The loafing pace from yesterday is over, time for some serious walking. Up to Fuller Ridge at 9100 ft, then down Snow Canyon, which bottoms out at about 2300 ft.
The first half of the day was walking mostly on snow, through magnificent forests of Ponderosa pines and a fir that I don’t know the name of, as well as an assortment of spruces and cedars. I had forgotten just how much more biologically rich California is compared to Colorado, but marching through well-spaced groves of 150 foot trees 8 feet in diameter certainly reminded me of that fact.
At the end of the ridge, the big descent began – 6500 ft, 17 miles. The trail is in terrible condition, eroded and overgrown with very thorny bushes. Despite the heat I had to wear long pants or risk leaving far too much of my hide behind on the trail.
Hiking is nothing if not a humbling experience. Rather than thinking grand and lofty thoughts, your mental dialog is utterly mundane – “is that twinge in my knee something serious?”, “should I stop and see if that hotspot on my foot is turning into a blister?”, “it sure is hot”, “is that the trail or a washout?”, “should I have soup tonight or chili?”, and so forth. You’re pretty much at the level of the snakes who rattle AFTER you pass, the rodents who steal your food and the thorns that tear at your legs. Which is to say completely consumed by the present.
It was slow going down the bad trail, so I stopped at dusk at a sandy flat spot at mile 201, so about 18 miles for the day. Dinner was followed immediately by bedtime.
The San Bernardinos, PCT mile 193