With the fabulous Las Vegas hiatus and lovely time with my daughters at Taylor Swift (and some hiking in Joshua Tree and above Palm Springs too), it’s time to return to the trail.
With the latest round of storms and checking on snow conditions, the only realistic option to continue now is to flip flop the flip flop. I’m not terribly worried that I’ll be messing with the program too much as I’ll be hiking opposite my official permit from 3/28 to 5/13 until I try again for Leg 3 southbound from the Washington/Oregon border. I think I can safely stay that every planned PCT thru hiker starting at the southern border any day the month of March as been disrupted one way or another, so just joining that crew of folks trying to march forward…
So I return this afternoon (UPDATED – Had to postpone another 4 days, arriving at Plan D) to where I left off in Morena Village, 20 PCT miles north of the border, and hope to make Boulder Oaks by dark, and then head up into the mountains of Mount Laguna and try to cover 50 miles by the weekend. Ashley will continue to work out of Palm Springs another week. Almost unbelievable, there is yet another round of storms forecast for Wednesday and Thursday this week brining more rain and even snow above 5,000 feet in these far south mountains. I’m going to try and march through it now that my head cold has finally receded.
The only thing I really want to avoid these next 5 days is this: Breaking down a wet tent, and setting it up again in the rain. These are the words I used backpacking in Hornstrandir in Iceland or in late September on the western slopes of the Washington Cascades, not heading into the start of April in the Southern California desert!