6/23/2023
Section: Milepost 541.5 to 558.5
Distance: 17.19 Miles
Moving Time: 06:26 hrs
Elevation Gain: 2,604 ft
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The stage today winds east, up and out of the small river depression we were delivered to the day before. At mile 544.5, it descends into another river valley before winding ~1700 feet up to the top of a north running ridge. On top, the path ambled across a number of low summits before turning northeast and easing itself down to the Tehachapi Willow Springs Road. My itinerary had us going beyond Tehachapi Willow Springs Road to Highway 58 but Sean and others were getting off at the earlier road and so we decided to do the same.
We woke up at around 6 am. The wind had been insane the night before, howling through the oak tree above our tent from about 11 pm to 2 am. I have been scarred about wind in tents since I took a group of friends up to the Bugaboos in British Columbia a few years back and we got caught in a massive thunderstorm. At the time there had been no good way to stake the tents on the granite shelf we were camping on and the whole thing was quite a catastrophe so last night's wind kept me staring up through the mesh at the waving limbs above us the whole time. To compensate, we slept in and several groups, including Push-Pop and Sean were up and out before us.
Once we had eaten and packed up, we beelined directly up the hillside to rejoin the trail. Looking back, i could still see Jye (Tit Punch) and Vanessa (Sugar Momma) packing up. We hiked in relative silence most of the morning, but occasionally commented on the crazy wind and the far off turbines. At one point on one of the many dips into a side valley, I caught a glimpse of a lizard we had been looking for for some time. This was a Leopard Lizard. We had talked with Sean about another lizard, the WhipTail Lizard, which seemed to have some very “Leopard-like” markings on it’s side but he had assured us that was the Whip Tail, but today, as we meandered along under the warming sun, we caught a much larger lizard with leopard print skin and took a picture to confirm with Sean later.
Shortly after our lizard encounter, we came to the edge of a ridge and looked down to see switchbacks disappear below us only to reappear on the far side of a small valley. Deep below, at the bottom, we could see Sean’s tell-tale blue Patagonia running shirt making its way up the switchbacks on the other side. I took out a cliff bar and started munching as we made our way down into the valley. At the bottom, we crossed and began our climb, begrudging to a small degree how late we had started. The sun wasn’t even that bad which made me muse about what this hike must be like in a true, hot California summer. We climbed on and eventually caught up to Sean, who fell into step behind us. We excitedly told him about the Leopard lizard which he had also seen and confirmed that we had the species correct this time. We walked on, crossing through the long series of low summits on the ridge, talking on and off.
Far behind us we could see Jye and Ness just reaching the descent into the valley. We traveled on and eventually came to “the Oasis.” Here, on this little, random patch of land a group of trail angels had set up a picnic table with chairs and repository boxes for books and snacks. Delightedly, we sat and relaxed for a while, taking the chance to snack and refill water at the drums that had been left behind, all commenting on what a wonderful stop it was. We stopped for so long that Jye and Vanessa caught up to us and joined for a while before we headed out. Walking on, we continued to meander through the low summits of the ridge, still very much in the desert but a little higher than before. As we headed north, the wind turbines that dominate Tehachapi pass could be seen and, as the sun began to come down from its noon high, Jye and Vanessa caught up to us and joined our little group. Sean, Jye and I talked as we walked while the girls talked behind us. Jye and I talked about van life and our mutual love for wind turbines as the trail began to descend toward the Willow Springs Road. At one point, a day hiker came up going the opposite direction and we all said hi.
The trail continued to wind down, in a seemingly endless fashion as we entered the domain of the wind turbines. Looking up, these turbines were noticeably older than those we had walked amongst the day before with smaller blades and older looking bodies. Far off in the distance we could see an entire array of much smaller turbines spinning at much lower speeds. Jye and I talked about future plans on the trail. It sounds like both him and Vanessa are going to rent a car and drive to the Canadian border tomorrow to begin traveling SOBO as this is the typical time when most of the SOBO hikers are starting. I told him that was awesome and told him all about my favorite parts of the North Cascades.
About an hour more finally brought us down to Willow Springs road and, at Jye and my insistence, we both crossed briefly to read the informational signs on the wind turbines themselves. It was an informational sidequest that I think we all appreciated in the end. Turns out Tehachapi was the site of an American wind turbine uprising, being one of the predominant sites of wind turbine development in the United States. There - I bet you just learned something awesome about wind turbines that you didn’t know before. Afterwards we moved out to the highway and put our thumbs up to see if we could get a ride. Sean looked at us all with our thumbs up in the air and laughed as he told us we were supposed to point our thumbs in the direction we wanted to go, not straight up and asked who had taught us that. “We learned it from your generation Sean!” I said with a grin to which he just laughed. A long line of cars went by without so much as a turn signal or brake light. “Tough crowd today,” Jye said. As the cars passed, the day hiker we had seen earlier crossed the road, looking at us curiously. He came over and asked if we needed a ride. We told him there were 5 of us as he pointed to his Lexus sedan. He assured us it wouldn’t be a problem and we all migrated over to his car. The boot of the car was surprisingly large and we smooshed our way into the back seat giving Sean the front. The Lexus was maxed out but it made its way down the pass just fine. The day hiker’s name was Dillon and he was from Idaho completing an internship in Lancaster as an electrical engineer for a wind turbine company. He took us to the post office where Amanda and I were expecting a package from Amanda’s cousin Rachel. Sean was also looking for a package from his wife. The post office staff was able to find Sean’s package but not Amanda’s, much to her chagrin. We committed to trying again the next day as we were zeroing in Tehachapi and went about calling an Uber to ride to the Best Western Plus where Amanda and I had used some credit card points to book a room.
We arrived at the hotel, dropped our things and scrubbed ourselves clean before all walking down to Red House BBQ which many hikers before us had raved about on FarOut. We loaded up on classic bbq and I tried a few beers on tap. Jye and Vanessa joined us later and we apologized to Jye as he was a vegan but all of us had forgotten when choosing a place to eat. He seemed un-bothered by it and we talked late into the evening. Vanessa was a purser on a super yacht for a family down in Tennessee and had all sorts of fun tails from her job. We shared tales of our many travels and eventually we all realized how tired we were. We walked back to the hotel, stopping at a gas station (which Jye referred to as a “Servo” in Australian English) for some ice cream bars and other snacks.
Back at the hotel, Amanda and I went out to try the hot tub for a bit before returning to our room to pass out on the wonderful mattress.
