Percentage done: 26.5% (more than a quarter done!)
WE MADE IT! WE HAVE ARRIVED TO KENNEDY MEADOWS!!!! The start of the Sierras, the land of resupplying and mandatory bear cans, we are finally here!
After my UCLA graduation last week, Brooke and I were dropped back off in Tehachapi. It was 140 miles to the meadows, we were chasing down our friends ahead of us, and the home stretch of the desert section was finally here. Will we make it? Will we survive? The suspense!
As always, please feel free to mail letters, postcards, mail, or care packages! I always get so excited heading to the post office, and the next one will be in Bishop. I can’t wait to see what you send!
Address:
PCT Hiker — Dennis Gavrilenko
Bishop USPS
585 W Line St
Bishop, CA 93514
If this is your first episode and you’re thinking “what in the world is happening right now”, start here!
Finding the cache “Cache”!
Day 36, Sunday 6/15:
Today we hiked 10 miles with 1200 feet of elevation gain. Nothing too crazy, just screwing our trail legs back on after 4 days of not hiking at UCLA.
After packing up from our hotel in LA, my family, brooke, and I drove back to Tehachapi to get back on the trail. We were dropped off back where we left off last Tuesday, ate some delicious apricots and tamales we had bought in Lancaster, and then my family was off! Brooke and I relaxed some more in the shade (it was 95 degrees), then headed off around half an hour later.
Maxim with the trail register in Tehachapi!
Today’s scenery was a lot more windmills. We’re still in the wind farm area, so the trail snakes through windmill after windmill after windmill. We hiked about with another PCTer, Rabbit, who was named for his fast walking and was hiking with his girlfriend before she catastrophically twisted her ankle on San Jacinto and had to head back home to Vancouver. Yikes. Rabbit was great though!
Cruised all after through the windy hills, and made it to the freeway crossing after 8 miles. We refilled our waters there, relaxed on the camp chairs set up for hikers (a camp chair is an absolute godsend after a day of hiking), then carried on for two more miles to get to a campsite underneath a giant Joshua Tree. We’re officially now in the land of Cheryl Strayed, since she started her hike in her book Wild at the Tehachapi freeway overpass. She really lucked out with skipping the entire desert section.
Day 37, Monday 6/16:
Today we hiked 25 miles with 6200 feet of elevation. Morning was extremely rough because of poor sleep last night, extreme winds and a bright moon prevented me from falling deeply asleep and Brooke from falling asleep at all.
We started off the day with a 5-mile climb up a mountain, then cruised the high elevation wind farms for the rest of the day. The scenery is all starting to blend together now.
I’m starting to get quite concerned above my right pinkie toe. It’s the only physical damage left from my 90-miles-in-3-days-push-to-Wrightwood a few weeks ago, and it has gone over several iterations of destruction since then. First, there was the massive blister on the entire bottom pad; then, there was a miscellaneous blob of calloused skin; and now, there’s extreme pain every time my pinkie toe nail hits the shoe wall. I trimmed the nail to be as short as possible, drained some unknown liquid from the scene of the crime, and had Brooke wrap it in several band-aids and Lucou tape to carry it over until Kennedy Meadows. A few more days of this and I’ll need to amputate it; fortunately, I brought a pocketknife!
The highlight of the day was the geocaching adventure I had in the afternoon to find an epic ammo can atop a mountain called Cache Peak. I saw this one on the map a few days ago, and noticed that it hadn’t been found in 11 YEARS. Plus, there was a trackable inside that had been in geocaching jail for over a decade, and I wanted to rescue it and drop it off at Mt. Whitney.
What proceeded was an epic 4-hour (I thought it’d take only an hour and a half lol), 5-mile adventure just to find an ammo can located just 0.9 miles off trail. My “Found” log on the container describes it best:
“I started my northbound thru-hike of the Pacific Crest Trail on May 11th, and here I am now! It’s been such a wonderful (and challenging time) already, but geocaching along the way keeps me in high spirits and is super fun. This past weekend, I headed back to UCLA for my college graduation, walked the stage, then was dropped back off at the Tehachapi trailhead to carry on to Kennedy Meadows. Canada, here I come!
I had my eye on this geocache for the last few weeks, and had been planning an epic assault up Cache Peak since then. Geocaching is a great break from hiking all day, so I’ve been downloading offline all geocaches above 5+ Favorite Points (someone hid a power trail of size micro caches at the beginning of the trail, polluting the map with tiny film canisters for 150 miles) and selectively adding individual caches that didn’t meet that threshold but seemed interesting to that list. This geocache was one of them!
My plan was to make it to Golden Oak Springs on the PCT, drop off my pack and refill water, take a break, then head up to the Cache Peak summit. I did just that, and departed up to the summit around 4 pm.
It was brutal — 1200 feet straight uphill, with extremely thick brush cover, tree branches everywhere, and a million thistles in my socks. It was exhilarating. I didn’t have enough service to plan a satellite map route to the GZ, and used the geocaching app terrain map to plan a ridge walk up. That plan sort of worked, with several major backtracks and semi-cliff descents included. Thank goodness I’ve studied (and drawn) topographic maps extensively, so I was never actually lost, just struggling to get to the summit. Fortunately, I have K-pop music blasting in my AirPods to keep me company the entire way up.
Eventually, I made it at about 5:15 pm! I thought the hard part was getting to the summit, but it took me another hour of searching to eventually find the ammo can. I must’ve turned over every single rock within 50 feet of the summit plaque, to no avail. I even messaged the CO for a hint, with no luck. I was about to quit and head back to the trail before it got dark, but decided to sit for a bit more near the top to enjoy watching the late afternoon sun over the windmills. I turned over another rock in frustration, and there to my absolute amazement, buried under 6 inches of pine needles, was peeking out the top of an ammo can. I FOUND IT OH MY GOODNESS!!! Turns out that 11 years of rockfalls and pine needles coverage bury an ammo can quite thoroughly, so it was honestly very lucky I managed to squeak a find on this one. Thank goodness!
I signed the log victoriously (I was 11 the last time this geocache was found 🤯), rescued the trackable from its geocaching prison (I’m planning on dropping it off at the summit of Mt. Whitney), and skimmed through the tradeables collection. They’re so many! I didn’t grab anything but a bike chain keychain for my bag (trying to keep my thru-hiking pack light!), but did notice the several hundred pennies at the bottom that explain why the ammo can was so heavy. That must’ve been quite the trek bringing that up here!
What a day! Thank you SO much to the CO for hiding this one and bringing me such an adventure on this fine afternoon. I’m so happy to have increased the number of finds by 1/3, and find this ammo can for the first time in a decade. This is the easiest Favorite Point I’ve ever given, and I sincerely hope more geocachers venture out to find this one. Adventures like this are what geocaching is all about!
After descending down the much more chill southern side of Cache Peak, I was back at the water spring at 7:30ish. The other hikers there were quite relieved that the owner of the backpack had returned (they were really confused as to whose abandoned bag was at the water source, especially since the FarOut comments mentioned a bear), and we chatted for a bit while we all filtered water and I took out a million prickles from my socks. Left the water source around 8 pm, then hiked for another 2 hours in the dark to catch up to Brooke; she left a trekking pole on the trail so that I’d know where to turn off the PCT to find her, and we had a late dinner and were off to bed.
Also, I saw a SpaceX launch today at sunset! Either that, or a nuclear missile was launched and WW3 is on the way.
Day 38, Tuesday 6/17:
Today we did another 22 miles with 4000 feet of climbing. We are shooting to get to Kennedy Meadows by the summer solstice on the 21st, and boy oh boy are we pushing the mileage these days. We only have enough food until then, so either we make it there, or we’re bear lunch.
Had a bit of a later start today because of the late night yesterday, and left camp around 9. Putting contacts in was a pain this morning, and I’m seriously considering moving back to my transition + prescription glasses permanently after Kennedy Meadows. Their convenience and hygiene factor is much, much better than my contacts, even if the latter provide slightly crisper vision.
Cruised along for the first 15 miles until we reached water and stopped for lunch. I can’t wait to get to the Sierras and not have to carry 12 pounds of water between springs, this has been brutal!
Robin Bird Spring was truly heavenly, with tons of flowing water and plenty of shade (that two other hiker groups were already enjoying). I filled up on water, washed my socks and legs, and set out the solar panel until Brooke arrived for lunch. She came about an hour later, we ate some delicious salami sandwiches, and ended up taking a (at this point expected) hourlong nap. Woke up in a daze, topped off on water again, and we were back on the trail.
It was another 7 miles until our campsite for the day, bur we were absolutely cruising on the hills and having a blast. The scenery has changed once again; we’re no longer in the land of windmills, but have rather entered a truly Sierra-esque landscape — pine trees, granite boulders, and beautiful sunshine every direction you turn. I absolutely love it. We have officially made it out of the desert, yay!
And for some reason, I seem to be farting all day long. I legitimately farted 60 times today without a single poop. It’s not as bad as brooke though, who’s been experiencing explosive diarrhea the last two days and has become quite the expert at digging emergency cat-holes on a moment’s notice. Maybe it’s the pork tamale she ate three days ago? We can only speculate. ‘Nuf said there.
Made it to camp by dark, set up the tent quickly, and had a DELICIOUS chicken and rice dinner. I cooked it in a chicken bouillon packet that I got at the Arab grocery store in Bakersfield last week (plus Joanne’s salsa flakes 😮💨), and that slapped harder than Will Smith.
Hug shoutout to Acquired today for pulling me through today’s hike. The Berkshire episodes I, II, and III made for great listening on the climbs!
Day 39, Wednesday 6/18:
Today we hiked 23 miles with 3300 feet of elevation gain. It was insanely hot, and I was mildly hallucinating all day.
In other news, I got a bit too carried away with eating granola bars the last few days, and I’m running dangerously low on snacks to get to Kennedy Meadows. Fortunately, I raided the hiker box back at the Tehachapi freeway and grabbed several extra oatmeal packets so I won’t actually starve, but that just means I’ll have to be eating Cinnamon and Spice instant oatmeal until we arrive. Needless to say, morale is quickly plummeting.
The first 7 miles were pretty chill downhill until we got to Kelso Road, where there was a massive water cache and unfortunately, no shade. Someone blue balled us by putting up a sign 200 feet from the road saying there was trail magic, but when we got there, nada. Mega bruh.
Trail update: It is so hot today and I am truly suffering. Fortunately, the time is melting away as I’m hallucinating and higher order brain functions are slowly shutting down. 4 miles of brutal uphill seemed to go by in minutes. I can’t believe I voluntarily chose to do this.
Another trail update: I just ate some Cinnamon and Spice oatmeal with my hot spork for a snack just now. Morale is at an all-time low.
Hiker thought: why is water flowing in the desert not super hot? I know that it’s flowing, but shouldn’t the desert creek be warm?
Hiker thought #2: what is a calorie? Brooke put chocolate electrolyte powder into her drink and it was 220 calories, how? It’s a powder, not food! I look at it and think it’s 0 calories.
Hiker thought #3: I’m still so confused about windmill power generation. I know the big windmills were 3 megawatts, but watts are power, not energy. I need my dad to explain how this works to me the next time I have service.
Today we had lunch under a giant Joshua Tree at Mile 620.8. The FarOut comments mentioned that this tree was wonderful and a great shady spot, and I’m absolutely thrilled to report that it did, in fact, provide plenty of shade. After lunch, Brooke thought her stomach was rumbling extremely loudly. It was rumbling, but the loud sound was just a plane lol. I’m sitting under this Joshua Tree typing this out right now and mildly tripping. I’m laughing so hard at what I’m writing. I’m so funny. What is life?
Hiker thought #4: do solar farm solar panels turn to optimally face the sun as the day goes on? They should if the panels create more electricity by this optimal facing than the energy required to turn them. Intuitively, that seems to be the case.
Hiker thought #5: Dipso Calypso is the best song to hike uphill with.
A fly was buzzing around me, and I slapped it dead on my leg. Turns out, it wasn’t a fly but a bee, and I slapped the stinger straight into my thigh. It was so painful.
It was still another 10 miles to camp, and both Brooke and I were completely cooked by this point. I grabbed a few of Brooke’s things to lighten her pack (the heat is really starting to get to us), zoomed ahead to camp to set up the tent and start filtering water, and made it in time to see the sunset. Brooke arrived 30 minutes later, we had a delicious dinner, and I finished the day by finding a size large geocache. What an absolutely exhausting 48 hours.
Day 40, Thursday 6/19:
Another 22 miles with 3500 feet of climbing.
After yesterday’s crazy debacle, brooke and I woke up super early to escape the heat on the first 1600-foot climb of the day. We were up by 4:40 and out by 5; we’re already pros at this whole packing-up-camp thing!
The first highlight of the day was the trail register half a mile up the climb, where someone that morning had already signed it “Tiny” from “Your mom”. We’d seen him that morning when he shined his flashlight in the tent asking where the water cache was, and I was cracking up at his “from” location.
The climb was a breeze, and I absolutely cruised to the top as the sun rose over the canyon below. Stunning. I even passed Tiny, who was legit 60 years old and told me he writes funny “From” locations because “everyone is boring and writes where they’re actually from, and I want to switch things up to make people laugh”. I passed him and continued listening to Jungle, and saw him later when I stopped for a break near the summit. He offered up the trail name “Jackrabbit” because I hiked so fast uphill (💪), and perhaps even “Delusional” when I hopefully suggested it wouldn’t be as hot today. Tiny is a funny dude.At the top of the mountain, I parked under a tree to enjoy my morning oatmeal overlooking the sunrise. Because I was bored, I tried putting some of the cold orange-flavored water into the Apples and Cinnamon oatmeal packet, which made my cold oatmeal mush orange. As you can tell, the food options are getting rather monotonous. Fortunately, I love Apples and Cinnamon oatmeal, so I didn’t mind at all.
The Maple and Brown Sugar oatmeal was a different story. Apples and Cinnamon is BY FAR the best flavor, hands down. Not up for debate.
The rest of the day continued great. Cruised over some more rolling hills for next 10 miles, and stopped at McIver’s Cabin for lunch and to refill water. Spent the next few hours cruising down the mountain to Walker Pass, and just like that, we’re officially done with the desert! THANK GOD!!!
The original plan was to continue onward to Kennedy Meadows once we got Walker Pass, but we decided to hitch into Lake Isabella because 1) we do isn’t actually have enough food to make it to Kennedy Meadows lol, 2) there are allegedly extremely delicious milkshakes at a diner in Lake Isabella that I really wanted to try, and 3) Brooke’s explosive diarrhea hasn’t gotten better and we need to go into civilization to get more anti-diarrhea medication. So Lake Isabella, here we come!
After descending down in Walker Pass for about two hours (and listening to the Mars Acquired episode, how interesting!), we eventually made it to the Walker Pass Campground and noticed a sign at the trail register that said “Magic at Red Honda”. We had seen this exact sign back at Kelso Road when we were dying yesterday and there was no one there with magic, but this time around, there was actually trail magic there!
Two trail angels were chilling at the picnic tables, along with Tiny and another female hiker, and offered us some donuts, bananas, cold Gatorades, and beer. Kindness is real. That was just the morale boost we needed, and the best thing ever! We all chatted at that picnic table for about an hour (so many stories about PCT lore, including massive trail angel weekends for 130 hikers after a lunar eclipse, hunting stories, one of the trail angels spending 3 night in jail, and the craziest gossip about the insane beef between the two stores at Hikertown), and the older one’s voice was so amazing — rustic, mountain man-y, exactly what you’d expect from someone living in the woods with their guns. Which makes sense, since that’s pretty much what he was doing.
And on the top of guns, he mentioned his liberal-but-2nd-amendment-supporting friend who’d bring his semi-automatic AR-15 to his trail magics in the woods and allow curious hikers to shoot empty bottle cans. I hope he’s there when we’re hiking by!
After our hour at the campground (so magical), brooke and I departed for the pass that was still a mile uphill. We made it there quickly, and began sticking our thumbs out to get a ride to Lake Isabella. Many cars passed by, but one guy driving a HUGE van pulled over to give us a ride! Timothy was heading to a dirt bike club retreat in the mountains, and picked us because brooke was jumping up and down really high (we were the first hitchhikers he ever picked up). Great ride down, especially sitting on the cooler in the back; there were only two seats in the car, and like a gentleman I offered shotgun to brooke. Really scenic descent, and seeing the bright blue Lake Isabella unfold from the desert landscape was amazing.
Timothy dropped us off at the motel we were staying at, which was the most rundown and lovely American motel in existence. Pink facade, cash only, Chinese-man-owned-and-operated, opened with a physical key; you really can’t make this stuff up. But, it was only $75 and a place to stay, and honestly lovely for the price. There was a large comfy bed, high pressure shower, nice toilet, free toiletries. Plus, the Chinese man gave us free Tide Pods. What more could you ask for?
After settling in, we headed to the laundromat for laundry purposes (in a crazy turn of events, they use the same laundry app as the co-op 💀), bought more food at Von’s (thank goodness), and got a Pizza Factory pizza for dinner 😋. Between all the stops and going to the laundromat to wash, dry, and pick up the clothes, I must’ve walked that short stretch of road 6 times. My goodness. Unfortunately, the milkshake diner I was so excited for closed at 8, even though our app mentioned the closing time was 9. No worries though, since the pizza and Burger King milkshake were delicious anyway.
Brooke then went to bed early, while I stayed up until midnight texting people back and reading blogs. I kinda played myself. One of the messages I got was from another geocacher (hi elrojo14!), who had read my log on the Cache Peak geocache that I found a few days ago. He congratulated me, and even offered to drop off food or other snacks between the geocache and Walker Pass. I was so bummed that I didn’t see that message sooner, but I simply had no service until Lake Isabella.
And on the topic of food: I’ve also become much more focused on calories and in tune with my body’s nutritional needs on this hike. I never was (and probably never will be) a gym bro, but I’ve started to care about my eating as if I were one. I began to get concerned over our dwindling food supply about three days ago and though we were never actually at risk of starving, I was beginning to get quite worried on the way to Walker Pass. Once in Lake Isabella, I did a lot more in-depth research about food and thru-hiking calories (thank you Perplexity Deep Research), and have made the following adjustments to my food supply:
I’m carrying an entire bag of Jolly Ranchers to eat on the climbs as they provide dense sugars and energy boosts. The South Pole expeditionary I met on the I-10 back in Palm Springs told me about this, and I’m trying it out this stretch to see if it works.
I have a little bottle of olive oil to add to meals and drink directly in case of emergencies. Apparently, it has a ton of calories and is a big hit among thru-hikers, at least the men. Or so I hear
Several large snickers bars for morale and energy
Plus, the Von’s in Lake Isabella was selling chocolate Z-bars at 50% off, so I went a bit crazy and bought 8 boxes since I assume the Kennedy Meadows prices are going to be crazy.
So yeah! Lake Isabella was lovely, and I’m no longer worried about food :)
Day 41, Friday 6/20:
Today we hiked 17 miles with 3100 feet of climbing.
Very brutal morning of waking up at 5 am to catch the 6 am bus back to the trailhead. These Kern County buses only come three times a day, so if we missed this early one, we’d be stuck in Lake Isabella for another 4 hours and hiking all day in the heat. Not good. The Kern County buses have been serving us so well (both here and in Tehachapi) and I’m so glad this infrastructure exists. Go Kern County.
It was a mile walk to the bus stop from our ~lovely~ motel, and in that time we saw two different school buses driving on the main road. Honestly, I have a tremendous amount of respect for these kids who wake up at 5:30 each morning to go to school. That’s crazy.
We made it to the bus at 5:56 (as you can guess, some mild jogging at the end there), hopped on board, and were off to the trailhead (the bus driver knew we were heading to Walker Pass somehow… maybe our backpacks and my handsome looks??). The pass reminded me a lot of Morocco (link to Morroco blog); the mountains are the same rocky, tan color, with a lush green river valley flowing through the very bottom. It’s also quite crazy to me that this pass even exists, and a pleasantly-graded valley winds perfectly through the mountains all the way from Bakersfield to Ridgecrest. Geology is crazy like that.
We got dropped back at Walker Pass, and once again it was just us and the trail again. Brooke went on ahead, but I stayed at the pass to enjoy the cell phone service some more and read some Chris Arnade and Rayne Fischer-Quann. You got to do what you gotta do.
It was a long 9 miles uphill to start the day, but the temperatures were cool and the climb gradual, so it was honestly very pleasant. I’ve been munching on Jolly Ranchers the entire ascent and cooking up Interosity blogs in my head and having a great time. At the top, brooke and I took a break to enjoy the view (remember my favorite hiking quote 😉), and set off once more. The turn round of morale from the last two days is extraordinary, and my spirits have never been higher!
Update at 10:30 am: I passed brooke on the climb, and chatted with her for a bit before carrying on up. She’s in extremely high spirits this morning (early Gatorade + being 100% right in our toilet wipes environmentalism debate) and proposed pushing to Kennedy Meadows TODAY. That’s 50 miles and 10,000 feet of climbing in one day. However. Brooke and I are VERY ready to make it to Kennedy Meadows, and as the Sherwood calendar says for every day of the month, “f it we ball”. Kennedy Meadows, here we come 😈
Update at 11:45 am: I like making these timestamped updates directly from the trail (albeit several days delayed), they’re very fun. I stopped under a tree to eat some ramen and wait for brooke before continuing the descent. Light work. Ate the yummy ramen, chilled for a bit, then caught up to Brooke.
Update from an hour later: I spent way too long chilling at the top of the mountain, by the time I got to the bottom I had 0 mental energy and was completely cooked. Took a long break in the shade, then forced myself up the next pass to continue on to the water. Now that we’re in the Sierras, everything is either uuuuuuuup or dooooooooown, no flats anymore. We made it to Spanish Needle Creek by 5 pm completely exhausted, had a second lunch (early dinner??), and took a 2-hour nap. By the time we woke up, it was 7 pm and the next water was another 12 miles over yet another 2000-foot climb mountain pass, so we decided to go to bed early today and have a mega push tomorrow. On the bright side we have a cute campsite, and hung up our hats together :)
35 miles and 6500 feet of climbing tomorrow to get to Kennedy Meadows?? LET’S DO THIS THING
Day 42, Saturday 6/21:
Massive day, 36 miles with 6000 feet of climbing. WE HAVE ARRIVED IN KENNEDY MEADOWS!!!
The first few weeks on trail, we met Pablo and Flo, medical residents in France who took a semester off to thru-hike the PCT. We quickly became friends, and were always so happy to see them in town and on trail. I haven’t seen them since Big Bear and between us skipping the road walk and then going to my graduation, we’ve been just a few days separated ever since. We’d been chasing them down all week, and seeing in the trail registers that they were just one day ahead of us. So close, yet so far!
Flo’s birthday is tomorrow, and I reeaaaaally wanted to be there for his birthday breakfast in Kennedy Meadows to celebrate and surprise him. Problem was, Kennedy Meadows was over 30 miles and 2 mountain climbs away, so the only option we had was to clutch up, put the packs on, and start moving.
We initially set the alarm for 2 am, which then turned into 4:30, then 5 am. We finally left camp around 6, and began the first climb of the day out of Spanish Needle Creek. I taught brooke all about geologic mapping on the very windy way up, then began the long descent with Brooke to Chimney Creek Campground. On the high ridge, I even got a text from Pablo, who said he and Flo wanted to hike the Sierras with me and brooke. I nearly cried tears of joy and excitement.
Once at the campground, we found true magic; while relaxing at the picnic tables, a minivan pulling a trailer barreled down the road, which I excitedly waved down. It was a family coming back from a camping trip, who just so happened to HAVE AN EXTRA HUMONGOUS SANDWICH AND TWO ICED TEAS FOR US!!!!!
Sometimes, you gotta create your own trail magic. We managed to get those for free (hoooooray), devoured the teas with our new PCT friend Rebecca, and mentally prepared for the 2500 foot climb to come.
And come, it did. Fortunately, though the climb was massive, it was also long, so the grade actually wasn’t that steep. Even more excitingly, today was National Naked Backpacking Day (it’s the summer solstice each year!), so I stripped naked at one of the creeks and continued up the mountain for 5 miles with no clothes. Fortunately, we didn’t see any other hikers, but I still had brooke scout out ahead each time we crossed a roadway. Even though it’s a fun hiker tradition, I’m not sure it’s legal lol. Gotta live life while you’re young! Fortunately, no chafing occurred :)
We eventually made it to the top of the ridge, where it was so windy and cold that all my clothes came right back on immediately. It was another long descent into the valley, but this valley is officially where Kennedy Meadows begins! I listened to some Coffee Break French podcasts on the descent because now that we’re going to be hiking with Flo and Pablo, this is a perfect time to be actually learning French. Lord knows I didn’t learn much in France.
And a fun surprise happened at the bottom of the descent; we ran into Tiny! We last saw him at the Walker Pass Campground when we all got trail magic there, and he was running so low on food that he had then asked for me to get him some food in Lake Isabella. Here on trail, 2 days later, I finally delivered him the bag of chips I’d bought for him! I had already eaten half the bag, but he was super grateful I’d brought him anything at all and he quickly devoured the rest. We chatted for a long while, then brooke and I continued onward to the Meadows. It’s always so great to see Tiny!
We still had 9 miles to go before getting to Kennedy Meadows, and they were pretty tough mentally. We were already 25 miles in, the sun was setting, and we were both feeling it. The plan was to get to the Kennedy Meadows General Store and camp there, but Brooke messaged our friend Zoe on her Garmin, and it turned out that everyone (Zoe, Pablo, Flo) was actually at Grumpy’s, the only other store in town.
Fortunately, I’m a navigational wizard (and modest about it too), so I rerouted brooke and I to make it to Grumpy’s that night instead. That involved hopping one fence, potentially trespassing on a well-leveled dirt road, and hiking another 2 miles on the asphalt road. Only one mental breakdown from Brooke, one calf cramp from me, and a dead headlamp by yours truly later, we stumbled into the Grumpy’s parking at a cool 11 pm and…
were immediately greeted by three hikers and offered free beer! Life is good! Our friends are amazing! The trail provides!
Zoe and some other hikers were all on the patio chatting away, and Brooke and I joined them for about a half hour, regaling them with tales of our adventures the last few weeks. The squad is back together!
We headed over to the free camping area, set up our tents, and promptly collapsed. I wanted to shake Flo’s tent awake at midnight to surprise him, but I wasn’t sure which tent was actually his. So we just went to bed. What a long summer solstice, hiking from sunrise to well past sundown.
We did it! Kennedy Meadows, we’re here!
Day 43, Sunday 6/22:
0 miles, FINALLY! We’ve earned a zero day!
Today was an absolutely magical one, full of so much companionship, friendship, and fun. It started around 8 am, where we finally found Flo and Pablo’s tents and shook them both awake. It’s Flo’s birthday, and you only turn 27 once!
They, brooke, Zoe, and I all walked back to the patio, where we ordered a massive hiker breakfast and sang Flo plenty of Happy Birthday’s. The pancakes at Grumpy’s are ginormous, well over 15 inches in diameter, and it took us all day to eat the two we ordered.
The day passed both quickly and slowly; I spent the entire day catching up with hiker friends, friends and family back home, raiding the hiker boxes, and relaxing on the porch. The owners at Grumpy’s are indeed grumpy but so kind, and we ate plenty of burgers and pizza all day. Tiny eventually hiked in too and bought brooke and I each a beer; I checked out the amazing Triple Crown Outfitters gear shop next door; picked up new Darn Tough socks from the General Store (their thru-hiker exchange policy is unbelievable); haggled for a $1 sharpie so that other hikers can sign my shirt (it’ll be such a cool souvenir back home); haggled some more over alcohol prices (unsuccessfully, I have a haggling problem); and led a 7-person game of Yahtzee with all our hiking friends.
Needless to say, I won, and it was the best time teaching others the game and Maxim’s iconic phrases, “I’ll be the big man and secure the upper bonus” and “THE PEOPLE DEMAND IT!!!”. Merit and I had a great conversation about how some of the best games are mostly luck and slightly include skill; this way everyone, both beginners and experts, enjoy the game and everyone has a chance to win. Yahtzee is the perfect example, which is about 80% luck, 20% skill. Truly an amazing time.
Once the sun set, we bought some more alc for the table, and even a Fireball shooter for Flo to suffer through. When in America! Merit and I taught our French friends how to shotgun a beer (cultural exchange), though it didn’t go too well for me (🤮). The grumpy owner of Grumpy’s even brought out a leftover half of a cake for us all to enjoy. We sang him happy birthday in French, English, Spanish, Hebrew, and Russian, then brooke and I headed back to camp to watch the first half of The Intern.
A magical day with wonderful friends. Life is amazing.
Day 44, Monday 6/23:
8 miles today, we’re back on trail!
Woke up a bit earlier today at the Grumpy’s campsite, packed up my stuff quickly, and migrated my things back to the patio. Everyone slowly trickled over to the patio, too, and began packing up to leave later this afternoon for the trail. The Sierras await!
Pablo and I took some quick showers (not together, but in adjacent stalls), and the hot water ran out in ~30 seconds and then it was freezing cold. I had Brooke’s tiny hand towel to dry myself with, while Pablo had a massive one; it turns out the Grumpy’s owner lets you borrow big towels, and I completely missed the memo. Bruh moment.
We all had another great breakfast together, then migrated to the shuttle stop to head back to the General Store (we packed 10 of us in the minivan!). Brooke and I’s care package is being mailed there and should be delivered today, so we had nothing but time while we wait for the mailman to show up.
But man, waiting is brutal. I’ve never been the most patient person, but waiting with no end in sight is tough. We know the mailman will come “sometime after 2 pm”, but as for when exactly, no one knows for sure.
But! There were so many hikers at the general store, and we had an absolutely lovely time hanging out with them all and relaxing on the patio. This PCT camaraderie is truly fantastic; we played Egyptian War (I won all the games 😉), hammocked (brooke and I learned the hard way that it’s a one-person hammock), talked with so many folks, got lots more signatures for my shirt, wrote my Tehachapi blog, relaxed, did eye masks with Brooke (thanks Sarah for mailing us these!), and generally enjoyed the day. There’s ~30 of us here passing the time, the country music is playing, and it truly is a magical place. I’m so happy I’m doing this trail. :)
Eventually, the postage came, and with it came good news and bad news. The bad news was that the resupply package from my parents didn’t come and should be arriving tomorrow; the good news was that my sister had sent us a package, which featured a handwritten letter and a POUND of Trader Joe’s dark chocolate!! Wowowow!!!! Thank you Emily!
We didn’t want to wait another day in Kennedy Meadows, so brooke and I decided to do our own resupply, and subsequently raided the general store and nearby outfitter shop for food (outfitter shop was 50% off). Included on this resupply shopping list was 14 bags of Ramen, two for each lunch, which was so much Ramen that the Japanese through hiker at the General store, Azuki, told me that he was blown away by how much Ramen I had. Azuki only had 5 bags of ramen, which means that I just out-ramened a Japanese guy. That’s one of my top accomplishments right there!
We let the store manager know to send our package to Bishop when it arrived, did a final bag check, made our rounds of goodbyes, and set off with Flo and Pablo. Mt. Whitney, here we come!
One last exciting thing: I have finally accepted my trail name, Bloodhound! Trail names are these fun thru-hiker traditions were other hikers give you a nickname based on some story, event, or tale related to you, and you can choose to accept or reject it when offered one. Then, you introduce yourself by that name for the rest of the hike. I was proposed “Bloodhound” by Kyle all the way back at Mike 2’s (even before Idyllwild) for leaving way after Brooke each morning and catching up to her every day. That, plus my 3-day push to Wrightwood and lots of subsequent thinking, made me realize I quite like the name (plus these dogs are so fast!), so now I’m officially Bloodhound :) 🩸🐕🐾
Made me giggle so many times ❤️
Loving reading about your adventures!