PCT day 11 - mile 185 to mile 209

"Whoever says Disneyland is the happiest place on earth, has clearly never been to the large rusty pipe" kelseyjo4sho

"As a pipe afficiando, I've seen bigger but to the pipes defence it was cold out. As far as large pipes go easily a 13 out of 8 on a Newtonian pipe scale" thebearded1ne

Today was a big descent day (biggest on the entire PCT) from underneath San Jacinto mountain were we spend the night, to the town slightly off the PCT called Cabazon. We descended about 9.500 feet and it was a welcome change to the uphill struggle of the past three days.

Night was freezing, I had to curl my feet up as they were getting really cold. I also had some bizarre dreams of playing football with Marlowe Theatre team in some kind of castle as a part of a staff party then going to the post office but really visiting my friends but when I rang their doorbell the door has been opened by Queen Elizabeth in her full royal outfit saying that my friends are living behind her house and then once I found them, we got an invitation from the queen for a tea.. so yeah, go figure :) It might have been low oxygen levels that brought those dreams, or so I hope.

We set off from the camp at 7am, with a good pace, the only problem we were facing were snow patches along the way which turned into ice over night, so we had few slips and falls. Few hours into the day we met Lucy from Czech Republic again, we ended up having our lunch with her - I suggested that her trail name could be Ibex as she kept on cutting the trail in front of us to avoid snow patches like a mountain goat.

There was 20 miles water carry we had to do from mile 186 to 206, but since we planned to hike this distance in one go, it wasn't a big problem. We arrived at the PCT famous Large Rusted Pipe and water faucet at about 4pm. Then Tom had an idea to book a Travelodge in the nearby town called Cabazon which I agreed to even though it absolutely ruined my weekly budget. We had to cross through four miles of barren dessert with the massive wind farm right behind us, and I can understand why it has been there as it was windy as hell. We then got picked up by a trail angel who gave us a ride to the Travelodge. Place turned out to be something out of an American criminal, so here goes another thing I can cross out of my bucket list. We had pizza hut (cashier offered us a 10$ deal, for which we got charged 18$, and a 2L bottle of pepsi was cheaper to buy than two 0.5L bottles, not i-deal) and first shower since Julian six days ago, I also tried and failed at fixing my facial hair. 

The plan is to be back on trail tomorrow by 7:30 and have another long walk before NERO in Big Bear on Sunday.

My only regret is that I only took one picture of Large Rusted Pipe, but life goes on.

Mile 200 marker:


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