May 14, 2017
Mountain Top Before Idyllwild into Idyllwild, CA
Pacific Crest Trail Thru-Hike: Day 10
All the eerie dead trees of this burn scar. Visceral feelings of what the fire must have been like.
It's Mother's Day, and I spent the last three days taking pictures of all the beautiful desert flowers in the superbloom. I put them together and set my mom a picture of each different one, giving her a virtual bouquet of wildflowers.
Idyllwild has a long-standing fire closure that meant road-walking into town. The road walk was hot, long, and plenty of extra miles. Cake has had pretty nasty shin splints so far, and partway through the road walk decided to hitch to Lake Hemet, our halfway-into-Idyllwild point to ice his shins. We met him there and rested with beer/ice cream/candy/chips at the convenience store when, suddenly, Cake stood up and said 'fuck it'. He put his pack on, walked out into the Lake Hemet parking lot and stuck out his thumb. It took several cars before one pulled over, but Cake got in and, as we later found out got a ride back to where he had originally hitched from. About half an hour later we saw him walking up to Lake Hemet. Even with shin splints, he wanted to keep continuous footsteps. I admire Cake for his tenacity, and his trail name was given the suffix of 'Boss' so he became 'Cake Boss' for his efforts.
The second half of the road walk started after about eleven hikers had congregated on the Lake Hemet convenience store patio. We stocked up on cans of Colt 45 and set out for Idyllwild on mountain bike trails and forest roads. Walking with the sisters (Rise, Shine, and Dana), Gary and Land Mammal, Alex, Sam and more into Idyllwild, we spent our time solving riddles and talking about what we would eat once we got into town.
We were almost turned away from the Mexican restaurant when we got into town but, luckily, Rise, Shine and Dana got there just minutes before the last seating and saved a table for all of us. I ate far too much Chimichanga for my own good, headed to the town campground and set up my tent on the most uneven, slanted campsite I've ever had the un-success of trying to sleep on.
