Leaftye - Pacific Crest Trail Journal - 2010

Zero day record holder

I'm sure I hold a few records for the year so far that may remain unbroken until much later in the hiking season. First is my daily average which is under 6 miles per day. Keep in mind that I've gone 266.5 miles. This is almost entirely due to my second record--my # of zeroes. I think I'm nearing 30 zeroes and I'm still taking another one here in Big Bear tomorrow. Hey, I love the accommodations here, love the people, and I'm not too crazy about the nighttime temperatures in the mid-20's that I'd be sleeping in if I was hiking. I figure it's so early in the season that I can afford to have fun right now. On to today...

Most of the crew left this morning, including Smiletrain, Crowdog, Calorie, Double Check, Moleman, New Knees and several others...at least from the Big Bear Hostel. Most of them got a ride with Lyle who uses a Swiss made military vehicle to shuttle hikers for $ 5 each with a $ 10 minimum. I think most of the hikers were going back to around Onyx Summit where they got off the trail. I think it's a little strange that they got off there instead of Highway 18 like I did, but I think some of them were running out of food...although if they hiked a mile past Onyx Summit they would have run into the awesome Big Bear Hostel cache. That thing had 3 coolers full of cookies, fruit and soda. There were also two 5 gallon jugs of water, although water is very easy to find on the trail this year. Also this could be enjoyed on a couch with a beautiful window view. There's also Sherman here at the hostel that will shuttle hikers, but he wasn't here until aroung noon. By 10 AM it was pretty much just me, Gutcheck and Kerry.

I soon found that Warner Springs Monty and Chuck Norris were coming to the hostel. That and the cold nights pretty much secured my decision to stay another night...and also gives me more time to catch up on my journals. Chuck was feeling pretty bad when he got here. I think he's eating plenty, but like most hikers I've talked to so far, really had no idea how many calories he was consuming, and a quick look at his food tolod me he wasn't eating nearly enough. I've bumped into a few hikers that weren't carrying enough food and fortunately I was ably to help on this last stretch of trail because my laziness mistakenly allowed me to carry 11 days of food from I-10 to Big Bear.....over twice what I needed, but at least I was able to help myself and other hikers by giving away about 5 pounds of food. Oops, back to today. Chuck and I went for a walk in The Village right next to the hostel to look for a place with blood pressre test for him and Emergen-C's for me. I found what I was looking for, but he was out of luck. A few of us started making plans to see Ironman 2, but were worried how it'd interfere with WS Monty. Apparently he was planning on grilling burgers for any hikers that were in Big Bear and wanted to come over. I didn't realize Monty was here until we were getting ready to leave for the movie. Monty kept trying to get me to eat a burger real quick, but we had to run. It was me, Gutcheck and Curley. The theater was really close to our place and the movie was great and Scarlett Johansen was incredibly hot. After the movie I chatted with Grason and Sherman for a while. At first Grayson wanted to pick my mind about how to get more hikers here, but we quickly switched to less serious topics, aside from trying to get Sherman ready for his own thru hike. Anyway, tomorrow looks like it'll bea busy day of updating my journal, shipping gear and food, and helping out around the house and trail. I love it!

Entry 41 of 41
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