A Tale of Two Hikers Part I

One Hiker

So we find ourselves winging our way back to Palm Springs on May 5th. We are excited to be getting back out to the trail after having been off for nearly a week. Our finances are back in shape, and the weather looks like it will be cooler as we head for Big Bear!

We grab a taxi and hightail it to Ziggy and The Bear's house, where the now 2 year old Whitewater Trail house is providing shelter and footbaths for the trail weary coming off the long drop of the San Jacinto Mountains and over the desert floor howling with the wind that races through the Palm Springs area nearly everyday. We are excited to meet Ziggy and The Bear again, as these were our first two trail angels we met in '99 when we arrived in Anza.

A fine reunion was had by all, plus we got to get reacquainted with Ron Vaughn, who is helping the trail angels, and who we hiked with on our last attempt at this trail. Then much to our surprise and delight, our friends KOKO and The Bald guy showed up as the sun was setting. They were cold and hungry, but still in good spirits as they settled in for the night. This would be our first meeting with them on the trail.

The next morning, Lego had us getting up before light, and since the wind was still roaring, I found a quiet spot with a light in the bath house to eat my breakfast. Now, I'm not such a hearty eater in the morning, and this morning was no exception. I was having a difficult time choking down a huge bowl of cereal. Ziggy got up at 4:30 am and made coffee and put out cereal and fruit for whoever was leaving early. After taking pictures, ( I'm having problems with picture again, I have them, they are just inaccessible right now) we started out over the desert and into the canyon we would have to traverse today.



The sky was dark with rain clouds behind us, accompanied by a beautiful rainbow. We would be climbing about 4000 feet over the next two days, but at the start the climbing was barely perceptible. After about 3 miles, we came across the Mesa Wind Farm. They maintain the thousands of windmills that dot the landscape, and they posted a very pleasant sign inviting hikers to partake of their hospitality. They had bathrooms we could use, and frozen sandwiches for sale, and most importantly, WATER! The workers couldn't have been more welcoming, for that we give a huge thank you to them.

I didn't eat anything, I still had what felt like a huge brick sitting in my stomach from breakfast. It wasn't digesting. As we hiked for another mile I was becoming concerned with my lack of energy, and I had a tiny panic attack. It was interesting in the fact that I never have had one of those before. Lego had me sit down and gave me some EmergenC, which always helps rejuvenate by replacing electrolytes that
your body needs. He also gave me a couple of Shot Blocs to help aid my lack of energy for getting up the hills. Within about 20 minutes of just sitting, my energy still hadn't returned. That was not normal!
After tossing ideas around in my head for awhile, I decided I had to turn around and go back instead of forward into the wilderness.

I let Lego know I couldn't continue and that he had a better shot of completing the trail without me. It was an extremely hard decision for neither of us wanted to lose our hiking partner. Finally, after a little discussion with a lot of tears on both of our parts, we figured out the best way to proceed, and we parted ways, me to go back to Ziggy and The Bear's, he to continue on towards Big Bear.

To be continued......