A nice clear 30 degree morning at elevation 5,000 feet,  but shouldering heavy packs (seven days of food plus full loads of water) was a serious “groaner”. After starting at 5:00 am, by 7:00 we found a cozy sunpatch to stop at for breakfast before  reaching Chihuahua Valley Road.  We were standing at the trailhead parking (several vans were there), when along came hiker Pat, fresh from overnighting at Trail Angel Mike’s place just up the road.  He said there were a lot of hikers still at Mike’s place, sitting around drinking coffee!  

“OK,” I thought, “that does it!  For any hiker who starts for Canada from ADZPCTKO, this is NOT a thru-hike!   It is a Hobbit Walking Party, with food at every road crossing!”    Just up the trail we found out what all the vans were about–  a whole pack of trail gorillas were cutting brush and fixing the trail tread— boy did it need it!  I took a “before” and “after” picture to show the difference.  Thankyou and cheers to all trail gorillas!! 

We followed the PCT up to a great viewpoint–there was Mt. San Jacinto up ahead–very exciting!  But after that, we were dealing with “un-gorilla-ed” trail –lots of pushing through bushes, with very rough, rocky tread, and tread that was falling down.  Add in our very heavy packs, and it made for slow progress.   We also talked for awhile with a hiker who asked Bill, “I’ve got a question for you. How’d you ever get a woman to go on this hike with you?” Bill answered by telling him the story of how the Lord brought us together. He encouraged our fellow hiker to consider asking God to reveal Himself in a way that was clear. The hiker’s response was “Nah— I already tried that.” But we are praying for him.

We went down the side trail to Tule Spring to cook dinner, rinse our socks, and air sleeping bags on a warm but breezy day. The rest of the afternoon, the trail was what I call “cozy”–no big broad vistas, just lots of winding out of picturesque little canyons and gullies and rocks, with plenty of wildflowers.

Later in the afternoon, came a very long climb up along Table Mountain.  With our heavy packs, even Bill became so tired that he decided to stop and rest  before our normal 3:30 Snickers break.  I was glad to rest, too!  Half an hour later, we reached the Hiker Oasis water cache.  A lot of hikers were sort of collapsed around it, and the cache was full of water— we could have saved ourselves a lot of energy carrying heavy water loads. One guy was reading a book on Attila the Hun, so we ended up talking history for awhile.  What was supposed to be a 10 minute break ended up being WAY longer!

Note from Alexa: This is an insider family joke— Bill has been a big fan of Attila since I can remember and I grew up with I think a story about him every week or so. It is part of the reason, when I bought my bows, that I chose hand-crafted Hungarian imported archery recurves in the style the Huns had.

From the cache, it’s another 8 1/2 miles to the highway, but we knew we’d never make it before dark, so we ended up stopping early because we were both so tired, and camped in a sandy wash, with another hiker in his tent a bit “upstream” from us. By tomorrow night, we may be at Apache Peak, where the “snow fun” begins!

Walk to Rivendell: Camp at Chetwood

Tags: Attila the Hun, Chihuahua Valley Road, Hiker Oasis, Trail Angel Mike, trail gorillas