Day 20: The Big Turn West

6/5/2023

Section: Mile post 232.9 to 266.1

Distance:  18.03 Miles  

Moving Time: 07:17 hrs

Elevation Gain:  1,407 ft

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Today’s route wasn’t too exciting except that it marks a major feature on the map. If you look at a map of the PCT, about an 1/8th of the way up California the trail takes a noticeable turn west to stay in the San Bernardino mountains north of Los Angeles. Today, we made that turn which is cool to see because, while our progress is still small compared to the entirety of the trail, it’s something you can actually identify. The path today follows solidly in the San Bernardino Mountains National Forest transitioning from tall pines into a high desert brush as we approached Big Bear. 

Amanda and I had meant to be up by 4 and on the trail by 5 but amanda hit the snooze for 10 minutes, than another 10 minutes, then reset the alarm for 5 and we didn’t actually get up until 6. Once up, it was pretty cold. I am on the verge of asking my parents to send my puffy to our next resupply because, while I warm up real quick on the trail, the hour or so it takes to get ready is pretty miserable above 4000 feet. 

We set out 10 minutes before 7. Amanda’s backup watch, the Garmin 5S I got her for her birthday about 7 years ago, had failed completely on me so i recorded the day on my phone. Add it to the list of things that finally gave up the ghost in the early days of this trip. We started off in high pines. “This looks a lot like Bend,” I said to Amanda. “Or Leavenworth,” she answered. “Or just anywhere on the east side of the Cascades,” I joked back. The trail ran due north and soon we could hear cars through the trees as it paralleled highway 38 south of Big Bear. We began crossing a number of dirt roads as the trail ran through an easement on the west side of someone's property. Eventually we arrived at Onyx Peak, where some trail angels had left a water cash. We decided to keep going, having made the 4 liters from yesterday last pretty well. 

The trail continued to parallel the road as it started to make its turn west. In the distance we got the first glimpse of Big Bear and Baldwin lake. From here the path descended into a creek bed with water flowing on our left side. This was Arastre Creek and as we followed it we came across the Arastre Equestrian Camp where we stopped for a bathroom break and a snack. I managed to tape up the Pur Water Filter enough to prevent further leaking and managed to get about 2 liters pumped into our water bladders.We rested for about 45 minutes before putting our packs back on and heading out. 

We had gotten the food really close to perfect this time. I was down to the last bit of my trail mix and some nut squares and Amanda was also down to the last bit of food she had. These are the best feeling days because, with little water and food left, the packs are super light and you can fly down the trail. The route stayed in the creek bed for another mile before it started to head out of the west side. Here we made a mistake, or, I think it was a mistake. In my GPS app, the trail reaches a road, crosses it and heads up the west side of the Arastre ravine but after checking a mile up the trail, I realized that FarOut - the app most everyone is using for orientation - shows the trail going up the east side of the ravine after following the road a little way. Sure enough, looking across the ravine, I could make out a well defined trail winding down closer to the river as we made our way higher above it. We decided to stay on our current path as it converged with the other path in about a mile and, sure enough, a mile on a poorly defined trail delivered us back to the PCT. I’m not sure I would have wanted to do the other path, in retrospect - it lost a healthy amount of elevation for seemingly no reason. 

From the point where the two paths converged the trail left the tall Jeffrey and Sugar Pines behind and entered a high, scrubby landscape. We weaved around and above small hills for another 5 miles before we arrived at a junction for the “Eye of God.” I had been raving to Amanda all day about going to see this ancient megalith which is a sacred tribal landmark for the native Yuhaaviatam peoples. Supposedly it was a giant dome of quartz that came out of the ground and was easily accessible from the trail. At the junction we turned off - Amanda a little less than enthused as the end of the day was only about 3 miles away. After taking a wrong turn and leading us about a ¼ mile down the wrong road, we rerouted and arrived at the dome. I have to say, it was underwhelming. A giant mound of white rock coming out of the ground was cool to see, but nothing to write home about (though, admittedly, i am writing about it here so…). We took some pictures than wound back up the road to the junction. 

From the junction, we continued on, now heading more west than north. Amanda’s feet were really starting to hurt her - the low drop shoes providing little cushion against the day’s many steps. We weaved through a number of low hills and eventually the sound of passing cars signaled that highway 18 was nearby. Soon we arrived at a trailhead with lots of PCT information plastered to it, including phone numbers for rides into town. We flipped open the registration box and were elated to find some rice crispy treats inside. We took one and shared it. As we wandered into the trailhead parking lot we found two older ladies with the backs of their cars open and two additional PCT hikers standing beside them. This was Trail Magic provided by Momma Tink who was local to Big Bear and had been providing Sandwiches and Iced Tea to tired hikers for the last 5 years. She gave us each a Chicken Salad Sandwich, some Cheetos and an Iced Tea. We sat and chatted for a while. The other hikers were from the UK and had started around May 10th. As we finished our sandwiches and thanked Tink for her hospitality a woman in a black Ford Ranger dropped off some hikers across the way. I jogged across the highway and asked if she was going back into town and if she could take us. She said of course and Amanda and I grabbed our bags to go with her.

20 minutes brought us into town. Our ride told us all about Big Bear and quite a lot about the trees in the area. Eventually we reached our destination, a Von’s Grocery store in a large strip mall a little ways from the Big Bear village. I pushed 5 dollars onto our driver and we both thanked her profusely. We jumped out and Amanda watched our bags while I went in to get stuff for guacamole, s'mores as well as beer and bratwursts. After, we headed over to the Starbucks to wait for the local bus to take us down the road to our AirBnB. 

As we approached the bus stop I was surprised to see a couple sitting there wearing some familiar looking bucket hats. “Joe and Jane!!” I shouted as we approached. They smiled and waved and we joined them on the curb to wait for the bus. They were finishing up their zero day at a time share that Joe’s family owned in Big Bear village and had actually offered us a stay there but we hadn’t had service to know about it before we got the AirBnB. We talked for a while and eventually the bus showed up. We got on and it wound us around Big Bear before we got off near our AirBnB. We said goodby to Joe and Jane, hoping this wasn’t the last time we would run into them and walked 5 minutes to our tiny cabin. 

Once there we took showers and jumped in the hot tub - one of the main reasons we had gotten the AirBnB. We staid in until we couldn’t take the heat anymore than made guacamole and roasted marshmellows and bratwurst over the fire. It…was…epic. Afterwards, too tired to do much else we passed out in the tiny cabin.