Day 35; Thur May 31, 2007

(Stud) We left the Motel 6 in Mojave around 7am after a breakfast of the remaining apple pie that Mike bought us and a delicious ruby red grapefruit we bought at the store yesterday and free hotel coffee.
I almost immediately regretted that we hadn't gone back to Primo's for another pancake special.

We got a quick hitch out of town with a guy in his late 50's that works for Portland cement. He had been working at a cement plant in Harleyville, SC and came out here for a "practice" interview in 1979 for a job he never expected to get. But he did get the job and has been here ever since. He said he has picked up about 20 hikers over the years and dropped us off right at the trailhead--several miles past his destination.

Hiker Jan was at the trailhead waiting for her husband to pick her up--so she can spend a couple of 0 days at home before returning to he trail. She lives about 2 1/2 hrs away in Redding (?). Her husband has picked her up a few other places as well but this will likely be the last since the drive is getting too long.

It was cool and windy as we set off hiking up open pasture land with nearby wind turbines. There was lots of evidence of cattle (cow patties and hoof prints) but we never saw a single cow. We did, however, manage to loose the PCT when we wandered off course onto one of the numerous cow paths that intersected the trail. Like before we figured this out because the character of the trail had changed to be too steep and too much like beach sand (although it does have the latter characteristic in some places). To find the trail, Dwight hiked part way up a nearby mountain and looked back for a trail that was more prominent than the others. Once he spotted it, he kept his eye on it and just headed back to it. I couldn't see him above the brush--so I just followed the sound of his voice back to the trail.

According to our water report, we would have to set off with enough water to take us 24 miles today-with the first sure water being at a spring. With 5 days of food, I decided the max water I could (or would) carry was 1 full Platy--about 2 1/2 liters. It would have to do. As it turned out, someone had cached water at road crossings near the 6 and 8 mile points (which neither of us took) and left some Poweraide and smaller bottles of water under a bush near mile 10. We split a Poweraide--that was nice.

We both agreed the landscape north of Hwy 58 was butt ugly--low scrubby dead stuff, dirt, rocks, more dead stuff, lots of trash near the road. We hiked uphill on this stretch for about 2 hrs--and near the top it became greener with Pinion pines and shrubbery that was still hanging in there in spite of the drought.

We hiked about 20 miles today--never getting to the spring. We should get there early tomorrow.