Tuesday, May 19th--Day 27

Couldn't seem to drag myself out of bed this morning. Tom, Jerry, two other hikers and I shared a room at Molly Ann's house. A huge room with one large bed, two alcoves with smaller beds, and a mattress on the floor. Tom and I took the alcoves, Jerry took the mattress, a hiker named "Just Chris" got the bed and a guy named Lewis ended up on the floor. Having become used to the semi-privacy of my tent, (it's like my own tiny, tiny house!) I slept uneasily and dreamt of murders, which is weird.

We finally dragged ourselves out of bed when Jessica (I'm just gonna make a separate list of all the hikers we encounter) called out breakfast.

The food! Yesterday, we had hamburgers and fajitas, and breakfast today was eggs, sausages, toast, fruit, yogurt and cheerios with milk! Lunch was nachos and hot dogs (!) with all the toppings. In between meals, we snacked on Red Vines, chocolate covered raisins, and the rare and wonderful yogurt covered raisins which I so dearly love. Washed down with every flavor of Crush, Brisk, Mountain Dew, or Dr. Pepper. Molly Ann is...there aren't words for the kind of generosity that she and others out here have shown us.

After the constant stream of food, we worked out how to get back up to the trail. We ended up sending our packs ahead to Highway 2 (the second way into and out of town from the PCT) and hiking pack-free back up the steep, winding Acorn Trail (the first way into town, and the way we had taken). From the top of Acorn Trail, we would have an easy six miles to the highway where our packs waited.

Acorn Trail has nothing to do with acorns, aside from the fact that it intersects with Acorn Drive, which also has nothing to do with acorns. Devil's Slide trail, which led into Idyllwild and was not as steep as this one, had a much better name. I'm just sayin'.

The hike back up Acorn Trail was pretty difficult, even without forty-five pounds on my back telling me to go back down. Jerry pushed ahead of me, steadily climbing up, up, up. When we got to the top, my breath returned, and I took off down the PCT at a run. Tom, who had actually run up the Acorn Trail, was long gone, but it felt so great to run with no weight on my back that I sprinted up hills and down into valleys, stopping when I ran out of breath.

I saw a coyote! It was crossing a dirt road, and looked back at me before disappearing into the brush. Awesome.

Met up with Tom at the highway, and when Jerry showed up soon after, we picked up our packs and hiked another mile or so in the fading light until we hit a campground. There may be a bear or bears around. The optimal outcome of this evening will be me riding one. 'Night.