Day 14 – 124 to 140ish – 16 miles (did 1/2 mile to water too)

I couldn’t catch up with Jenn the day before so after horrible sleep, I went to 127 to trail angel Mike Herrera ‘s house, where I had beer and a tequila shot for breakfast. Met Benji, Dang and Rita May there and some others. 

   
   The storm was rolling in and I wanted to get a move on. 

   
       Found a camp site at 140 with Dang. He’s a writer from Oklahoma. We chatted for a while but it was raining so ran inside our tents.

Day 15 – 140 to 151.9 to Paradise Valley Cafe and then hitch to Idyllwild 

Due to fire closure from PCT mile 162 to mile 177 , there was much fuss and debate amongst the hikers as to whether or not to just hitch to Idyllwild and get back on PCT at mile 178 or do the reroute, which involves dangerous highway walking (a local showed me where the alternate route and there was literally NO space on the shoulder of the highway. More than 4 locals I met strongly recommended skipping the reroute). 

Some purists claim it’s “cheating” if you just hitch to Idyllwild. To them, I say “hike your own fuckin hike!!” . I live near Idyllwild so, if I have enough time to get to Canada, I can always come back and do the section I missed. It’s NOT a big deal!!! But somehow quite a few hikers are all up in arms about it. Duuuuuuude, I just wanna hike!!!! Lololol

It was hot!!!! But I met so many cool people and got amazing fish tacos at Paradise Valley Cafe and a few beers. 

This cactus cracked me up. It’s like a foot cactus