It was a beautiful clear night and the stars were amazing. I did not have my rain flap on the tent and so I could just look up at the sky. A couple times during the night when I would wake up, I would put on my glasses and just stare at the sky filled with stars and it would remind me how incredibly blessed I am to be able to do this.

I got up early in the morning to start walking because I knew I was about to start a rather serious climb. The next mile, mile 720, is where I quit during my training walk. I do declare that mile 720 is the longest mile on the PCT. It is the mile that never ends!! I remember during the training walk, I would get to some place of interest or just have to stop to catch my breath and each time I looked I would still be on mile 720!! Here are some pictures along the way

And here is the very spot where I turned around on my training walk. Could not get over the tree or under the tree or around the tree with backpack on. Mile 720.99!!! This year someone had cut a way around the tree on one side and I took a picture from the other side of tree and mile 721. Finally I had made it past mile 720 🙂

By the way there was water at two spots before the 14 mile sure thing. One of those spots was up in the meadow shown in the picture below. A beautiful pool in a very small flowing stream going right down the middle of the meadow and which the PCT crossed.

Here are some pictures as I continue to hike toward the next water at mile 730.

2 miles before the sure water at 730, the PCT crosses a little stream with water. Someone has gone to the trouble to dig out a little pool and to arrange large leaves so the water is channeled and then drips off the end of the leaves into the pool. It takes awhile because there is not much water but I stop and fill my liter water bottle. While I am doing this, “Tent Talker” and another hiker come by and the other hiker says “you know there is really good water just 2 miles ahead”. I decide to tell him the story of Queen Elizabeth that when asked how she was able to attend so many formal gathering and greeting lines in a day responded that she never passed up an opportunity to sit down or an opportunity to go to the bathroom. I said in a similar way that I do not pass up real water right in front of me for theoretical water that I have not seen. He did not seem impressed. He shrugged and walked on. Tent Talker got some water.

When I go to mile 730 there was another hiker whose name is “2 pack”. He carries two packs. One on his back and one on his front with a 40% of weight in the front pack and 60% in the back pack. He says this is the only way to go and he had fashioned his own packs for this purpose. I told him I had seen other hikers that were using the two pack system and that some manufacturer was creating this very configuration. Anyway the really interesting thing about “2 pack” is that he started out carrying 140 pounds with 40 days of food!!! 140 pounds!! He said that it was probably only about 120 pounds currently. He said he only walked early in the morning and walked from water source to water source and took frequent breaks. All his gear and clothing was camouflage and I’m guessing he was ex special forces. He told me he was the one who fashioned the pool and leaves at the previous water spot and he had done something similar at this one. “Where exactly is the water?”, I asked. He told me to go about 1/8 of a mile up a trail and I would see the water coming out of the rock. Coming out of the rock?? Had Moses been here I wondered. Did he tap the rock once or twice. Anyway, I walk up the trail and sure enough it does appear the water is coming out of the bottom of the rock. “2 pack” had dug out a hole and you could just put a cup under the rock and it would fill almost immediately. So I filled up my 3 liters and went back and talked with “2 pack” for awhile and slept for about an hour and then decided to hike on for a bit. Got to mile 733 and found a beautiful place to camp. Here are some pictures from that spot.

By the way, “Tent Talker” had a very aggressive goal of doing 18 miles a day in the High Sierra’s. So she left the water hole earlier than I and I did not expect to see her again as she would have hiked to mile 738 where there was suppose to be a good camping site.

Lenora’s Note:
We are staying at an interesting motel in Lone Pine. Named the Portal Motel it is clearly one of the older buildings in the town but the only motel that would take the cats and let me stay a week or more, the rest are so busy they could only give us one or two days at a time. The funny part is the housekeeper will not enter the room with the cats here and so we have clean towels when we ask for them but no contact with hotel staff for most of the stay. By now the room needs to be vacuumed and mopped and so I tell the manager/owner that I will take the cats for a ride if she will just get the maid to clean the room. She agrees and we head out to explore the Alabama Hills. Why Alabama I wonder. From Highway 395 the Alabamas look like big red hills between the highway and the “real” mountains but the Alabama Hills bakery and cafe has photos and paintings of the unusual formations of the hills so I decide we need to check it out.

We need to be gone at least an hour so with litter box, water, treats, toys and a drink for me we make the short drive to the hills. What we find is amazing. Behind the red hills are a rock climbers dream. Big and smooth and clunky they form amazing shapes and are bundled and jumbled in mountain high piles. We take one of the dirt roads called Movie Road and drive for over an hour turning this way and that until I fear we will not ever see Lone Pine again. I find myself wondering at the power of God who chose to create on this earth a landscape so wild and unreal that it has graced the backdrops of numerous western and sci-fi movies over the years and on film is still a mere shadow of the wonders of creation. I have always contended that God must have a special affection for the southwest since this part of America he did not feel a need to fancy up with green growing things or bright colors, except for the wonderful dirt 🙂 and He left this land just as he created her, wild and scary and beautiful in her own way.
Don is hiking the mountains and I continue to track his progress daily but I have grown much more confident of his trail skills and I no longer look at the computer every 30 minutes or so to reassure myself he is still moving forward. I do check however and so I noted his long rest this day and asked him how it is going. We are getting into a routine and I will be glad to see him tomorrow or Saturday.