We only had a short hike of about 8 miles to ‘Nero’ into Big Bear. It was a beautiful clear morning with a slight breeze and yet there was talk on the trail of some moisture moving into the area with some possible snow at higher elevations. We didn’t expect much of the storm because last time we heard about rain nothing happened.
We got a quick hitch into Big Bear and found a hotel for the night and shortly after arriving our good friend Brando arrived with his mom (who we ran into in Idyllwild) and they brought a bunch of good beer from San Diego! We all went to lunch and then just hung around the hotel and chatted for the afternoon. It’s always so nice to be able to get together with friends and family while out on the trail. Thanks again for visiting!
The following morning we woke to SNOW! The cars in the parking lot were covered, the streets were buried and the mountains on the other side of the lake in the distance were white. How lucky we were to have headed into Big Bear for the night. I almost felt guilty for having spent the night in a warm hotel with a fireplace. It would have been kind of fun to have been out there while it snowed. Cold, but fun.
Today was our zero day and we had made plans to get picked up by Sugarpine’s cousin and taken to Lake Arrowhead for the night. She picked us up at Von’s after we shopped for the next few days of food. While we were waiting, a stranger who had done the PCT years ago offered to buy us some Starbucks and chatted with us for a while about how the trail had changed, why we were on the trail, and life adventures in general. People on the trail are just great!
We took the drive with Kathleen from Big Bear to Lake Arrowhead and there was even more snow on the way out. We arrived at a beautiful house that one of Sugarpine’s relatives own. It felt so nice to be in a real house, and not a hotel. There was even a trail that led to a dock on the lake! We got comfortable while dinner was made and she even treated us to some beer! We worked on making a sign for hitch hiking. We wrote “Hikers to Town” on one side, and “Hikers to Trail” on the other. For dinner we had amazing veggie tacos with quinoa and beans. It was outstanding! We did our laundry, showered and relaxed with Kathleen. We woke up to the smell of veggie sausage, eggs, and coffee. It was so hard to leave after having such a nice day off.

Kathleen dropped us off at the trail the next morning. After taking two zeros and a nero it was almost painful to hike. Our packs felt heavy and almost foreign. We must have gotten too relaxed in town! The vortex had sucked us in! We started to notice a weird sound a few miles into the trail. It sounded like a heartbeat. What was it?! We hiked a little further. It was techno! But it was coming from deep in the mountains! It was alright at first, but after hiking 18 miles hearing it, and then all through the night, and into the morning wasn’t alright. It never stopped. A few hikers joked about a rave in the mountains, another thought it was accidentally left on at a rental cabin. Either way, we finally hiked far enough to where we couldn’t hear it anymore.

We hiked along a creek for a couple days. The creek was called Deep Creek, and one of the spots along the creek had hot springs. It was really fun relaxing in the hot springs, then jumping into the cold creek. There were lots of old naked locals, but as more and more PCT hikers arrived, we took over the area and the naked locals covered up. There was even a guy wearing a loin cloth going by the name of Tarzan, who had been living there. We left the hot springs and kept hiking for a few hours before setting up camp for the night.

A few days later we hiked to the 15 freeway were we stopped at McDonalds. We actually ate McDonalds! It had been a long time, but it was actually really good!