Hey all! Thanks for caring about us. It's been two weeks for us on the trail and it feels like a lot has changed since day one. First of all, we started out gung-ho for the Canadian border, planning to do around 30 miles a day. Fine, go ahead and laugh, now it seems like a silly idea to us as well. Obviously that didn't last long so we've modified our plans a bit and now we just take each day as it comes.
We agreed that we wouldn't quit until at least Big Bear, and now we're there. We've decided to try and go another week and then decide again. So all that to say, we're enjoying it but it's a lot harder than we expected. So please keep praying for us and don't be shocked if you hear our voices before the next update. Thanks for being such great friends and families and not disowning us if we don't make it to Canada. We love you!
And now some highlights from the past week or so:
After a long morning of dragging through the desert, we come by a water cache at a vacation home in the middle of nowhere. IvaJo is pointing at it here.
What was so wonderful about this place is that we arrived to get water just when the owners -- Mike, Cheryl, and their daughter Alex -- were leaving. And besides giving us much-longed-for human contact, they offered us watermelon, amazing turkey sandwiches, cookies, apples and bananas and (as you see here) very comfy chairs. What a boost!
These are some of our favorite desert wildlife: the horned lizard. They look like they're wearing samurai armor.
After seemingly endless days in the desert we pass over Palm to Pines Highway and we enter some alpine country. The desert will make you a tree hugger.
That's Palm Spring just below IvaJo up here in the San Jacinto Mountains. We were wishing that IvaJo's grandparents still lived there. We would have been down on the aerial tramway in a flash and at their house for a little R & R and water aerobics.
Worst decision on the trail so far: we hiked off trail the night before down a very steep and rocky trail to our campsite and water. Wanting to avoid taking that treacherous path up, we decided to take a "not recommended" trail that would actually cut a few miles off the PCT. It was not recommended because it wasn't a trail at all. It had burned away in the '80s. OK. Long story short: at the crest of the mountain we had to crunch and scrape our way through a quarter-mile of thick manzanita. Here's Jon: Captain Chaparral. [
It appears the proper spelling of Chaparral will be my ongoing contribution to this log. Nice to be of use. - ed.]
Best decision so far: a rest day in the beautiful mountain town of Idyllwild. We get to sleep in a bed and do our laundry.
Back on the trail and refreshed, here we are at the Tahquitz River.
"Hey, want to see my art? Do you know where my friends are?" (If you're not a Sojourner, don't worry about this one.)
We're down in the desert again at I-10 (San Gorgiono Pass). These are the San Jacinto Mountains we just conquered.
We're in the desert and we can't remember our names or what our feet are supposed to look like. Ouch!
[
I was sent instructions for this photo which are kind of self-fulfilling: "The following pictures are of my bare foot and you can't see them, but I have dozens of little pricklies in my foot from the cactus foot shot. Make sure and do some photo editing on this one and make it worth the pain I went through for the folks back home." I'm not sure photo editing could say it better than that.]
A sleeping rattler. He slithered away a moment later and we're off to Big Bear! New shoes! Lots of food that we don't have to carry! Talk to you soon.
[
I got an authentic dried strawberry along with the memory card and their notes. Just wanted to gloat. -ed.]
