PCT 2018 Thru-Hike: Episode 9 - Into The Sierra and Back To The Stove

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 List,UL Backpacking,Zpacks,Enlightened Equipment,CNOC Outdoors,UL Backpacking Gear,Vargo Bot 700,HIker Trash,Hiking,Backpacking,Adventure,Long Distance Hiking,Zpacks Duplex,Zpacks Arc Blast,Alpine Start,Alpine Start Coffee,Sierra Nevada,Mount Whitney

Video Transcription

[Music]

I left Kennedy Meadows this morning not too long ago from grumpy bears had a great day off got all my new gear got the ice axe and my micro spikes and I have hit the trail again I just entered the south Sierra wilderness and I am now in Sequoia National Forest not the park the forest it was pretty wild to finally be here pretty excited a little nervous I guess

not digging carrying this heavier gear a bear can man who have put some extra weight in your pack especially when it's jam-packed full of food so

here we go [Music]

[Music]

make it even a little bit better it's kind of overcast so it's not too too sunny and not too hot just amazing big beautiful meadows tall rocky granite mountains kind of a burnt down forest behind me it's just so so beautiful [Music]

so I'm about yeah about 20 miles outside of Kennedy Meadows I'm currently sitting at over 10,000 feet it was just snowing a second ago made camp and I'm actually about to do something that I haven't done since I've been out here and that is eat hot food so I cold soaked for the first 700 miles and I decided to finally pick up a can and put my stove to use and I am currently cooking some couscous well I'm boiling water to make couscous it'll be different because you know it's hot

plus plus I have a some coconut oil to put in the couscous to kind of jazz it up a little bit and give it a little bit more fat today was a pretty pretty interesting evening Kennedy and climbing up into the beginnings of the Sierra that got rained on a little bit so many beautiful water sources and just amazing ponds the trail has completely changed to a totally different environment and I'm so glad to say goodbye to the desert so I'm going to eat my couscous jump in the home and hit the hay and do it all over again tomorrow had a pretty cold night last night and pretty cold this morning I woke up with a lot of ice on the inside of my tent because of condensation freezing and then the outside of my tempest warning was completely frozen and I had to really shake it off and get all the frost off of it I think that last night we had an ice storm to me sounded like rain at first but I'm pretty sure it was ice so it is pretty freezing cold I am a little over 10,000 feet about to go a little bit higher word is I'm gonna get into some snow today which yeah so keep pushing on and hopefully today I'll warm up quite a bit I can stop and dry my tin out and dry my bones out good way to start the Sierras [Music]

the trail is absolutely beautiful this morning I finally feel like I'm in the Sierras see all these snow-capped mountains in the back and I get through these little valleys and meadows big granite rock huge old-growth pine trees so good so who's so good I'm gonna be stopping for lunch today about 13 and a half miles in from where I can't PLAs night apparently it's kind of like on a ridge and they're self-service there and apparently it's the last self-service for quite some time I want to say it's like the last cell service until bvr which is quite a ways away so I'm gonna take advantage of that get a horse snuggles get a hold of some other people try to plan out the next week for myself where I'm gonna go into resupply trying to side if I'm gonna go into Independence or Bishop it's a little further into Bishop but then I have to figure out the whole summit in Mount Whitney thing you know at first I wasn't gonna summit Mount Whitney I was like no it's too much trouble there's gonna be too much snow but come on I'd be stupid if I didn't summit Mount Whitney so I'll definitely be doing that and then I start to figure out how to get my waterproof socks that I ordered that the post office lost so hopefully I can get those forwarded to Bishop for Independence or wherever I'm going to be popping into but again the trail is just uh it's beautiful it's so good today [Applause]

just got done taking lunch drying my tent off getting some cell service for the last time and quite some time and pretty much planning my next handful of days so I do plan on going into Bishop I'm gonna get off at Kearsarge pass get down into independence and then find a way to hitch into bishop and the waterproof socks that I have bought on Amazon should be waiting for me at a hostel that's in Bishop's I'll resupply there take a night off and then come back up and dive deeper into the Sierras got to talk to snuggles for a little bit she ended up hanging out at Kennedy Meadows for another day helping out hikers shuttling them around and now she's back off on her own adventure and I'm back off on my own adventure so beautiful beautiful day today and do about eight more miles for the day I'm trying to keep my days in the Sierras 220 miles I don't want to go too crazy I don't want to hike too many miles one I want to enjoy it too it's just it's harder terrain there's gonna be snow here in a little bit all gonna have to be some post hoe and climbing Whitney all of that so trying to lower my miles down a little bit take it easy enjoy it well I can [Music]

[Music]

well I have made it to the end of another day out here on the PCT it ended up being just a 20 mile day but I think because of the elevation change between like 9,000 and 10,000 just up and down all day it felt more like a 30 mile day it probably doesn't help that I'm having a little bit of hip pain and IT van pain I think because of the the shin tendon problem that I had that I've gotten over I was overcompensating a lot and walking kind of with a gimp and I think that's caused a little bit of an injury or a strain in my IT band on the other leg so it was pretty much dealing with that all day today it definitely wears you out a little bit quicker whenever you have just kind of a dull pain hanging out your hip all day but I found a good little campsite here about 9,500 feet got my tent set up got here pretty early I don't like really get in the camp super early I got here at like 4:45 like hiking later than that but I'm trying not to push it through here trying to take my time trying to only do 20-mile days got to eat some food relax a little bit and I'm actually gonna make a fire tonight I haven't made a fire on trail for a very long time probably since the section hike that I did of the CDT so tonight I want to treat myself since it's early it's chilly there's a fire put somebody collected some wood I am going to make a fire and then I'm gonna hit the hay tomorrow I'm gonna try to get to the base of Mount Whitney or at least to the trailhead where you take to go to Mount Whitney and camp there for the night I think it's a little over 20 miles and then on Thursday I'm gonna summit Whitney back down and then on Friday I'm gonna try to make it into corsage pass which is independence and Bishop going there resupply do everything that I got to do and then pick up

package that I should have waiting on me so good night [Music]

well I am pretty excited for a lot of different reasons today number one this morning I should be hiking into Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park which are two of my favorite parks in the country I've spent a little bit of time in both of those it's gonna be really cool to walk into them and hype through them number two word is that I'm probably gonna catch up to Foxtrot today and I haven't seen Foxtrot since Wrightwood so it'll be awesome to see a familiar face catch up with him and then number three is by the end of the day as long as everything goes okay I'm gonna end up doing 24 miles today and all be at the base of Mount Whitney where tomorrow morning I can wake up and start to climb to the top of the highest peak in the lower 48 so pretty pretty exciting day today a lot to look forward to and yeah doing just a crazy steep hard climb mainly because the elevation going up over 11,000 feet pretty close to the base of Whitney pretty Decker now [Music]

[Music]

well today ended up being a pretty decent day I ended up hooking up with a good old friend named crane up that I actually hiked a bunch of miles of the 80 with back in 2015 finally caught up to him and we hiked most of the day together doing a 25 mile day to the base of Mount Whitney and then hooked up with another hiker named Tang who is actually the cousin of Foxtrot who I was previously I can with so we're camped at the base of Whitney right now it's about seven and a half miles to the peak and we're gonna get up in the morning and and hit that get back down here and then I think that I'm gonna try to hike a little bit past here so on Friday it's a shorter day over Forester pass and a shorter day in the Kearsarge pass so that is the plan but just an awesome day on the trail super beautiful amazing scenery a little bit of snow

nothing crazy though I don't think the craziness will start until a Forester pass so right now still pretty docile on me the snow and ice so Mount Whitney awaits in the morning

you