Day 14 - 5/09/12) - Idle in Idylllwild

Contents:  0.0 miles

I had a great day in Idyllwild!  I love this place!  It is adorable and the whole town including the campground is located within a quarter mile radius.  There's even a fantastic climbing shop.  In fact, I think I might move here, work at the shop, and become a 5.14 climber as soon as I'm done with the trail!  it is definitely one of those idyllic mountain towns.

I had a productive day.  We went out for breakfast at a restaurant called the Red Kettle and then hit the laundromat.  After laundry, I moseyed over to the gear shop and was happy to find Super Feet.  The pair I wound up buying is slightly different from the pair I've been using, but they feel good and I'm just glad to have a little more support.  Insoles underfoot, I stopped by the visitor's center to pick up a postcard and then made my way to the post office and grocery.  After leaving the grocery, I grabbed some HEET for my stove at the Chevron station and then wandered back to camp for some hang out time before dinner.  Karl and I also made a quick trip to the library to print out updated water reports.

In camp, some serious food organization went down along with a little strategizing about the upcoming section.  We are planning to climb San Jacinto Peak at 10,834 feet tomorrow.  The 6.2 mile alternate route bypasses 4.5 miles of the PCT and climbs 1869 feet to the summit.  It is supposed to be really awesome but we expect it to take some additional time.  There was some discussion about hiking to the top of Devil's Slide this evening, but we ultimately decided that taking a full day off was more important than the head start.  The only potential drawback to this plan is that hitching to the Devil's Slide trail head may be more difficult early tomorrow morning, but I was definitely in favor of the additional rest.

Most of us have a 5 day stretch ahead, as our next resupply is in Big Bear.  Smiles and Extra Credit sent mail drops to an angel located in between but the rest of us are going straight through.  I'm still figuring out exactly how much food I need.  I think I've probably been carrying a little too much (and at times forcing myself to eat extra to avoid carrying it), but I'd rather err on the side of too much food than too little.  As long as I have plenty of fuel, I'm usually good to go for as long as necessary, but I tend to hit the wall pretty fast once I'm hungry.  Given that most of our days are fairly long and strenuous, that's definitely something I'm trying to avoid.  We're definitely going to have heavy packs tomorrow and lots of elevation gain, but I think we're all antsy to get back on the trail.