Day 112: Burney Falls, more heat, and back in the trees

Wednesday 8/08/12
Miles 1419-1433 (14 miles)
Elevation 4175'

Wow there was a whole bunch of us at Burney Falls State Park! It was basically the entire crew we've been traveling around the last couple days. I took some pics, the older guy is Flagman. The guy in the red shorts is Scooter, and the guy with the shaggy beard is Baboon.

Burney Falls is pretty cool, it's mainly spring fed, and the water is super cold. I didn't jump in, some of the other people did. Cactus was shocked that I haven't really gone swimming in any of the rivers or lakes this entire trail. I'm from Hawaii, why the heck would I wanna swim in cold water?? Lol!! Although there was an awesome creek after leaving the falls, and i did sit almost waist deep in it. :)

There was this huge dam after leaving the state park, and right on the other side of the dam were tons of blackberry bushes! Oooo that was soooo epic! Lol! Me and Scooter were trying to walk and pick blackberries at the same time. But the blackberries were seriously inhibiting forward progress. Haha

Man, it was suuuuper hot leaving burney falls. Thank goodness we were entering a bit of shade. I found Kyle around 6:30 on the side of the trail, he was 1/4 of his bottle deep in whiskey. Lol! Guess we are camping there for the night :)

You know, its gonna really suck for all the 2013 pct thru hikers, leaving Belden. That's where that huge fire is, and coming out of Belden it's a 4,000' climb. Now itll be super exposed too, since that whole area burned down. :(. Same thing with the Lassen fire, I think that burned a part of the trail too.

Oh, kinda random, if I didn't mention it before, Kyle loves Li hing mui. So to his mom and whoever wants to mail him stuff, send him some Li hing mui. It's these little dried prune balls that are salty and sweet and sour and covered with red powder. If you don't know what it is, ask any Chinese person. Lol. They'll tell you where to find it. :)

Day 113: oh glorious shade!! I love you trees!! :)

Thursday 8/09/12
Miles 1433-1453 (20 miles)
Elevation 5,443'

Well, we are slowly going back up in elevation. Although the trail hovers around 5,000' for a while. But at least today was shaded!! Oh glorious trees, how I love you so!!! <3. My goal today was to not have to use my umbrella. We were in enough shade all day where I didn't have to. Whoo hoo!!

The trail went though a couple active lumber fields. That was kinda gnarly. I took pics of it. I wonder how the logging process works nowadays. Randy, who maintained the cache we found a couple days ago, worked in the lumber industry, back when it was manual labor. He says now they use machines. Either way, it was gnarly and not so fun walking through those areas.

We were leapfrogging with that herd we've been around since Old Station. We all ended up at the same place for lunch. I took a pic, that's Extra Credit and Cactus in the shade in the background, I think Trip and Scallywag are back there somewhere too.

We all pretty much ended up at the same campsite in the evening. Water is somewhat plentiful here, but not all over the place like in the sierras, so we all pretty much go from water source to water source. I feel like a herd of animals in migration again, just like when I was in the desert. Lol!

NorCal is so cool. It's kind of mind boggling, really. And I mainly mean people-wise. All along the trail, through the socal sections, ive come across absolutely amazing people. Trail angels, random kind strangers, etc. I honestly didnt think people could get any cooler. Then i hit norcal, and its like, WOW!! Mind = blown. For reals. If you're on the verge of losing your faith in humanity, go thru-hike the PCT. it will be restored within the first 100 miles :)

Thus far, location-wise, everywhere I've been has been so amazingly awesome. I dunno what it is, but the NorCal population of regular people just as a whole seem so much cooler than SoCal population. Perhaps I'm biased, due to my incredible disdain for anything having to do with southern California. Lol :D. But in a nutshell, here's how I see it as: SoCal is a sea of douchebags with pockets of epic and amazing people; NorCal is a sea of epic and amazing people with pockets of douchebags. And those are probably people who moved up from LA. Lol :D. Meh, perhaps it's because I lived in Huntington Beach for so long, which is the epicenter of douchebaggery. Haha! Then again the north shore of Oahu gets kinda like that in the winter. Its quite comical, really. Except the level of surfing is much higher than HB. But in all seriousness, I lived in the most awesome place in HB, I could walk to go surf, and I could walk to Main Street. Except I was far enough away from main street that i dont hear the drunk yahoos from the bar at 2am every morning (even though at times, *i* was amongst the drunk yahoos). Lol. In Haleiwa, I could kind of walk to the surf. Depending on which board I was using. My SUP weighs too much to carry on my head for the walk to the beach. Lol. By the way, Haleiwa is the most epic place on earth. It is my motherland. <3. Although if I could choose to live anywhere, it'd be Wainiha on Kauai which is west of Hanalei bay on Kauai's north shore.

Dang. I wanna go surf. I missed my opportunity. Hiker town, which was around mile 500, was due east of Ventura. I didn't really think of hitchiking to go surf until 100 trail miles later, but it was too late. Ah well. Guess I'll have to wait til I get home.

For reals though. All of you who live in SoCal, hurry up and get out!! Now!! Before it's too late!! Lol :D. Seriously, SoCal will suck out your soul and spit it back out in the form of idiotic bandwagon social media geared toward people with with the IQ of genetically modified corn kernels (Booooooo Monsanto!!!). So yeah. Hurry before its too late!! :)

I'm so stoked to be amongst trees. No wonder John Muir liked trees more than people. Lol. What a fascinating guy. It'd be cool to go back in time and meet him. As well as Edward Abbey. And Thoreau. And Rabindranath Tagore. And Joan of Arc. And Socrates. Heck, my list could go on forever. Shoot. If someone figures out how to successfully time travel, let me know.

Day 111: 1400 miles, and epic trail magic x2!

Tuesday 8/07/12
Miles 1398-1419 (21 miles)
Elevation 3,000'

Sometime in the morning I hit 1400 miles!! Whoooo hoo!! :D. I hiked a good part of today with this guy named Scooter. He is so cool. He started the hike on June 7th! Holy frickin crap!! O.o that means he had to regularly do 25-30 mile days all the way up til now. Geez.

A lot of today's hiking reminded me of the Serengeti desert. Not that I've ever been there. But it was very Lion King-esque. Lol. It was like I expected a herd of buffalo or gazelle to run across the field or something. :)

Sometime this morning we found a cache by one of the roads. Thank you anonymous trail angel!!! It was amazing, there was a cooler full of ice, water and soda. Oooo my god that was amazing, it was frickin hot today!! A whole bunch of us were at that cache, Baboon, Spins, extra credit, Scooter, Kyle and I, flag man, and Papa Smurf. Papa Smurf is hilarious. He's a really tall lanky older dude with a bawdy sense of humor, rocks little bike shorts, and totally hauls ass. He started the trail on May 23. Geez how do these people walk so fast?!?! Lol. Flag Man is a badass too. He was in the army 27 years and retired as a really high ranking guy. I think he was in the medical field/army ranger. Anyhow, Flagman regularly wakes up at around 4am and does 20 miles by 2pm. That's awesome but screw that!! Geez, in the default world I'm not even asleep by 4am a lot of times. Lol!!

So that was the first cache. Sometime this evening we found *another* cache by a dirt road crossing. It was amazing!! Cold sodas and water and candy and an epically built picnic table! A little bit after we got there, a guy pulls up on Rhino (those offroad golf cart things, not the animal) with his dog. His name is Randy and he was the guy that maintains that cache. Thanks Randy!!! It was so cool to meet the Trail Angel who maintains the cache. Dang I wish I took a pic, the picnic table he built was really cool. Randy is a local in the area and started that cache because he is fascinated by the PCT culture and lifestyle. Meh, its not that cool; we're just a bunch of dirtbags walking north for several months. Lol :P Thank you for the epic treats Randy!! And good luck bow hunting in Castle Crags this weekend!

Day 110: walking on the edge of the world

Monday 8/6/12
Miles 1382-1398 (16 miles)
Elevation 3,450'

Are we back in the desert again?! Lol. It sure feels like it. Damn I am so glad I have my umbrella. This whole section we are up on hat creek rim which is this gigantic exposed plateau. The trail goes right along the edge of a 1,000' cliff. It's really, really cool. Only downside is there was a huge fire here in 2009 so the whole area is bare. And it's toasty!! Like, temperature probably in the 90s. I really enjoyed this section though. The views were pretty rad.

But holy forest fire batman!! So all day today it was smoky and exposed and ash was falling from the sky. At one point I turned around and saw tons of smoke billowing from somewhere in Lassen forest. There's a fire back there, 1,500 acres. Dang. I feel like we're dodging forest fires this whole section! We just got away from the Belden fire and now this Lassen fire is behind us, and I heard there's a fire 100 miles north by Dunsmuir. So we're walking towards another fire. Yikes!!! I hope all the firefighters are ok. One of the other hikers said they saw a plane dropping off smoke jumpers. The plane would circle around and 2 people would jump out of the plane at a time. What a badass profession. But dang I imagine the NorCal forest service firefighters would be spread thin, with so many fires in the area. :( Yay for firefighters! :)

In the early evening I came across an epic cache! Thank you trail angel who maintains "cache 22" (called so because it's by forest rd 22). It was like a little oasis. We ended up hanging out there for a long time. I took many photos. Hence we only did 16 miles. Lol. Ah well. It was sooooo awesome! They had tons of water there which was wonderful. It made this whole dry stretch no so dry :)

This whole area reminds me of Hawaii. <3. I miss home!!!! :) Mt.Lassen is still an active volcano (even though it hasn't erupted in forever). This morning we checked out the "subway cave", that's the pic of Kyle by that dark hole, it's a huge lava tube. Kyle has never been in a lava tube before, so it was fun to check it out. It's cold in there!

We left that oasis/cache around 9pm with the intention of night hiking, we didn't get too far because my headlamp wasn't at full power. I haven't changed the batteries in a while. Dangit! But it yeah...I don't like night hiking without full headlamp power, it's really sketch balls. Especially since I don't see well at night, and the rocks and the dirt are the same color here. Lol.

There's a lot of rattlesnakes here. Dangit! Now I gotta be on the lookout for those guys, as well as poison oak.

Oh, you can see Shasta in the distance. I think I took a pic of it, it's covered in haze from the fire though. But that's the mountain with lots of snow on it.

Day 109: getting there...eventually. Lol!

Sunday 8/5/12
Miles 1378-1382 (4 miles)
Elevation 4,354'

The whole first half of the day consisted of me doing everything I didn't get done yesterday (organizing my resupply, trimming my maps, etc) and laying around. Lots of laying around. Lol! By the way, for the aspiring thru-hikers out there, your feet will be sore the entire duration of the hike. No matter whether you do 3 miles or 30, your feet will still be sore. Lol. It's always baffled me, how I will have done nothing the day before, yet when I wake up it's hard to take those first few steps. Lol.

Anyhow, gosh Firefly's house is so amazing. I ended up leaving in a rush and forgot to take a pic of the treehouse. DOH! But if u flip back a week or two in the blog, I have a pic of the Peter Grubb hut, just imagine a smaller version of that, up in a tree, with stained glass windows. That's what Firefly's treehouse looked like. :)

When we got back to the trailhead, DIP was doing trail magic there with his family!! COOL!! They recognized me immediately from the PCT community and his wife immediately handed me some chilled wine. Lol!! I guess it's no secret that I really love wine. :D. I took a pic of the bunch. DIP is the older guy with the long hair, his wife is in the pink shirt, I forgot the hikers name with the hat, and the gal behind him is Extra Credit. There were also a ton of hikers behind me. Anyhow, thanks for the awesome trail magic, DIP and family!! He left us an epic hiker box full of goodies.

We walked 4 miles up the trail to a place called the Subway Cave. It's a lava tube, like the ones in Hawaii, and you can walk through it. The water spigots here is also the last water we have for 30 miles. UGH. I took a pic of us at the picnic table. Yaaaaay picnic tables! Epic luxury item. :). On the far left is Trip (green shirt), Extra Credit with the visor, Magellan in the kilt, Kyle is on the other picnic table, Hollywood has his back turned to me, and I don't remember the name of the guy sitting on the picnic table. That whole crew camped in the cave. I didn't, it's frickin cold in the cave!! It was nice and warm out here. :)

Ugh, not looking forward to this longass dry stretch. Oh well. If I run out of water it will be motivation to walk faster. :D

Answer to Trivia Time #3: US Lakes Edition

Whoops, sorry this is late, I kind of forgot about it. Lol.

Yes! It is indeed Crater Lake and Tahoe Lake, the 2 deepest lakes in the United States. In the north American continent, there is one lake that is deeper, somewhere in Canada, I don't remember what it's called.

Someone told me that if you took all the water in Lake Tahoe you could cover the entire state of California with 14" of water. I don't feel like doing math but if someone wants to verify this, let me know the results. :)

To the 2 people who commented on the original trivia post, if you want a postcard email me your mailing address kealadancer@gmail.com. Aloha!

Thank you for the care packages! :)

To all the people who have been sending me epic care packages, thank you!! <3 My resupply person tells me when she gets a box from someone, and then divides them up into my various mail drops so I don't end up with too much of any particular thing. I really appreciate all the presents! thank you!! <3

Oh, and Kyle says thanks for his care packages too, from his family and friends! His cell service is crappy (Sprint), and his phone is crappy so hence he doesn't bother to use it. To Kyle's mom: when I showed him the card you wrote to me he said, "hey she wrote more to you than me!" And the short answer to your question: I do all kinds of dance. Thats what I went to UCI for (BA-Dance, 2000-2003). Then I was performing with a salsa/tango/gaucho company for a while in SoCal. In Hawaii I was performing with a salsa group and a Tahitian halau for a bit, now I mainly perform burlesque/aerial dance with Cherry Blossom Cabaret (www.cherryblossomcabaret) and contemporary/urban dance with Dancers Unlimted (www.dancersunlimitedhi.com) and I freelance whatever gigs I can hustle.

Oh, I spilled the cookie crumbs from those chocolate chip cookies on the floor under the treehouse. I was so sad. Normally i would have eaten it anyways but i spilled it in pine needles and soft dirt, which tastes kind of funny. So I started whimpering like a little kid about to break into tears. Lol. Kyle said he'll buy me ice cream and beer to make me feel better. And wine if I was good. Whoo hoo! I'm going to hold him to that. :)