Day 15: (04/19): to 179.4 :: 8.5 miles

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We continued along the ridge in the morning which began resembling a mountain spine, reminding us of a trail we did on Mt Baldy near LA called the Devils Backbone. It was thankfully clear and the wind had died down, but the valleys below were filled with clouds. We had 8 miles to go to reach the junction for the town of Idyllwild where Shannon will be meeting us with more food. We have been on slim rations and can’t wait! After a few miles on the exposed ridge we went around the backside of the mountain and into a snowy bowl. Travel became a little tedious and slow going, but wasn’t dangerous. We followed tracks in the snow and eventually made it to the Devil’s Slide Trail, a 2 1/2 side trail down to town. We went down switch backs eventually getting back out of the snow. About 1 mile from the trail head we spotted the welcome site of Shannon walking up the trail to meet us! We enjoyed lovely views of rock formations, oak forest and lots of sugar pine trees, which have my most favorite pine cones!! Shannon drove over an hour from Huntington Beach to meet us!

It was a Sunday and although the trailhead parking lot was closed for COVID, many cars lined the road leading to it. Many family had come out for walks or to find little patches of snow to play in. Shannon had found the best parking spot on a curve in the road, with full afternoon sun and a cedar tree for lounging under. She had brought us the most wonderful and nourishing picnic, take out from Vegan Express in Redlands, rice, beans, plantains, salad, curried tofu... she even brought us kombucha! We basked in the sun and feasted and dried out our wet feet.

I sent an order of Vitacost food to Shannon’s so that she wouldn’t have to shop for us during the time of corona virus and it was like Christmas opening the boxes! We did all of this seated on the ground under the cedar tree on the side of the road. We repackaged it and refilled our food bags. We’d considered staying at a hotel and going back to the trail tomorrow or the next day, showers and laundry and warmth and comfort are always appealing, but we knew we’d never get an early start the next day if we did that and it would cost a lot of money and we’d have to walk a long way through town to get back to the trail. Instead we opted for a scenic ride through town in Shannon’s car. Town was depressing and eerily deserted! It made us sad seeing how much the businesses must be suffering! Idyllwild is definitely a popular weekend getaway spot and no one was there! We were glad we weren’t staying!

Shannon brought us back to the trail head and we found a stealth spot to camp in view of a neat rock formation called Tahquitz Rock. The rock is said to house an evil witch spirit! It reminds us of Yosemite and is a popular rock climbing location, in fact we learned on an informational sign at the trailhead that it was one of the birthplaces or rock climbing. Technically camping is not allowed here which is true at most trailheads. We have a permit to camp along the PCT and this is not the PCT. Breaking the law always makes me nervous, but we will leave no trace! We are scared of a man who goes by the name of San Jac Jon, he’s a state park ranger and he’s been known to lay down the law with PCT hikers! He hikes the trails just about every day and does YouTube trail reports on the snow conditions. It is good an important work, a hiker actually fell to their death a few weeks ago! Unfortunately the PCT has become so popular that in order to get permits people are starting earlier than they should and getting into trouble! Anyway we must get out of here early or San Jac Jon might find us and yell at us!


View of the fog bank in the valley below at sunrise 

The trail was on ledges with steep drops in the morning 

Beautiful view of the “backbone” and all the way back to Toro Peak and some of the San Diego County mountains 

Panorama of the trail towards San Jacinto, all of the left side is a huge burn zone

Red Tahquitz

Sugar pine!

Massive trees!

Sugar pines and snow going down the Devils Slide 

The ridge line of San Jacinto and Marion Mountain 

Mmm vegan express!

Vitacost Christmas!

Shanny and her little egg car and the fine cedar tree rest area!

A quick trip to Idyllwild!

Tahquitz Rock

Alpenglow of Tahquitz Rock

Comments

  1. JGJune 5, 2020 at 9:39 AM

    I would like to know more about things like Vitacost and bear boxes and how they work for you on the trail.

    ReplyDelete

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