2 June - Day 43 - Saved by Okie Girl

From Bird Spring Pass (Mile 630.8) to Walker Pass Campground (Mile 651.4)

Total PCT Miles hiked today: 20.
Total rattlesnakes encountered on the trail to date: 11

On our hike in, we saw 2 coyotes. 1 rattlesnake. 0 food. But one glorious trail angel appeared! Okie Girl!

Dionysus here. Well, Pan and I both miscalculated on our food resupply in Tehachapi and developed what is known as "hiker hunger" - which is when your body simply can't fight its way out of the calorie deficit you have worked up and so you are constantly ravenous. (I kept eating my allotted meals and then saying "what else can I eat." I would eat the next day's worth of food ... "what else can I eat" and I ate Sean's backpack, etc).

As a result we realized this morning we didn't have enough food to make it as planned all the way to Kennedy Meadows. In fact, half way through the day we realized we barely had enough to make it through the night. We decided the best plan would be to make it to Walker Pass then hitch out 35 miles to Lake Isabella and do a short two day resupply to get us to Kennedy Meadows where a much larger post resupply awaits us. So we spent the day sprinting through the heat in an attempt to make it to the highway at Walker in time to hitch a ride and settle in before dark. We sped across 20 miles of undulating dry mesa by 3 PM (all the way fantasizing about a soft hotel bed and town food while simultaneously kicking ourselves for planning poorly).

Saw 2 coyotes. 1 was quite large - about a foot and a half at the shoulder and a big long bushy tail.

We see a pavilion of Trail Magic off the trail to one side! Is it a mirage?

Then, ragged out, ravenous and stupid, we tramped into the Walker Pass Campsite and lo!, TRAIL MAGIC. Okie Girl had the site stocked with cold beer, sandwiches, fruit, snacks and the rest of the amenities.

And the place was full of thru-hikers who cheered us into camp. Happy reunion.

Pan slamming a beer as Dionysus looks on. See the crusted salt on Pan's black shirt? Photo courtesy of 3Bears.

Thru-hikers hiding out from the desert sun in Okie Girl's Trail Magic Station! Photo courtesy of 3Bears.

Dirty Brown on far left, Okie Girl at the back, Anteater in the middle in gray, 3Bears on the right with bandana, and Dionysus on the far right. Seano is the photographer. AGAIN. :-D

She fed us dinner (and breakfast the next morning) and supplied us with enough food to get us on our way without having to hitch out to Isabella. Thanks for the rescue, Okie Girl.

The only worry left was whether it was safe to camp in a site I had to shoo a prodigious diamondback out of.

We took our chances.

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