Keen Camp Summit

The one with the mountains, alpine forests and a very windy camp!

📍 Location: Idyllwild to MM 163

🏔️ Elevation 7002ft
🥾 I actually walked: 11.4 miles
💰 Money: $10 on a hitch.
⛑️ Health: I feel amazing. I have energy and am enjoying the trail. I’m literally skipping up and down these mountains today. It’s all good.

☀️ Weather: Perfect weather. Around 18 degrees and was a bit chilly on the ridges but for me, it was spot on. I don’t miss the desert heat!

🍲 Food: Lots of snacks and trail mix today. Noodles and bacon bits for lunch. Hot chocolate. So looking back I didn’t eat much :-(

💤 Sleep: Last night in the cabin I slept like a log. I was sound asleep by 10am and woke up at 5am.

LEARNINGS:-
These multi vitamin gummies are awesome! (Thanks Rachel)

THE LONG WINDED VERSION:-

7am - Our trail Angel, Leo, collects all four of us from the cabin. He’s a character. I’m sitting in the front as he declares “I’ve not driven for over 20 years”. What?? He lived in New York so didn’t need to use a car. “It took me a while but I’m getting used to it now…. Ah! “School bus” he yells as we nearly had a head on collision with a big yellow school bus which he finds hilarious! The road is twisting and turning and I feel sick. My head goes down and Inclose my eyes praying that we all get to the trail head in one piece.

7.35am - “There’s Disco Daddy” says Harry as we whizz by Paradise Valley Cafe. He is a fast walker so will catch us up.

8.34am - We have Leo goodbye and thank him for the lift. I feel better now I’m out of the car. Rucksacks on and we are off! The trail is beautiful and we can see why so many western movies were made here. We have boulders to negotiate, and then little sections of alpine forest with humongous pine cones. We start meeting hikers who are coming the other way. A guy stops to chat whom is called “One Time”. He had a big beard and was sweating profusely so much so that it was dripping onto to the floor. He gave us advice about what lays ahead. Di and I looked at each other when he said “it’s easy if you have good mountaineering skills, but very sketchy if you don’t”. Um!

It’s 9 o’clock navigating boulders. There’s a nice cool breeze. The snow covered San Jacinto mountain is looming ahead with looking quite intimidating. This is so much fun!

9.14am - Di has issues with her shoes. She purchased new ones yesterday which were a bit big for her and they are flipping around in her foot like clodhoppers. Disco took charge and retired her shoe laces so that her foot sat better in the shoe. We stop for a break at the creek. It’s beautiful here. Perfect weather so far.

950am - Look at the size of these pinecones, they’re gigantic. We snap photos of them next to our heads! Everything in American is huge!

1247pm - Di is not feeling great and her altitude sickness has made a return so it’s my turn to take care of Di, rather than the other way around. Everyone else is ahead of us now as we just take our time and take lots of little rests.

1.20pm - We are sitting on a log and hear giggling voices coming above. Two sisters are in hysterics laughing about something or other. They turn the corner and see me and Di sitting in the log and start laughing again. They stop to chat and their humour is infectious and exactly what we needed. The trail provides!

3.10pm - We have bern climbing all day and now we are over 6000ft. The Royals and Disco are waiting for us in a shady spot. Harry takes charge and explains that it’s a mile off trail, downhill, to the water source. Then a mile back up. I think I carried the most of everyone and still had 3 litres left so I didn’t need water. I would wait under this nice tree while everyone else left their packs with me and headed down the hill. I get out my little chair and my puffy jacket. I’m all settled and ready to have an hour or two of rest. This is the life! PCT hikers go by and stop to chat.

I’m still feeling good, especially as I didn’t do the 2 mile water source trek. A few others are knackered and if we don’t stop here then it’s another 6 miles to the tent side and the bad weather is rolling in. Decision made, we start pitching our tents in the wind. It’s challenging with a rocky ground and the wind blowing everything into spikey bushes!

As soon as I get changed and snuggle up into my quilt with my puffy pants on I realise how tired I am. Let’s pray I sleep well tonight and that the rain forecast for tomorrow blows o we during the night.

Night night. See you tomorrow.Læs mere