OUR NEARLY 200 MILES ON THE PACIFIC CREST TRAIL

                               November/December 1999

Section E. Agua Dulce to hiway 59 near Mojave Calif. - 108.8 miles
Section F. Hiway 58 near Tehachapi Pass to Hiway178 at Walker Pass - 84.1 miles

On Saturday Nov. 20th I drove from Yuma AZ to the Airport in Los Angeles to pick up a friend of 30 plus years. She came from Whistler, B.C. Canada and came with a large backpack. Her name is Pat Gutherie.

 Over the phone we had agreed to hike a couple of sections of the PCT. We are both excited and very glad to see each other. We only made a few mistakes getting out of Los Angeles, (I am getting very good at reacting to a screech "Get in the next lane QUICK". We did arrive at Aqua Dulce by seven p.m. There, we were hosted by trail Angels Jeff and Donna Saufley who allowed us to use a marvelous 2 bedroom trailer on the back of their property. They make this facility free to anyone hiking the PCT. It was GREAT. 

That night we arranged all our food and a food re-supply box. We put all the duplicate items back in the car. Early next morning we proceeded to drive to the Mojave desert to stash water and drop off the re-supply box. We did not have to put out much water, a young couple LETITBE AND SKUNK (trail names) who were hiking North to South had already stashed water and were unable to finish on this section. They left information on all the water locations for us. 

Next we met up with Jim Ostdick and Kelly in the town of Mojave. (A great Trail Angel Couple) We left my car at the White Motel in Mojave and  Jim and Kelly  drove us back to the trail head in Aqua Dulce.

We are really excited now.....have waved goodbye and are off hiking when we realize "Disaster number one" We do not have the hiking poles, they are in the trunk of the car. These poles incidentally are the two poles needed to set up our tarp-tent. Well we mulled that over for awhile and realized the only thing that resembles a pole on the trail are the dried up stalks of the Yucca Plant. We got two of these and they lasted for the entire section as our hiking poles and also for our tent poles.

Marge walking the Aqueduct - Mohave desert

Our packs are a little heavy as we are both carrying a gallon of water. I think that we are scared the next stash of water will not be there. So we end up carrying more than needed. However, in the next section we learned to manage our water better. One time the water stash had been used by someone else. "Disaster number two" So we looked in the guide book and saw where we could get out to a highway and found a forestry fire station.  We used their hose to fill up our bottles, as we were doing this they returned, and told us the hose we were using  was not potable water  and would most likely give us Giardia. So out it all went, and we  purified our bottles and filled up with good water. It was so dark when we finished and really cold, we just set up our tent by the fire station and went to bed ( no supper that night).

From Agua Dulcie we experienced the Santa Ana Winds. These winds come in from the North and are bitter Cold. In some areas they were blowing in gusts at 70 mph. We experienced very high winds in both sections and all the time very cold. Our tarp tent was flattened only once, I ended up on top of it and Pat ended up inside it, we did manage to sleep that way for a few hours before dawn. We became very good at pitching this tarp-tent. (it has no floor, just netting at each end). We also became very innovative in setting it up.  We tied up to Joshua trees, big rocks and anything else we could find to anchor it when the ground was too hard for the tent stakes. We even banked up the tarp-tent with frozen cow pies one night.

Pat, keeping out of the wind on the trail

With all this wind in this part of the country you see lots of Wind Farms which are big windmills used for electricity. One night we were camped just below a number of these windmills and at 5 a.m. we both sat up wondering what had happened. The wind had stopped blowing and the windmills had shut down. It was an eerie silence that woke us both up. Apparently they are all computerized and when the wind gets below a certain point the windmills close down automatically.

 Another experience in the wind, as we were coming along the final mile and half towards Mojave, the wind was so strong it kept blowing us of the trail, I was walking by a barbwire fence and had to use my Yucca stick against the fence to stop me from being blown into it. You had to hunker down into the trail and plant your feet firmly. Your hat had to be tied on very strongly or it was gone.

Our days began about 6.15 a.m. just as the dawn was breaking, we were off hiking by seven a.m. We would stop for breakfast at nine a.m. and after going to bed without supper a few times we started having our main meal at two p.m. Then hiking until four p.m. Look for a flat spot to camp and be in our sleeping
bags by five p.m. It would be dark by this time and usually very cold. We then had  a snack and would be asleep by 5.30 p.m. It was critical  we find a spot to pitch the tent by 4.30 p.m. A few times we could not do that, so we ended up sleeping (not well) on the trail. or in among the small bushes without benefit of the tent.

Some of the hiking was just beautiful and some was awful. The awful parts were on trails that motor bikes  had run up and down.  It was very much like walking in eight  inches of sand uphill. Very tiring and of course my mind was writing letters to my congressman complaining about the condition of the trails. The signs all say "no motor vehicles" just foot and horse traffic. But Oh Well.......

We did get lost a number of times, due to motor bikes making other trails, or there were no signs. Pat was the best in finding our trails. She was RIGHT five times out of  five. I learned to be quiet and let her find the trails and do what I was told.

Part way through the first section we had a food (re-supply) drop at a small store on Hiway 138. We manage to get to the store and picked up our package, then decided to visit with Mr. Jack Fair (another Trail Angel). The PCT trail goes right beside his house at the start of the Mojave Desert) You can get water there and have a shower, do your laundry, and sleep in his garage (all for a small fee). We did all this.  We had stopped by his house and met him when we drove our re-supply food box to the store prior to our starting our hike.

 He was expecting us and was concerned for our whereabouts as most people do not hike at this time of the year. We listened to Jack  talk for hours on his "far out" philosophy of life. He was 76 years old and smoked constantly.  Apparently in his younger years he had been the head of a motorcycle group called the "Shaggers" located in California. I read all the newspaper clippings and confirmed this and  that he had also done the 4 x 4. (only a motorcycle person will understand this). He also used the "F" word every other word ,until even I began to think it was part of the English language as a adjective, verb, pronoun, adverb, conjunction etc.

The desert was not what I expected. It is full of vegetation and people. We hiked along the cemented over big pipe that holds the California Aqueduct. Lots of people have places out there and come from Los Angeles for the weekends. We could not have done this section without the water stashes. We did come across a trail water seep only once.

When we finished the first section we spent 2 nights at the Whites Motel in Mojave. We got cleaned up and ate everything in sight. Again, good friend Jim Ostdick has come  here to help us. He will take my car to  Walker Pass. He and Kelly have also stashed water along this part of the trail for us. 

Now, we are back on the trail for another seven days. During this time it is very cold with high winds. Our water bottles froze on two nights. I wore all my clothes to bed and all my clothes on the trail. I never took off my hat and my hair hurt when I did take it off. During this seven days we did not wash ourselves or our eating pot or dish and spoon. We rationalized the cold would freeze any germs on the pots etc. As to ourselves, we did manage to get a diaper wipe on the body once or twice. I felt we were in a Survival Mode and just wanted to hike and get out of there.

Two days from Walker Pass, we thought it snowed but it was only frost.

Jim was able to leave water in a few places and the rest we had to get it from Springs. Some of these Springs were running just fine and one we could not get water out of except in a small stream on the ground. I had a new filter with me and we just could not scoop up the water correctly. We just managed to scoop up a litre and use the iodine tablets. Jim would leave us extra water that we could not carry, if the temperatures had been warmer we would have used it for a sponge bath. This did not happen, the winds were just too cold. So we left several gallons for some others who might be hiking.

When I turned in a short trip report to the PCT Digest on the internet. We had many messages of congratulations. The following two I would like
to share with you:

From Owen Kitteridge:
There is a reason that the area east of Mojave has windmills and you found out. I went to High School in Mojave and that was 27 years ago and I still will not go into the High Desert in the winter due to unstable weather. I was a boy scout and camping/hiking in the wind/sand sucks.  In fact Mojave averages 360 days of wind.

From Charlie Jones:
Congratulations to both of you. You two must hold the record this year for being the last hikers with enough guts to still be out on the PCT despite the weather and low temps.
I hope you turned off the lights...........there is no one hiking behind you.
Charlie.

Would I do this again, probably, but not in December and not with a tarp-tent. I would take the Seirra Design Clip Flashlite tent and a " warm body" to share it with. I would definitely take the next layer of warm clothes. I was always just a little bit chilly.

After being home for three days, my body is now starting to function correctly. Every fibre and being in my body ached and I could not stop eating or sleeping. 

So with all that in mind. I WISH YOU A VERY MERRY CHRISTMAS 
AND A BLESSED NEW YEAR.

Marge (the Old Gal) :)