On The Road, Part 1: The South

I heard an old saying from folklore once:

"Avoid starting a journey in fog or rain, as it is an omen of bad luck."

Well...what about starting a journey in a hurricane?

As I was driving away from my childhood home, windshield wipers on full speed, Hurricane Joaquin was making her way up the eastern seaboard. The storm was traveling up from Georgia towards Virginia, and I was headed...yup...to Georgia. Needless to say, we made plans to meet in the middle.

It poured every second of the two days it took me to get to Atlanta. I stopped off to briefly visit some friends in the valley, and stayed overnight with my brother in Blacksburg. I was hoping to wait out the storm but to no avail. Me and every Clemson fan on the planet were stuck in the worst of the swell coming through South Carolina. Fortunately, I made it to Atlanta safe, dry, and with my nerves only half fried. I visited my good friend Becca and let her show me her city.

Evaluation of Atlanta: AMAZING food, good craft beer scene, and some truly gorgeous architecture. Oh, and ALL the trees. Mostly though, Becca and I relaxed and caught up. Becca is one of those friends that I see maybe once a year or so, but when we do get together it's like not one day has passed. We have been friends for a long time, and I was extremely grateful to begin my journey in her company.

Atlanta at night

I left Georgia a few days later, headed for Oklahoma to visit Little Foot. For those of you too lazy to flip back a few posts, Little Foot is the girl I hitchhiked across Northern California with, and subsequently finished my hike this summer with. We have hiked about 400 miles together. We are basically family. My goal was to reach Little Foot in a day, but it was a long drive. The GPS was estimating it would take about 10 hours, 12 if I hit traffic. I resolved to camp in the Ozarks in Arkansas if it got too late.

Driving through the southern states is amazing by the way, for those who have never been. The speed limits are high, the roads meander through the countryside, and usually the interstates are wide open. At least, that was my experience. I was flying across the south. I reached the Ozarks around dinner time, and wasn't quite ready to call it a day yet. I cooked dinner in my JetBoil at a highway rest stop and continued on.

Sunsets in the Ozarks

How the "cool kids" cook dinner

I didn't really start to get tired until I started to get into the indian reservations in eastern Oklahoma. ADVICE: Do NOT let yourself get too tired to drive in an indian reservation in the middle of the night. Or run out of gas. I did both, and I do not recommend it at all. I was scared out of my wits. I was running on fumes (gas and energy-wise) until I filled my tank at a well-lit Chevron (which I only pulled up to because the one other car in the station was the sheriff's truck). Then I bee-lined it for Little Foot's town. I arrived around midnight, exhausted and resolving NEVER to drive longer than 10 hours in a day EVER again. Lesson learned.

I spent a few days in Oklahoma recuperating and hanging out with Little Foot and her work friends. Little Foot is an outdoor educator and was working at an outdoor ed facility in the hills of Oklahoma. I say hills, because they are Oklahoma's version of mountains...aka not mountains. Nevertheless, I went hiking, did yoga, read a good book, rode my bike around the farmlands nearby, goofed around with Little Foot's awesome friends and co-workers, and hung out in my hammock by the lake. It was very relaxing, especially after such a hectic first couple of days on the road. And thank goodness I got that rest, because the next few days were going to be pretty hectic as well...

Campfires and horses up at the ranch in Oklahoma with LF's co-workers

9/30 Post-Trail Musings and Plans

It's hard to believe that it's been more than a month since I left the trail. I still miss it every single day. I knew it would take me a while to get re-acclimated, but honestly...I still crave adventure like a fish craves water. Since I got back to civilization, I've gone through various phases of recovery and readjustment. Here's my account of what I'm referring to as "The 5 Stages of Trail-Related Separation Anxiety":

Stage 1: "Culture-Shock-Resulting-In-Collapse-From-Exhaustion"
A red-eye flight of no sleep from Reno, a morning spent in a crowded terminal at JFK in New York, getting picked up by family in the carpool lane, and ALL THE SMELLS. It was so overwhelming that I genuinely did not have the energy to care how radically different my environment was from 24 hours earlier. I just got into the car and immediately morphed into a Silly Putty version of myself. My reaction was, to quote a white girl, "I can't even."

Stage 2: "Oh Shit...Is This My Life?"
Also known as the "identity crisis" phase. This happened about 5 days after I landed, when I walked into the house I grew up in. I had barely walked in the door and dropped my luggage when I felt the lump in my throat emerge and my face flush. I just sat down on the floor and cried. I didn't even completely know why. I think it was a gut reaction to the fact that I felt I no longer fit in this life, and that I couldn't go back to the one I fit into before. But I was still suffering from the residual effects of stage 1, so I was still too tired to actually try and resolve this issue. I just slept, ate, and drank wine instead.

Stage 3: "Basic Rehabilitation And Cognitive Hyperbole"
Getting back to a healthy weight took next to no time at all. Turns out it's easy to have a normal percentage of body fat when you're not perpetually draining you entire energy reserves on a daily basis. Go figure. So I got my body back, slept a bunch, and the second I started feeling better I found I could no longer sit still. I went for walks at first (weird, without a pack or trekking poles), then rode my bike like a maniac, and even tried running again (little success, much soreness). I escaped to Appalachia any time I could manage it, but hiking and camping would always make me miss the trail. No matter how hard I tried, I found I could never satisfy my exercise needs. It felt like I was going through withdrawal, and when I couldn't get my fix of endorphins and movement, I had some major meltdowns. With all that nervous energy bouncing around in my brain, I was often jittery, easily agitated, and had a fair few unexplained "stress-crying" fits. The stress I was feeling from inactivity pooled itself into my sense of displacement, of not belonging to the environment I was in, and amplified it. I felt that my core values were no longer in line with my surroundings, and that combination was having toxic results on my emotional health. This stage felt very similar to the overly-dramatic teenage years.

Stage 4: Trying To Be Normal
...And failing. Miserably. Sure, I started showering daily and washing my clothes after one use again. I made my bed, and cleaned up after myself. I read the paper and had conversations about how Donald Trump is doing in the primaries. I applied for "grown-up" jobs, took interviews, and spent my days editing my resume and looking up insurance quotes. I tried to re-engage myself with my old communities and social groups, though I found that most of those felt stale to me as well. It isn't that I don't love my friends and family, but every time I tried to reintegrate into my old life habits, something just felt wrong. After one particular interview for a job I actually kind of wanted, I realized suddenly (mid-sentence while talking with the interviewer no less) that it wasn't about what the job was. It was about where the job was. And where I was just wasn't clicking for me.

So now I'm at...

Stage 5: Screw It. New Adventure. GO.
I didn't leave the trail to fall back into boring routine and "normality". I left the trail because I had a feeling that there was another adventure out there to be had, and it was time for me to go seek it out. I had said several times before I left the trail that maybe when I got done I would drive across the country and find myself a new place to live. It was an option, but not one I had given much thought to. But now I found that when I started giving that idea some thought, I started feeling better. No more stress-crying, no more identity crisis, just calm; the same kind of calm that I felt about my decision to hike the PCT. I can't explain why I want to do this thing. I just do. For better or for worse, I just know that's where I need to go.

Note: There is a very real possibility that Stage 5 is actually the stage of "Reckless and Desperate Actions" and that this is insane. But I don't care. I'll find out how many stages there actually are later.

In a few days, I begin my trip across the country, width-wise this time and with wheels. I have interviews in several states out west, but at the moment I have no sure job, no place to live, and in most of the places I am headed I know next to nobody there. If I hadn't lived through the 4 months of  this summer where those things were concrete, daily truths for me, this adventure might scare me. Instead, I just see it as an awesome new challenge.

So without further ado.........ROAD TRIP!!!!

8/18 It's Not "Goodbye." It's Just "See You Later."

This is a difficult post for me to write. This is my announcement that I am leaving the trail for the 2015 season. I have wrestled with this for a very long time, and while I know it is the right choice for me, it has not been an easy decision to make. There was no one clear, concise reason for why I’ve decided to call it a year. It was just a lot of little reasons that led me to the conclusion that it was the right time. Honestly, and as strange as it sounds, I believe that the trail told me it was time for me to go. And I listened, because I wanted to leave the trail while I still loved it. I wanted to leave the trail with all the extraordinary, beautiful, happy memories I have of this summer intact. I wanted to leave knowing that I will return.

Let me first say that I really truly do love my life on the trail. If I didn’t love it, I would have left a long time ago. I even loved it when it was hard, when it broke me down. The trail was everything I had hoped it would be, and so, so much more. The trail has a simple beauty to it, and it challenges you to grow as a person with every step. It makes you appreciate the little things, and allows you to live on a different frequency, experiencing intense emotions and events almost as if you were moving through them in slow motion. It is life in its most potent form.

Second, I would like to emphasize that I am NOT “quitting”. Quitting implies failure, and I do not believe that I failed. I hiked 1,500 miles. I saw beautiful places that few have ever seen, places that it takes days to walk to. I made new friends and met wonderful people every day. I experienced the kindness of strangers, and learned to trust that things always work out for the best if you believe they will. I came out to this trail to try my hand at this life, and I succeeded.

Third, I would like to speak to future aspiring thru-hikers, reading this as research for their own hike. My advice to you all? Leave your expectations at home. Seriously. Leave them behind. All of them. Your expectations for the trail, for the people, and most importantly, for yourself. I had expected that I would hike the whole trail this year. Abandoning that expectation was harder than any other challenge the trail placed on me this summer.

And finally, I want to say thank you. Thank you to my mom, for handling the stress of my wilderness excursion like a champ and letting me cry on the phone to her when the trail was mean to me. Thanks to my dad for not lecturing me too much for being a bum-hippie for 4 months. Thanks to my brothers for supporting me and secretly thinking I’m cool, even though you had to pretend like I was embarrassing and weird. Thank you to the friends that I called every town to tell all my crazy trail stories to and who gave me great advice from thousands of miles away. Thank you to my friends and neighbors who sent me letters and encouraged me every step of the way. Thank you to everyone who told me they were proud of me and they believed in me. Thank you to the friends I made along the way, for a summer of amazing memories and for inspiring me every day out there. Thank you to the trail angels who helped me out and showed me kindness when I needed it most. Thank you to the trail, our Eywah, for providing the most incredible setting for this life-changing experience (and to the PCTA for taking good care of it).

A very wise friend of mine said something to me the day I left for my hike, before I’d walked even a mile of this beautiful trail. “It doesn’t matter how far you walk, how many miles you do, how long you’re out there. The minute you put your feet on that trail, you’ve won. You got yourself here. You knew you wanted something so badly, even though you didn’t know what it would be like. You wanted this, and you made it happen.”

People ask me all the time why I decided to do the trail, and I have never had a good answer for that question. All I know is that some voice deep inside me said that I needed to be there, on that trail this summer. That same voice was what told me it was time to go home. When that voice speaks, it’s hard to ignore. So I’m home now, starting my next exciting adventure. Put a pin in it, PCT. We’ll meet again one day.

8/11 SoBo Life, Castella/Mt.Shasta Back to South Lake

Little Foot and I decided it would be smartest to do our hitch in stages. The first leg of our hitch would take us to Sacramento, where we could post up near the interstate and have an easier time finding a ride for the longer second leg to Mt. Shasta up north.

We got our first ride in minutes. Kris, a teacher from Texas on a cross country road trip for the summer, was driving to San Francisco after dropping his wife off at the airport. He told us the last thing his wife said to him was, "don't pick up any hitchhikers!" Whoops. He offered to get us as far as Sacramento, since it was on his way. We swapped stories for the whole two hour drive, stories about life on the trail, stories from his road trip with his wife. We stopped by a burger place called In-N-Out (which is apparently a big deal in California, and it was a crime against humanity that I'd never even heard of it) and bought lunch for Kris as a thank you. When he dropped us off at a gas station near the interstate, he said, "I know this is how this works, but I feel weird leaving you two on the side of the road like this." 

At In-N-Out, left to right: Kris, Happy Feet, Little Foot

We grabbed some lunch at the rest stop and then geared up for the longer stretch of road to get us up north. Our first ride, Randy, offered to take us about 20 minutes up the road to a truck stop where it would be easier to get a ride. Where Randy dropped us off, it was HOT. We stood outside the truck stop with our sign for Mt. Shasta, trying to look cheerful and not like gross, sweaty vagabonds frying under the glaring California sun. To lighten our spirits, Little Foot and I started singing James Brown and Marvin Gaye songs, being silly and dancing. People leaving the stop laughed at us and our enthusiasm, but no rides. After a bit, a semi pulled over, and a seedy looking guy motioned for us to get in. Little Foot looked at me warily. I shook my head. Not a chance. I know semi drivers aren't supposed to pick up hitchhikers, and something about the look of this guy didn't sit right with me. I waved him on. He scowled at me, but drove off. Not a chance.

We were hot. We were frustrated. We had just passed up our first and only offer for a ride, and it wouldn't be long till it started to get late. I called a hail Mary. I threw my hands up and my head back and symbolically incited the help of a higher power. "Universe!" I yelled. "All we ask is for someone safe, preferably female, and not driving a truck to get us there!"

Two minutes. That's all it took for us to meet Rita, who was driving a rental car home to Oregon and could take us the rest of the way. We sat in the back and chatted with Rita about her job, her daughters, her friends that are hiking the Appalachian Trail, and finally we dozed off, exhausted from our day of hitching and happy to be in the safety of Rita's clean, quiet rental car. Rita roused us when we arrived in Shasta, and dropped us at the diner where we'd agreed to have our trail angel Joann pick us up. We hugged her goodbye and she wished us well before driving off.

Little Foot and I couldn't believe it. More than 300 miles of hitchhiking, and we'd done it in 6 hours. We were exhausted,we were hungry, but we had made it, and in one piece. We ordered fresh squeezed orange juice and pasta dinners to-go while we waited for Joann.

We stayed two nights in Mt Shasta, one with Joann and her husband and the other with our hiker friend Rocky, who'd just finished her hike for the summer and arrived at her home in Mt Shasta the morning after we got to town. We cooked, we showered, I got new shoes, and we waited out the thunderstorms. The next evening, Rocky drove us to the trailhead, and the three of us walked southward for a few miles before we hugged Rocky goodbye and headed on.

Left to right: Happy Feet, Rocky, Little Foot

It felt weird, to walk south. I kept getting confused, thinking I was headed north and wondering why the sun was where it was. I had to check my compass pretty frequently to keep my head on straight.

Wait...which way are we supposed to be going?

Little Foot and I guessed that we wouldn’t see any of our friends for at least a week or so after starting south. We didn’t know any hikers in Castella. But to our surprise, we started seeing our friends right away, even that first night. Some days we would see next to nobody at all, familiar faces or not, and we could walk 25-30 miles uninterrupted. Other days, we would bump into someone we knew every 15 minutes or so, and on those days we barely walked 15 miles. We would get asked a thousand times a day “wait…why are you walking the wrong way?” We told our southbounding story so many times that we got sick of it and started making things up. Northbound hikers who didn’t know us often mistook us for true southbound thru-hikers, coming from Canada (which would mean the two of us had been averaging anywhere from 25 to 40 miles a day to have made it so far so quickly). They looked at us as if we were gods.

Little Foot and I had a lot of fun hiking together. We joked that we were “moonwalking” the trail, and spent a lot of time dancing and singing while we walked. We’d laugh until we couldn’t breathe about trail gossip and inside jokes. We told northbounders that we had invented our own religion, and we were now vehemently worshipping a deity we fondly referred to as Eywah (yes, like from Avatar). We braved thunderstorms, nearby forest fires, and dry stretches together. We had real talks about life, the trail, and our hopes and dreams and all that. We went skinny-dipping and would hike without our shirts on whenever possible. We did laundry only one time in a month. We called ourselves goddesses of the trail.

I spent my time in Northern California enjoying absolute freedom. A primary draw of trail life is its potent freedom, but I felt I had taken it one step further in the 20 days that I walked south back to Tahoe. Little Foot and I stopped caring about miles entirely. We walked however long we felt like walking. We took breaks in beautiful places, and fully embraced the concept of naptime. We ate well, never skimping on our resupplies or worrying about weight, and even packing out little bottles of wine on occasion. We didn’t stay in a single hotel, didn’t eat in more than a couple of restaurants, but mostly we met wonderfully kind people who opened their homes and their hearts to us. We especially met some really powerfully strong and loving women, who inspired us greatly. We spent as much time as possible focusing on appreciation for all the trail had to offer us. 

Verdict? Flip-flopping* was worth it.

1,300 miles? Please. Give us something hard to do.

Stormy skies

I missed alpine lakes, thank you Desolation Wilderness!

Eywah lovin'

Lion King on Hat Creek Rim

Our girl Mt. Shasta, stealing the show in the back

Partying in South Lake Tahoe!

Um...that's chocolate right?

Feeling fancy? It's wine and cheese night!

Butterflies at the swimming hole!

Aloha Lake in Desolation, last day, so beautiful

*"flip-flopping" is a term used in the hiking world to describe a hiker who hikes part of the trail one direction and then "flips" to hike another part the reverse direction

7/20 A Decision In South Lake Tahoe

Brain rant:

How is it fair that you can walk 1,000 miles, and still not even be halfway to your destination? It's demoralizing at best. I mean, what's so great about Canada anyway? It's about the journey, not the destination right? I am really looking forward to hiking through Washington state in particular, but unless I speed up quite a bit, it's going to be cold, drenched in rain, or worse, blanketed in snow, by the time I get there. And if I speed up, how will I even have time to see, much less enjoy it? I'm supposed to be trying to stay emotionally present out here. Barreling down the path trying to make it to the end doesn't sound very present to me. And anyway, I don't like the idea of hiking big miles all the time. Walking is hard. Sure, I can do it, but I don't want to keep doing it like that. One week of hard hiking is all well and good, but a month? A whole month of averaging 20, 25, 30+ miles a day? Two months?? Not for me, no sir.

Sigh....

But...I want to do the whole trail. I wouldn't have come out here if I didn't want to walk the whole thing. And it would feel so good to finish in one season. Think how badass it'd be to post that picture on Facebook of you at the Canadian monument in October! You'd get SO many likes. No one would ever question your badass-ness ever again. If anyone even tried, someone'd be like, "Oh that girl? No she's definitely a badass. She walked to Canada. It's pretty far." There's probably some kind of sign you could wear all the time so people know you're unquestionably a badass. Plus, there's all these totally non-superficial reasons for wanting to hike the whole trail, like the fact that it's absurdly beautiful out there in the wilderness and the absolute freedom of  living a nomadic, minimalistic lifestyle. How often in life do you get a chance to have an incredible adventure like this? You love the trail. Why wouldn't you want to do the whole thing?

I dug myself into a mental trench running over these thoughts again and again while I spent a few days resting in South Lake Tahoe. (And for the record, trench-digging is not a restful business.) While I was in town, I met another hiker who was feeling a lot of the same pressures as me. Her name was Little Foot.

Little Foot is a big-ass-section hiker from Colorado, and she loves the PCT. She grew up in San Diego, and started hiking the PCT with friends a few years ago. She had already completed the first 100 miles, and decided that she would add the next 600 over the course of this summer. She did it. And then she quit her job, broke her lease, and kept going. Aside from the similarity of our trail names and our generally silly dispositions, Little Foot and I bonded over our new-found hatred of the pressures of "CANADA". We found the general conversation among our fellow hikers, all about miles and worry about not making it, to be largely exhausting.

We were commiserating about our frustrations over beers one night at a bar in town. That night I had just booked a flight to visit family out east for a wedding in about 3 weeks. I had found a deal on a round trip flight I couldn't pass up, and had just decided I would find a way back from Reno for my flight one way or another. As I was telling Little Foot my plan to hike up and find a ride back down, she suddenly chimed in, "why don't you hitch up, and then hike back down?" Southbound?

Some gear inside me that had been off its track for a while suddenly clicked into place and started to turn.

"Oh my god. That's EXACTLY what I want to do."

I said it before I realized the words were coming out of my mouth, before I knew I wanted to say them. I actually took a mental double-take, I was so surprised.

"It is? Really? Why? Is it even possible? It's several hundred miles, could I even feasibly hitch that far? Maybe there's a train or a bus...but it might be expensive...how far up would I have to go? How far could I go? 400 miles in 3 weeks? More? Less? Maybe..."

As I was thinking all these things, aloud and in the middle of a bar, Little Foot sat and watched as a plan started to take shape in my brain. I hadn't even made a concrete decision when she quietly interjected. "Can I come?"

I looked at her and grinned. "Hell yes."

I can't explain it. I don't know exactly why I reacted that way, or how I knew with such strong feeling that I was meant to southbound Northern California with Little Foot. But that's how, less than 48 hours after that conversation, Little Foot and I found ourselves standing in front of a Chevron gas station on the main road through South Lake, thumbs out and holding a sign:

7/18 The Sierras Part 4: Tuolumne Meadows to South Lake Tahoe

As I rode the bus back up to Tuolumne Meadows from Yosemite Valley, I felt physically tired, a little sad to have said goodbye to my JMT hiking companions, but feeling much better about my walk. I was going to hit 1,000 miles in just a few days. I knew I would be alone, and the terrain coming up was supposed to be tough, with a lot of ups and downs. With my victory over the John Muir Trail under my belt, I felt ready to take on the challenge.

But the trail can knock you down just as easily as it can lift you up. The next week's emotions felt a lot like the elevation profile on my maps. Really big highs, but really low lows.

My first day out it rained all day. All my rain gear soaked through. I was frozen to the bone, my fingers so stiff from the cold that I couldn't even cross them to wish for sun.

That morning, as I was trudging through the awful weather, grumbling to myself miserably, I suddenly looked up to see a bear. I had only seen one other bear on the trail, and never up close like this. He was a big one, his cinnamon brown fur wet from the rain. He hadn't noticed me yet, too occupied with digging up grubs from a stump no more than a foot off the trail and only about 15 yards in front of me.  For a minute I stood watching him, frozen; partly from fear, partly from wonder and awe, and partly from being just plain cold. When my brain kicked back in, it reminded me that I needed to keep moving to stay warm. This bear was in my way, and I needed to get by. I was going to have to scare this bear off myself, alone. I couldn't show any fear. I had to be bigger than this bear. I had barely registered these thoughts, when suddenly I stepped forward and yelled fiercely in a voice I hardly recognized as my own, "HEY GET OUT OF HERE BEAR!!!"

The bear jumped in alarm. I guess he hadn't noticed me at all, and was now surprised to see a tall, skinny, wet, alien creature in green and blue nylon advancing towards him, waving and clacking big metal sticks and yelling at him to buzz off. He must've decided the stump he was after wasn't worth picking a fight with me, because he promptly ambled off to the safety of the trees. My adrenaline surged as I watched his scruffy wet butt running away from me. I had become the dominant animal. This sopping wet patch of dirt path was mine, and he was not welcome on my turf.

The weather cleared briefly a few times over the next couple of days, but only long enough to get my sleeping bag and clothes from soaked to mildly damp. Up on the high passes, you could see that it had snowed quite a bit. Several hikers ahead of me got caught in the white out and had to turn back. The rivers down in the canyons began to overflow and flood. I had to be careful to time my stream crossings for earlier in the day, when the water levels were lower. I walked 20 miles or more a day just to keep my blood flowing and my body temperature up. The morning I woke up and poked my head out of my tent to finally see the sun, I literally jumped for joy, whooping like a maniac. I dried my things out fully in the afternoon sun, and for the first time in days I slept in warm dry clothes and a warm dry sleeping bag.

The weather was far more pleasant from there on out, but that didn't mean the hiking was easy. Each days hike was littered with lots of hard, steep ascents followed swiftly by sharp, rocky descents. The footing was loose and I tripped a lot. The high point of the stretch was the morning I woke up and decided to hike 19 miles over Sonora Pass by 1, hiking 4mph to make it in time for lunch at the resort. The climb was starkly beautiful and exposed with excellent views.

Funnily enough, I actually had a bad fall this morning while taking a descent a little too quickly. I skidded out on the loose gravel coming down the pass and scraped up my leg up badly. I didn't have any bandages on me, so after I washed the dirt and grit out of the wound I had to just let it bleed till it clotted on its own. I arrived at the resort where my resupply package had been shipped with blood all down my leg. It looked a lot worse than it was, and it didn't really even hurt, but I'd be lying if I said it didn't make me feel like the toughest hiker on the trail, hiking with my leg all bloodied up like that. A woman at the resort asked me if I was alright, and when I jokingly told her a bear had attacked me, she actually believed me!

From Sonora Pass on, I averaged 22 miles a day. The trail was still a roller coaster of elevation gain and loss, but I walked hard and made it happen. My biggest day was a whopping 26 miles. I walked a marathon! I wasn't hiking with anybody in particular on this stretch, there wasn't anyone else to motivate me to walk so far. That was all me. I did it just because I wanted to see if I could. I've had two decades of competition and athleticism in my life, and the taste of victory over a challenge or a goal you set for yourself is still not soured.

1,000 miles!!!

But that week of pushing myself did, understandably, wear me out. By the 1,000 mile marker, I was so ready to be in South Lake Tahoe. My energy flagged hard at Carson Pass, 15 miles from town. As I walked down to the visitor's center where the trail crossed the road, I could feel fatigue finally taking me. I met some wonderful day hikers, a group of neighbors who live in the Tahoe area who reminded me a lot of some wonderful neighbors of my own back home. They were so impressed with my journey, how far I've come. They asked all kinds of questions; what I ate, and how much, whether I was alone, where I slept, how I got water, and so on. They walked with me all the way down to the visitor's center where the PCT crossed the road. A volunteer was there cooking hotdogs and offered to let me weigh myself on the scale in the cabin. I weighed myself, and was concerned to see that I had lost a grand total of 30 pounds in my 3 months on the trail. I now weighed the same as I did when I was a preteen, going through my growth spurt. Not good. That definitely explained the excessive fatigue. One of the day hikers I'd met offered to drive me to town and take me to a buffet at a casino on the state line, and I happily accepted. I hastily scarfed down three hotdogs before hopping in their car.

On the ride down, I found my thoughts were preoccupied with worry over my health. I had lost the 15 lbs that I had put on for this trip a long time ago, around mile 700. Back then I still felt very strong physically. The Sierras had taken a lot out of me. I started feeling the burnout setting in my second week up in the high country, and it seemed like I was crashing harder and harder each time I reached a town. Overtraining syndrome is extremely common in long distance hiking, and I knew I was exhibiting the symptoms. Persistent exhaustion, muscle inflammation, loss of appetite, weight loss, etc., I was moving steadily down a track that leads to illness and chronic injury. I was going to have to figure out a better way to do this, and soon, if I was going to keep going...

I spent several days in South Lake, resting, recovering, and reevaluating my situation. My schedule discouraged the time off, but it was necessary, for both my physical and mental well-being. I had some hard questions to ask myself, some complicated feelings to sort through. A change was coming my way, that was clear. That change revealed itself to me on my last day in Tahoe, and as a result my hike's course would be altered drastically from there on out.

7/12 The Sierras Part 3: Mammoth Lakes to Tuolumne Meadows, and Finishing The John Muir Trail

I was exhausted in Mammoth Lakes. I couldn't get enough rest, I wasn't very hungry, and I just felt listless in general. I had walked over 900 miles, just barely over a third of the trail completed. Looking ahead at the two thirds left to come, I felt so incredibly burnt out, physically, mentally, emotionally. To make things even more complicated, it was Fourth of July weekend, and the vacationers were swarming. Mammoth was becoming more crowded by the minute. Mountain bikers, lake-goers, and outdoor tourists of all kinds were taking over the town, and I began to feel like I was suffocating in all the hubbub. I had to get out of this place.

As I rode the crowded tour bus up to the trailhead, I felt shaky at best. I hadn't had enough rest in town. I'd definitely lost more weight, and not gained it back in the slightest. I looked over the maps, and thankfully the next stretch wasn't a long one, and didn't look to be terribly difficult in terms of terrain. Still, I just wasn't quite ready to get back out there. But I couldn't bear to stay in town another day.

On the bus, York, a section hiker from Oregon, came over to sit with me. He and I chatted and compared our gear and quietly made fun of the tourists on the bus. I didn't say much, since I wasn't feeling quite like myself, but York was lively and animated and asked lots of questions and was very kind to me. When we finally got up to Reds Meadow general store and campground where the trailhead was, he offered to buy me a milkshake as a pick-me-up. I'm not one to turn down free ice cream, so we went inside to find a table and order. Just then, Corey walked in, the JMT hiker who caught trout for our hiker fish fry at Guitar Lake weeks ago. It was his birthday. York bought him and his friend Ryan a shake as well, and we all caught up and enjoyed the air conditioning for a while.

After milkshakes, York decided to hike out ahead to get some miles in before sundown, but Corey, Ryan and I stayed behind and laid out on the lawn to enjoy sunset from the front of the the cafe. The boys had gotten their resupply packages, and were making a rather amusing attempt to fit all their food into their bear canisters. I watched and did yoga while I waited to scavenge among the food they would undoubtedly discard.

The day hikers visiting the campground for the weekend were all lined up by the store, waiting for the trolley to come. They stared at us in curious bewilderment, the strange, dirty, animal-like hikers sprawled on the grass with smelly packs and tattered gear strewn about. We stared back at them, just as bewildered by their clean, fashionable hiking clothes, obnoxiously fragrant perfumes, and electronic gadgets. It was a very odd juxtaposition of worlds. I imagined this is how animals in a zoo feel.

The sunset was nice until it became obstructed by storm clouds rolling in from the east. The guys and I realized we should probably hike a little that day, if only to avoid paying for a campsite at the resort. We started out, but Corey didn't want to walk very far. Since it was his birthday, we obliged, and only walked about 2 miles. We got to the junction where the PCT and the JMT split for a 15 mile stretch. The PCT climbed up to skirt along a ridge overlooking the many scattered lakes below, while the JMT descended down to explore each one individually. The mileage was the same for both routes, but the rumor was the JMT detour was harder but more scenic. The boys, JMT hikers, would obviously take the JMT route, but I had a choice, since the detour would eventually link back up with the PCT at Tuolumne Meadows. I stood at the junction for a minute, not sure where to go. Then Ryan, who'd done the JMT once before, said

"Trust me Happy Feet. You're going to want to see this."

I didn't think about it. I just turned and followed them up the hill. Best decision of the trail yet.

I spent the weekend of the 4th of July with the guys, averaging a nice and easy 12 miles per day. We hung out at each lake we passed, jumping off rocks into the freezing water, catching fish and cooking them up for lunch, camping as far away from the weekenders and southbounders as we could, just for the solitude. We sang songs by the band America while hiking on the Fourth, and weird bluegrass songs the rest of the time (Yes sir!). We came up with funny trail names for the guys. Corey got Barista (he carried a backcountry espresso maker), and then later Dr.Slick, for the brand of fishing lures he carried. Ryan was Horse With No Name, until we started calling him Dad because he stopped all the time to take tons of pictures and was always nagging Corey and me to hike faster.

When we reached Tuolumne Meadows, two days later, we already felt like family. But the trail was about to diverge and send us our separate ways. The JMT dove down to its northern terminus in Yosemite Valley, while the PCT headed north towards Lake Tahoe area. Sometimes PCT hikers could get a permit to finish the JMT, just to see the incredible domes and waterfalls, but it was a holiday weekend and it was really unlikely there would be any permits left. The guys pressed me to at least ask the ranger at the visitor's center. We weren't quite ready to break up our little gang. So I went to ask the ranger, fingers crossed, but with little hope.

There's a saying out here that the trail provides. It gives you what you need right when you most need it. That weekend, I needed to stay in the company of my new trail family and take a little vacation from the monotony of making miles. There were two permits left to go down into the valley when I stepped up to the info desk. The ranger asked if I wanted one, and I said yes. She then asked, "Do you want to climb Half Dome?"

"Absolutely."

And that's how I finished the John Muir Trail, with two new friends who became more like brothers to me in just 5 short days. That's how I got to hike into a storm and watch it overtake and light up Cathedral Peak, how I got to spend a morning at the lake below cooking eggs and bacon while the guys had a fishing contest, how I got to climb Half Dome and watch the sun go down from the top in complete magnificent solitude, how I got to walk into Yosemite Valley and meander through the throngs of tourists, and how I got to say goodbye to Corey and Ryan as they completed their 200+ mile journeys before I continued on with mine.

One of many amazing lakes on the John Muir Trail. This was the view from our campsite one night. On a boulder. In the middle of the lake.

Dr.Slick catches a fish! Celebrating 4th of July, hiker style.

Entering Yosemite

Swimming hole near Tuolumne Meadows

Cathedral Peak after a storm

Meadows near Cathedral Lake

My last day before arriving in Yosemite Valley to finish the John Muir Trail

Watching light leave the valley on top of Half Dome

Morning sunshine on the domes

Corey, Ryan, I know you both will read this, and I just want you both to know how thankful I am for those five days. Goofing around with you two knuckleheads on the JMT was exactly what I needed to remind me how fun the trail can be, how beautifully simple. You guys are awesome, and I hope the trail provides another opportunity for us to hike together again one day.

Family photo!

(Left to right, Corey, Ryan, and myself)

6/30 The Sierras Part 2: Bishop to Mammoth Lakes

Bishop was a nice town. Even though I didn't stay very long, I felt really rested after staying the night there. The hostel was wonderful and I got to see a lot of hikers there who I hadn't seen since Kennedy Meadows.

Now, in Independence, I'd had a package mailed from home with maps for the next section in it and some cards from friends and family back in Virginia. It was supposed to be waiting at the post office there, but when I stopped in to ask for it the day before, it wasn't there. Crap. I needed those maps and I really wanted those letters. I decided to go back to the post office and check again before heading back up to the trail the next day. It meant I'd get a later start than I'd wanted, but whatever. I wanted to get to the post office right when it opened at 9, but the shuttle wasn't leaving until 11. I would have to hitch. The highway that runs right through Bishop is the same one that runs through Independence though, so I didn't think it'd be too hard. I stood on a street corner on the southern edge of downtown with my thumb out and a sign saying I was a PCT hiker needing a ride. 

It wasn't easy. There was a lot of traffic and I got a lot of funny looks. After about 30 minutes, a car drove by with the windows down and a woman yelled out "Where ya going?"

I quickly shouted back as they passed me by, "Independence!"

Her response was a thumbs up out the window. They slowed down near the stoplight up ahead, and I thought I'd gotten a ride, but then they turned the corner and were gone. Oh well, back to the grind. I turned back to face traffic and put my thumb back out. Two minutes later I hear a whistle behind me. I turn around to see the woman and her husband parked in the lot behind me. The woman gets out, and the first thing she says to me is: "Does your mother know you're hitchhiking alone??" 

She spends the 40 minute drive to Independence lecturing me, in a very motherly way, that I am very irresponsible and I shouldn't take risks like that, and what if some loony picked me up, you know, that's the only reason they pulled over for me in the first place, and I should call my mother the minute they drop me off and apologize to her for being so reckless and giving her a heart attack. It was one of my favorite hitches yet. Joelle, if you read this, I did call my mother, and I promise I only take rides from nice people like you and Jeff :)

I get to the post office and hug Jeff and Joelle goodbye and thank them. The post office finds my package and I have enough time to read my letters and enjoy a Subway sandwich before the shuttle appears, and I hop in and ride up to the trailhead.

The hike out over Kearsarge Pass back to the PCT junction is steep and long and not much fun at all. I take my time, I'm in no rush. It's pretty anyway, there's all these beautiful lakes along the way. 

When I arrive at the junction, finally back on the actual PCT after 7.5 miles, it's already pretty far into the afternoon. But I still have energy, so I decide to tackle Glen Pass. 

Awesome snowmelt lake below the southern side of the pass 

Passes are common in the Sierras, and they usually mean pain. It's the lowest point at which the trail can cross over a ridgeline, but "low" in the Sierras is anywhere between 9,000 and 13,000 feet. It means a big climb. Typically, hikers do one pass a day. I was about to take down two in an afternoon. 

Surprisingly though, I managed the feat with relative ease. I was tired of course, but I knew I would be able to camp at an awesome spot as my reward for a job well done. Rae Lakes was on the other side of Glen, some of the most scenic lakes on the trail. I descended down into the area as the sun was setting, reflecting the gorgeous pink and purple clouds against the golden and white cliffs of the pass in the lakes' glassy mirroring surface. I cowboy camped by the water and enjoyed an evening of stars and a gorgeous sunrise.

Rae Lakes at sunset

Rae Lakes at dusk from my campsite

Leaving Rae Lakes after the sunrise

After Rae Lakes came more passes, more people, and more mosquitoes. This part of the PCT is also technically the John Muir Trail, so there were a lot of south-bounders (SoBos) and weekenders out on the trail. It was a little crowded, but they usually over-pack on food, so they fed us desperate starving thru hikers pretty frequently with their excess granola bars and freeze-dried meals they didn't want to carry anymore. The passes didn't bother me much. I really like climbing up steep ascents so long as there's a view, and in the Sierras there's always a view. The mosquitoes, on the other hand, were intolerably ruthless. I had to abandon cowboy camping for a while, hiding in my tent to escape the incessant whine of the legions of bloodsuckers that would swarm and divebomb, kamikaze-style, the minute you stopped moving. For the record, mosquito-evasion walking speed = approximately 3.8 mph.

This section was a long one. I tried to pack a week's worth of food, but it proved to be far too little. I was down to one day of food left when I reached the junction to Muir Trail Ranch, still a few days out from my next resupply in Mammoth Lakes. I had heard the hiker box, a donation bin system for hikers to take and leave excess supplies that is commonplace on the trail, was typically well-stocked down at MTR, so I decided to hike the extra 2 miles down to check it out. And success! I found more than enough food to get me the rest of the way! Thank goodness for weekenders and JMTers. They fed me so much this week.

Regardless of the extra food though, by the time I got to Mammoth, I was running on fumes. Two weeks in the Sierras now, and it was really taking a lot out of me. I looked at myself in the mirror and was starting to be shocked at how thin I am. That "thigh gap" thing that's really "in" right now? Yeah, I have that. It's not all it's cracked up to be. I resolved to take a few days in Mammoth to rest up and try to regain some weight before getting back out there. Maybe I'd even stay for the Fourth of July!

Here's some other cool things I saw!

Suspension bridge!

Awesome waterslide before Pinchot Pass

Hiker babes cooling off, being crazy

Palisades Lakes, an oasis. Several hikers jumped in nude. The weekenders were shocked and appalled. We've been in the woods too long.

Glassy lakes below Muir Pass

Muir Pass lakes again. Can't tell where the rock ends and the water begins.

The famed Muir Hut, on top of the pass named for the man himself!

Storm clouds over Evolution Lakes, always cooler with an awesome filter

I LOVE THE WILDERNESS YEAH

Sunrise summit of Silver Pass, pretty sure this is Heart Lake.

RAIN STORMS

Swimming in Virginia Lake, the lake of my home state

Wait....what....

So yes, I have completed a third of this trail. 2/3rds to go!