PCT 2018 Thru-Hike: Episode 16 - Hiking On

Description

PCT Gear List Video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaQqPbu1Fa0

PCT Gear List - https://darwinonthetrail.com/2018/04/19/darwins-2018-pct-thru-hike/

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Tags: UL Hiking Gear,PCT,Pacific Crest Trail,PCT Thru Hike,Thru-Hike Gear,Thru Hike Gear List,UL backpacking,Zpacks,Enlightened Equipment,Cnoc Outdoors,UL Backpacking Gear,Vargo Bot 700,Hiker Trash,Hiking,Backpacking,Pinhoti Trail,Adventure,Long Distance Hiking,Zpacks Duplex,Zpacks Arc Blast,Donner Pass,Donner Party

Video Transcription

often rolling this morning I woke up at about five 2530 and on the trail by 6:10 it's a nice nice smooth morning let's enjoy our breakfast it's amazing how much more time you have in the morning when you're not making hot coffee let's throw my coffee in my water bottle shake it up and I am ready to ingest caffeine

I've been climbing for a while and I finally made it up here to the Squaw Valley ski resort which is a pretty wild I was told there was a ton of snow up here and it doesn't look too bad right off the bat but uh obviously it's been shut down for quite some time because there's not enough snow up here but it's pretty wild up here yeah apparently just a month ago there were people bailing out up here and like taking the gun boy down because of a house sketchy it was with all the snow and rocks mmm it looks like there's a little bit of snow left so we'll see how this descent goes a lot of people are signing it's super sketchy and rocky but oh well today's lunch menu we have a snickerdoodle complete cookie snickerdoodle and an Rx bar so speaking of an Rx bar I wanted to give a quick shout out to chika and sunsets who sent me a box back in South Lake Tahoe chicken sunsets have a youtube channel called Appalachian Trail tails and last year they thru-hike the eighty and I followed them on their their hike then this year they are following me on my hike chicken sunsets did like I think almost a daily video so they've logged their entire hike thank you so much guys for sending me this and a bunch of other stuff I ended up splitting it up and I carried half of it out this time and then I sent half the other half ahead - Sierra City [Music]

looks like I have made it to down our pass famous for the Donner Party I'm gonna go into the history that look it up a long time ago my people ate each other

survived pretty crazy hopefully I can get down to this little restaurant and they're supposed to have some food and I don't know where I'm gonna go tonight because this is 30 miles for the day and I think there's supposed to be some camp spots like point something from here but for now we will find some DEET [Music]

who just got done eating at the Donner Pass ski lodge and restaurant and was it so worth doing another 30 mile day and then hiking something like a quarter mile down the road but got a awesome awesome awesome quesadilla with chicken in it and I get a grilled chicken sandwich and if you're a PCT hiker they give you a free beer but not any bear they give you a 40 ounce kingcobra malt liquor so today is off to a pretty fantastic start trails been pretty smooth really beautiful somebody told me a couple days ago that there was no snow on the trail north of Donner Pass so I am now north of downer pass and so far so good a little patch but no real snow and I can walk right behind it so yeah I'm gonna do a little bit smaller of a day to day camp for the night and then the plan is in the morning to hike into Sierra City pick up my resupply box that I sent myself grab something to eat charge my phone and keep heading just got done with some lunch drying out all my stuff because condensation was crazy last night I guess it's because I was a camp next to that like pond and got service so just got done watching some videos on YouTube yeah today's shaping up to be a pretty awesome day again not too bad nice blue skies service on my phone driving my stuff out taking a break life is good [Music]

it is right at five o'clock and I've been like 25 and a half 26 miles for the day so I think that I'm going to cut it off here and make camp pretty we're out after doing a 31 the day before yesterday and a 31 yesterday 25 is uh all right with me plus I only have 16 until I get into Sierra City today was a pretty decent day this happened

you can see my shoulder here but my shirt ripped quite a bit pretty massive rip and a couple of them I think be fabric is just old and thinning out and finally rip so I'm gonna have to order another one of these silver red shirts and have them sent somewhere up the trail and grab it off and rolling this morning it is a Tuesday I have about 16 miles - Sierra City the post office closes at 2 p.m. I have a box waiting at the post office so time is of the essence serve of the virtue or however you say that thing about time in other words I'm trying to boogie to see her steady before the post office closes [Music]

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made it to the road and walking down into Sierra City you down here see what's going on grab my box good ol bite to eat well I had a good but short time in Sierra City got down there didn't get a hitch got my box from the post office before they closed went to the general store got a awesome awesome awesome awesome chicken sandwich and onion rings uh hung out with a few other hikers charged my stuff up got a hold of snuggles to let her know that I'm alive and yeah hit the trail again and now I have a massive climb out of town so I'm like 4,000 feet straight up it's kind of switchback yeah it's not too bad look at this Northern California yeah home sweet home for the night look at the lake in the spot yeah oh yeah end up being uh

26 miles for the day so 3 to 3 hours in town 26 miles pretty happy with that check this out somebody left an old steak behind a long time ago and either they hammered it into the tree or the tree grew around mistake and yeah that's a perfect anchor point how cool is that good morning good morning like usual often rollin woke up completely just soaked with condensation sleeping next to that lake last night everything was just wet and sticky and it also got kind of warm last night so it's already getting pretty warm this morning so I feel like it's gonna be a hot day on the trail I'm not really looking forward to but summer is finally here and I'm finally out of Antarctica back in the High Sierra so I guess it's just so I'm gonna deal with [Music]

the deer right outside of my tent it scared the hell out of me it is a beautiful morning

nice and cool I feel like it's probably gonna get pretty warm again today it's June it's the end of June at that so we're creeping into July getting up in the Northern California elevations going down heats going up [Music]

really really hot outside right now but I just got liking this little nook in this switchback and it's like an air conditioner because of all the water it is so hot doesn't hope that I've been climbing the mountain for about a six-mile seven miles 4000 feet it's good thing there's all these Springs can kinda wash off a little bit they're nice and cold too it's just crazy how you can go from like the high sierra to you know being insanely cold every day and snow and freezing high elevation to just being insanely hot and sweating to death and getting dehydrated real easy total polar opposites and just like one right after another they're like that's the PC T's thing it's like one extreme to the next just over and over at the turtle itself is pretty easy good terrain but it's like the elements are just like one extreme to the next just kind of fun so if you're wondering what was with the silent treatment last night when I got to camp there was another tent spot there and there was already somebody there I got there pretty late so they were in their tent I didn't want to bother them didn't want to make too much noise trying to be respectful good a camp etiquette so that's why I was it narrating much and saying much [Music]

been coming down this mountain for mmm about five miles coming into Belden or at least the road take me to Belden it's apparently only like point two off of the trail it's a little resort

I guess just have a restaurant a little store that I can probably resupply at and hopefully a little shower house that's supposed to be like pay shower but I've been coming down this massive mountains for quite some time to give you a little example or a little kind of a insight into how much elevation this is I think it was almost 7000 all the way at the top and I'm going down to like 2500 been a while since I've seen railroad tracks actually I think that the last time I seen railroad tracks was the first day I was on trail I just got to find out where the trail goes looks like I have made it to Belden not really what I was expecting but uh as long as they get food and the place where I might be able to shower I like it

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well ended up having a pretty decent time in building a totally different than what I expected a lot more hiker friendly than I thought it was gonna be I actually thought it was gonna be some sort of like upscale resort but had a pretty awesome sandwich got to do a little bit of resupply and get a few things out of the store kind of expensive and hopped in the shower for a couple minutes and kind of washed my clothes and shower it off the same time just to get some of this sticky crap off me so I'm gonna do about another seven miles for the day headed out of Belden and up this insane climb beautiful morning for a climb so just now finishing up with this monster climb out of Belden yesterday when I left Belden hips late it was like 4:30 5 o'clock I got 7 miles up the climb and then camped last night got into camp pretty late so it's why I didn't really fill him a lot 8 just went to bed and then this morning woke up to a 6 point something miles to the top so a monster monster climb it's like over 7,000 feet at the top it was under 3,000 feet down in Belden so one one heck of a steep climb I got pretty much all the steep stuff out of the way this morning's been pretty cruisy and absolutely beautiful supposedly it's supposed to get up to over a hundred degrees like by noon today

so I can get this climb out of the way before that happens I should definitely be done hopefully it's not too bad tomorrow is town day going into Chester and today maybe maybe maybe if I'm feeling really good I might actually hit the halfway point so the halfway point was only like 20-something miles from where I was camped out last night halfway the PCT [Music]

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so you may be wondering Darwin why the hell are you eating with a stick unfortunately today I lost a really close dear friend the spork that I've had for a very long time since 2014 my sea2summit alpha aluminum long handle spork I think that I left that at my lunch spot today so if you're out right before Chester the PCT and you randomly find a long-handled aluminum spork please contact me that thing has been on every single hike with me it has fed me every single one but until then I fashioned a stick you

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