Pacific Crest Trail - Day 29

Start: Mile 232.0 - Backcountry campsite
End: Mile 239.9 - Mission Camp Junction

The wind last night went from a pleasant breeze to 80mph gusts ripping through the canyon. I spent a good portion of the night worried that the tent was going to fail, and another good portion of it fixing the tent from instantaneous failure. The tent is a tension based Tarptent Stratospire II that we pitched in a fashion with the broad side directly perpendicular to the wind direction.

Stacking 75lbs of rocks on the upwind stake was my final effort to keep the tent intact at ~2AM. After climbing back in the tent I pleaded, exasperated, ”I can’t fucking take this anymore” and the wind almost immediately waned to silence. It felt like a test of will that I never signed up to take.

Trail?

Trail?

Trail?

Advanced approximation of former trail 👨🏻‍💻

Trail?

Trail?

Trail?

Indian Paintbrush! (Is that still the preferred nomenclature?)

Trail!

Trail? WTF‽

We were inspired by this section and made stickers:

Forest fire and flooding is a gnarly combination. Coming soon to theatres near you.

Trail?

Trail?

To top it all off: Tremors

Broke into the wrong God damn rec room, didn't ya you bastard!

Trail?

This is fine 🔥 🐕

It‘s pretty ~30 miles away!

LMAO. Fuck me. 🤦🏻‍♂️

Pitched the tent with the ridge-line aligned with the expected wind direction and used the supplementary ridge-line guy line for the first time. Lesson learned.

Worst day of hiking by far. The only way out is through. The general consensus of the Mission Creek section from other hikers was “that fucking sucked” and “I’m happy to have made it through that stretch alive”.