent into the San Gorgonia Wilderness and ended back in the San  Bernadino Wilderness. We walked up and over and down drainages. We started at 6:15 and did some stair master jazz for 4 hours but we did have some contact with water. A half hour into the hike we walked  beside a shallow clay bottomed river. Tidy Camper and I immediately wet our heads, shirts and hats. It's a great way to stay cool. Topo watched us and by days end she was joining us in the drenching. She doesn't like cold water but she also does not like to get hot. Something has got to give because cold makes you less hot. We walked out of this drainage into another, then for 3.5 hours we went up. 

      I think the sweetest sound ever is the sound of a bird singing (yes, even better than prepubescent choir boys). The 2nd most beatiful, welcoming sound is water in the desert. After 4 hours we came upon another river, braided and shallow. As soon as I could I took all my clothes off and started splashing water on myself. Then I sat in it. Then I lay back in it but the water was so shallow it didn't quite cover my head. It was still heavenly to have that cool water cleaning and refreshing me. TC as soon as she caught up to me did the same thing. There is so little water in the desert when you get it you treat it like it is big water-you do everything in it you would do in the ocean because desert water feels bigger.

        Well everything was going just dandy because even though we

Were going up we were crossing water until we were not. The landscape got dryer and dryer as we got hotter and hotter. Our maps (which TC and Topo are constantly analyzing) did say there was water at mile 235 but TC began to panic thinking that perhaps the water had dried up. The water report she kept referencing was old. She wanted to return to the water. Dirty Girl, who Tidy Camper thinks is cavalier about water said that if they were on vacation it might make sense to go back to the brightly flowing river, however they were on their way to Canada and why the hell did she not believe her maps and water reports. It's not as though they were seeing dessicated bodies strewn over the trail or the sun bleached bones of previous PCT hikers. DG insisted they move forward. The blessed mile 235 was reached and there was water. It was a trickle but that is all that was needed. WATER IS LIFE. We know it first hand. 

      What I find so encouraging and reassuring is the a actual path itself. It's width varies but it is usually about a foot wide. There are many footprint on it and those footprints belong to people I have met. They have gone before me they are leading the way for me and I feel gratitude for that. That's what teachers do. They trample the earth to make it easier for others to on it. They've been where you are going. This path is my teacher  and everyone on it before me. 

     We lived through the night and now we are at 7,800 ft. Back in the alpine environment. It smells like whole grains cooking in the kitchen. Later.

Whitewater Preserve (trout farm)

G

Today we took a Nero day and only hiked for 4.5 hours. We did 8 miles and had about 3 one hour stairmaster sessions of severe uphill. At one point 

DG had to lean forward, the grade was so steep, however the  views were  panoramically spectacular. At one point I was reminded of the Grand Canyon. It was terrifically hot and my face once again turned into a salt rub. TC and Topo sweat to the soaking point. I  become a salt shaker.

      The Whitewater Preserve is awesome. PCT hikers can camp for free. There are restrooms and water and a ranger station with cool exhibits inside. We get to sit at a picnic table to eat. Tonight we will be sleeping on top of the table. Who needs a tent when you have a stone slab.

    Tomorrow will be a predawn start as we have 15 miles to go. We are on our way to Big Bear which should take 3 days.

      I have come on this trip to experience the kindness and generosity of this planet I live on and yesterday's experience at Ziggy and the Bears was exceptional. Epsom salt footpaths upon arrival. A shower, washing basin (we missed the salad), fruit, ice-cream, tea, coffee, a carpet covered backyard to lay down our sleeping bags, a newly made porch to accommodate hikers, a recharge station for everyone's devices, organized trash services, need I go on? But mainly there was such heartfelt welcome for weary travelers, our trials and hardships of the day were forgotten. These two elderly people (maybe in their 80s) performed this service from pure love and joy. They were both limping around smiling from here to kingdom come. I asked The Bear why he did this for hikers. He said he respected the endurance it took to complete the trail. He took everyone's picture (taken as a mug shot) as we held our number. We were numbers: 163,164,165. That is how many people have stopped at his house this year. If you make it to Canada you are supposed to write and tell him and he puts a star beside the picture he took of you. Many hardcore hikers who never rest for a second cannot resist the charm of this place and it's owners.They slow down, have a footbath and let Bear take their picture. Ziggy and the Bear used to live  in Anza but they moved to be closer to the trail. They are about 100 yards from the trail. They moved to a place to be more convenient to people they don't know and will probably never see again. Hello!

Cow girl camping.  Topo's patch of grass. 

Rattlesnake

Yesterday was a momentous day for both tidy camper and dirty girl. In all the years they have been hiking and climbing and backpacking neither of them have ever seen an adult size rattlesnake. Late in the afternoon tidy camper walked by a bush and heard a sound. Initially she thought that her gas canister was letting out gas.  She then realized it was not her gas canister but the sound of a rattlesnake. She quickened her pace and shouted out to dirty girl who was in front of her. Dirty girl did not hear her. This was a bit concerning to tidy camper because had she been bitten by a rattlesnake snake dirty girl would not have heard. Tidy camper would be slumped over her backpack slowly dying of poison wihile 

dirty girl walked on merrily taking in the beauty of the blooming cactus. 

        A few hours later in the day tidy camper was walking ahead of dirty girl. Dirty girl heard her scream and thought maybe she had fallen down and hurt her ankle. Not so. Tidy camper once again heard another rattle, jumped into the air and ran forward. The sound of that rattle does very strange things to tidy camper. She immediately goes airborne and yelps like a coyote. Dirty girl was close enough to hear her and she stopped in her tracks. Tidy camper said rattlesnake and it was then that dirty girl saw her first rattlesnake. It was big and fat and looking straight into her eyeballs. They communed then dirty girl took a wide berth and let the rattlesnake be. Tidy camper did not actually see the rattlesnake she just heard it. She said she would've taken a picture of the rattlesnake had she seen it. Dirty girl told her to look into an encyclopedia to find a picture. Dirty girl was not carrying a camera. Later on down by the Palm Springs District water conservation area the security guard said that the rattlesnakes were in a bad mood having now just come out of hibernation. Dirty girl had to think about the idea of a rattlesnake in a bad mood. Really? He then said that the sidewinders rattle snakes on the flatlands were way more dangerous. That's where they were headed. Apparently they are flat camouflaged into the sand they move sideways and they're blind. When you're blind you're a bit more Agro. Oh joy of joys. Here we come sidewinders.

Big Numbers Day

Early start needed for water...15 -miles away.

Dropping 6000ft back to the desert floor. It was a cloudy day. Our next high point is above Dirty Girls head.

Another milestone : 200 mile mark

Many rest breaks:

Wow! Our faucet at mile 206.

Last but not least it was our first 20 mile day!!