PCT day 22 - mile 444 to mile 469

"One day I brought my special trail magic to the mile 420 but no one wanted to have it" Mum, the trail angel.

"After living in America for 30 years I was fed up with this country, but since I discovered PCT it feels like I found where I belong" Kermit.

Today I left RV camp at 6:30am, Tank and eight other hikers including Beastmode and his friend decided to have a zero day and went to Six Flags Theme Park to ride some rollercoasters, I decided to stick to the trail.

After two miles of walking I met The Field Trip family again, I also lost them pretty quickly as they have been walking fast, putting all other hikers to shame. I still can't believe the youngest of them is only 12 years old!

There was around six people leaving the camp early, we arrived at the Aqua Dulce town around 11am. Everything but the Hardware Store and Home Made restaurant has been closed but it was all we needed anyway. Owner of the Hardware store put up a tiny hiker resupply section with tuna, tacos, big cookies (uuu big cookies are lush!) and dry ramen. I got one days worth of food and the nice lady at the counter took all my unidentified small coinage and changed it to a dollar bill!

After resupplying and topping up my water from a water hose for flowers I went to Home Made restaurant for breakfast. I got pancakes with eggs and sausages. Pancakes were huge but sausages tiny, it all tasted good, especially with maple syrup all over it. When I was eating I heard someone talking Polish at the table next to me, I introduced myself and the people turned out to be Polish PCT hikers, kind of. The girl, trail name: Bright Eyes got injured and was being picked up by her husband with trail name Kermit who is planning to start hiking PCT (again) in two weeks. We chatted about the trail and what lead us to it, it was good to finally meet someone from my homeland after nearly 500 miles!

I said goodbye to my new Polish friends and walked out of Aqua Dulce around midday, the weather was good and the trail quite gentle so I made a good progress. 

Few miles before the campsite, at the place marked as "Seasonal Water Source" a woman got out of her car and asked me if I can help her carry water bottles down the trail. I said yes, she was a trail angel called "Mum" who not only brought water (she does it three times a week during hiking season) but had trail magic as well: cheese and bean burritos, sodas, beers, cookies and the best trail mix I ate so far. Within 15 minutes place was crawling with hikers and we all had the most unexpected trail magic yet. Timing could not be better on this one.

Mum took few pictures of us for her Instagram, she said that she will be going back hiking around San Jacinto in few weeks time so the cache won't be maintained then. There was a rumour of a stalker in the area, so people got a bit nervous, and everyone started to make their way to camps.

After I reached mine there was not enough space (also few people were walking behind me) so I carried on and ended up shoving some earth around to make a new camping spot at mile 469, good deed for the day complete.

From the mediocre news, someone else has a trail name Cinnamon, but they only got it few days ago. Nevermind, I'm still the OG Cinnamon, hehe.

Mum the trail angel and the magic:
Bright Eyes, Kermit and their daughter:
Star Trek filming location:

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