PCT Day 16: Mile 166.6 to Tent site Mile 175.4 (June 3) Rain and Hail

The day started with a better attitude. Attitude on trail is so important because you never know what is coming. A good attitude is a buffer against unknown future do-do.

This is the day I entered the San Jacinto Wilderness. So beautiful. The first objective was to get water at Apache Spring. I made it to the side trail – a steep, long trek down. I was surprised to see a hiker who had passed me a day ago. He advised me to leave my pack and go to the spring with just my CNOC water bag to gather the water, so I did. The area to gather water was tight – not a lot of space. There was a boxed spring which formed a shallow pool – deep enough for me to scoop up the water with my 2 liter water bladder.

I decided to take a break there and have my lunch. I made my very first “ramen bomb.” A ramen bomb is adding mashed potato flakes to ramen. It was delicious! I had four cheese flavored mashed potatoes, added those. I also had a gourmet cheese stick from Idyllwild (my favorite – Beecher’s Flagship Cheese from Seattle) I added that. I felt it needed a bit of something so I added a packet of Fire Sauce from Taco Bell. Perfection. It was yummy.

Hiking the steep way with a full load of water was challenging but I actually felt a tad less nervous. I was so happy when I finally made it back up.

I noticed the clouds but totally ignored them – after all, the weather report said 0% chance of rain. I remembered when I was in Oriflamme Canyon and I saw that horrible black cloud covering the sky – the weather also said 0% chance of rain and no rain. Still – I was thankful to have the disposable rain poncho I picked up in Idyllwild just in case.

About 3 miles from camp there was a little sprinkle so I decided to pull out that disposable poncho and put it over me and my pack. It worked fine. The misting stopped. “Good,” I thought, “No more rain after this – since there wasn’t any chance that there was gonna be rain to begin with.”

I only had a couple more miles until camp. It was hard going but it was beautiful. But – the clouds were still there…and the wind. About a 1/4 mile from camp it started sprinkling again, eventually evolving to full on rain as I approached camp. By the time I got there it was blowing hard, raining and HAILING!

Yes indeed. Hailing on me as I tried to set up my tent. Blowing wind is bad enough when trying to set up a trekking pole tent – but hail added to the mix was wild. I was thankful that my tent is created as one unit – the inner mesh is connected to the outer shell. I knew I would be able to get dry once it was up and I was inside.

Finally, the tent was up – ALL of my stuff inside and me inside. I just sat there. Staring. Staring at all my stuff. And I just sat there. Not drying off. Not getting changed into dry clothes. Just sitting and staring. And listening to the rain and wind. Thankful that the hail had stopped.

I finally snapped out of it and remembered my new Rab mid layer pants that I had gotten just recently with Janet in Idyllwild. Thank the Lord! I really did need those pants that night. (I told this previously, but I threw out my long pants that I had brought with me because I hated them so much.) I got out of my other wet things and was soon warm. I was not cursing my 15° sleeping bag that night.

As I lay there getting warm, I hear my message notification! Amazingly I had reception. It was from Carmen from Pine Springs Ranch! ”How are you holding up in this weather?” I wasn’t too far from them still so she knew I could be in the mess as well. It was so good to hear from her. I told her I was fine and she was surprised when I told her that I had hail.

Eventually, I fell asleep, thinking about what my next move would need to be.