Got a ride out of Julian at around 10:30 am. Not ideal hiking time, but such is life. The wind was blowing pretty steadily, which helped keep me cool. I planned to hike for a couple hours, take a break during the hottest part, then coninue on to the 3rd Gate water cache, for a 14 mile day.
That day was another of a lot of ledge walking, with very little shade. That being the case, I just walked on during rhe middle of the day. If it wasn't for the wind, I would have been in very bad shape.
Just after the first gate, I found a little shade and took a break. Saw a couple fighter jets buzz through the canyon. That was cool.
When I finally made it to 3rd Gate, I set up camp near some other hikers and called it a night. It wasn't very windy at that point, so I didn't drive my stakes very deeply. That turned out to be a mistake, as the wind picked up in the middle of the night. Gusts of up to 70 mph. I didn't sleep very well, especially after the wind ripped a couple stakes out of the ground.
The wind wasn't supposed to let up until 2pm, so I around dawn I decided to just pack up and hike on. Figured I would be ok as long as I didn't have to do much ledge walking, or if I did, the wind wasn't trying to push me off the ledge.
There was a bunch of ledges, but the wind was pushing me into the uphill side, so I continued walking. Caught up with Roy after a while, and hiked with him until he had to pause to deal with a hot spot.
Not long after that, there was a major change in scenery. Meadows, and some streams, and actual trees that provided shade. I got a picture of some hikers ahead of me in the meadows area. Two little dark spots in the bottom right quarter of the picture.
I caught up with them, and it turned out to be Jinx and Hannah. After some trekking through the meadows, we came to Eagle Rock. We took the obligatory pictures there, clambered around on the rocks for a bit, and waited for Roy so I could take his picture for him. The 4 of us then hiked the rest of the way into Warner Springs to end about an 18 mile day.
Warner Springs has a community resource center that lets us camp in the field, provides bucket showers and laundry, wifi, and other niceties. There is an outfitter in a trailer that helps people with pack shake-downs and has a surprising amount of gear for how small a space they have. There is also a post office, restaurant, and resort.
Hannah was meeting her sibling (trail-name Dragon) there. We all set up our tents, and then went to the restaurant for dinner. When we got back, it was bed time.
I didn't sleep very well that night, again. Partly because my face got really cold. Everything else was toasty, though. In the morning we went to the restaurant for breakfast, and then to the post office to pick up our packages. I still had a bunch of food left, so the resupply wasn't as necessary as I thought it would be, but it was still nice.
Back at Laguna, I realized that the Fivefingers I had been hiking in weren't going to work for the whole trail, so I had called my parents and asked them to ship a pair of the trail runners I had in storage to Warner Springs. It was a relief to get them. I am not sure what exactly was causing it, but my toes were a little numb from the fivefingers. I am hoping it was them, anyway. I will see if swapping to standard shoes lets that heal up.
I was totally exhausted, and not dealing with anything well that day, so Tiny and a couple others convinced me to get a room at the resort for the night. A shower and a night in a real bed with a controlled environment felt really good. Took another shower in the morning to let the hot water soothe stiff muscles and to get some steam up into the sinuses. Rehydrate them.
Felt better after a good night's sleep. I hiked back to the Resource Center to buy some sun gloves, as I was tired of putting sunscreen on the backs of my hands. They also had Leukotape, so I picked up some of that, too. Planning to eat something, fill up on water, and put in about 10 miles today.
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