The Wonderland Journal

Miles hiked: 21

Mile marker: 151.8

It’s early in the morning when I awake to the galaxy painted above me. A mosquito buzzes around me and I throw my jacket over my face to try and sleep. My alarm won’t go off for a while. While cowboy camping is absolutely beautiful, I do sleep better in a tent. And a bed. 

The morning begins with my 5:00 AM alarm, silence, and me turning over to Dad. 

“I’m tired,” he says. 

“Me too,” I say. 

We begin getting ready. It takes me an hour and soon we’re off, going through warm and cool pockets of air. 

Today I’m tired. I stayed up late writing, late because we got into camp a bit late. Most of my early morning thoughts are focused on random scenarios, like watching myself walk into my old communities after trail or meeting Michael Easter, the author of the book that led me to hike the trail in the first place. 

We’re hiking through similar terrain as yesterday. It’s going through the hills with low brush grabbing at our clothes — I now have a hole in the hip of my shorts. I think I’ll just leave it alone. 

“Dad, look at me!” I say playfully. Yesterday, Dad mentioned that you can walk and filter water at the same time. I’ve managed to pull my water bottler with the filter from the right pocket of my bag — this particular pocket is actually shorter than the other so you can reach back and grab things more easily while walking. 

The terrain here is relatively flat and wide, so it makes for an easier water filtering job. 

At last, I see the sign we’ve been waiting for. 

De Benedetti’s! 

A tail angel named Rich is waiting by the sign. He’s waiting for a woman who injured her ankle. 

“She was a ways behind, maybe an hour or so,” we say. Rich mentions that the hiker who died recently passed away in this section. That news was something I was aware of before even starting the trail. A great outdoorsman, I read. He, too, is on the Trek, where I post. 

Rich offers us a ride, but we choose to walk the 7/10 of a mile up the road. This would have been a fun and bumpy ride in a car! 

The sun is getting hotter. I am pulling myself along with my trekking poles. My hood sits over the bill of my hat, something I’ve yet to do since I started trail. I don’t like how it blocks my vision, but today is so sunny I need extra protection. 

At last, we get to our destination. A blonde woman named Lori greets us. They are offering water, a bucket to wash feet and clothes, a pool (so exciting!), WiFi, and some food! I get a stick of cheese, a coke, and a cutie mandarin orange. Delicious! The cheese was especially amazing. The mandarin was sweet and juicy, flavor exploding on my tongue as I ate it. It doesn’t matter that I dropped it trying to grab a bucket from a kind hiker helping me out. He rinsed it off for me, and it was as if dirt never touched it. 

Maung! A Californian from Burmese walks into this oasis. He’s tan and sweaty from the hot walk. Maung and I met my first day hiking. Today is the first I’ve seen him since we’ve been on trail! He has a young daughter who he wishes would want to hike more with him. So many people are amazed that my dad and I get to do this together. 

After rinsing off, I step into the pool. It’s like ice! I slowly lower myself down as goosebumps spread up my body. 

Chilly!

Rafiki joins me, his shoulders up to his ears and face screwed up in the discomfort of the cold. I dunk my body in. It’s freezing for a moment, but when I emerge, I feel a little better. 

“Okay, okay, I’m going to dunk,” Rafiki says. “I’m getting ready!” 

It’s been a whole minute of this, so I shove him backwards into the water. Ha! He stands with a whoo!

Dad joins us for a freezing soak. I get out and start to clean my feet in preparation for blister care. 

Once it’s dry, Rafiki and a hiker named Hummingbird sit by me while I insert a safety pin into the soft skin to drain it. The fluid leaks down my foot as I press out the sticky fluid inside. Soon I bandage it and grab my clothes from the clothes line.

It’s quite crowded here, and we want to reach Psradise Valley Csfe before they close. 

I soak my shirt with water and we head out down the wide, dusty road. 

Eleven miles to the”burger,” as Denis calls it. It’s about noon at this point — the worst time to hike. 

We swing a right onto the trail and begin a very steep incline. The sun is at its high of 116 degrees. It’s wicked hot at 116 degrees and I keep my mind occupied with random things as we keep climbing. Sweat is dripping down my temples, behind my head, and down my neck. 

Dad is keeping a steady pace. This, I prefer. If he moves too fast, then I can’t keep up. When he moves just a bit faster than my own comfort speed, I work to try to catch him. 

Sometimes I control my breathing: deep breath in, slow and controlled breath out through the mouth. The sun beats down on my back and head as if I’ve walked right up to a furnace. Today is the first day I’ve pulled my hood completely over the bill of my visor — while this is the design of the sun hoodie, it also limits my vision to do this. 

We periodically stop to add electrolytes to water, which is now the temperature of a warm bath. Yum. Add the Nuun electrolytes to it, and I have a barely sweetened, hot fizzy water. 

If I think about it too hard, I may get sick. 

We seem to have been hiking for hours in these vast dry lands. Every breeze is like a kiss from Heaven, cooling us for the briefest moment. 

“Hello!” Dad says. He’s usually walking ahead of us, and he’s found a semi-shady spot in between rocks and under a tree. The sunlight is speckled over the ground as we move in. 

The heat is going to overheat my water, I’m sure. I need to move my backpack, but every time I move around, little pokey things stick to my clothes and my sitting mat. The heat is exhausting. After some crushed cheddar potatoes chips eaten with a spoon, I lay out my mat and crawl under the tree. 

Dad and Rafiki are talking military stories and jargon. Cheek down on my mat, I doze off — which I only know because I twitch and grip the shredded sticks. 

Knock, knock! Dad raps on my foot, which sends an earthquake through my body. I jolt my head up, a little spot of drool on my cheek. 

Time to go. 

It may have been the micro nap or it may have been the sun, but I can’t seem to will my body any faster. I drag myself like this for a while, Rafiki close behind. 

Dad and Denis are laid out by the trail. We join him for a few minutes, then we’re up again. Dad is behind me now, and we go back and forth over the switch packs, up and down. 

The terrain before us is huge, with dry brush and green trees. The giant hills — or mini mountains — stretch out all around us. If we fell now, we would surely tumble to death over this cliff. 

The sun is hanging lower, which means it’s giving us a little bit more grace. 

Rafiki and Denis are stopped ahead. 

Rattle snake. 

It’s giving off a fairly loud, high pitched TV static sort of sound. Dad says this one is quieter than usual. Some dust is tossed at the snake and it slithers off trail. Dad and I keep moving, the noise carrying on even as we pass. 

Soon, we reach another marker. 150 miles! Soon this won’t be a huge accomplishment, but to me, it is. The past two days have been tough! And fifty miles on foot is not necessarily easy business. 

My feet are really hurting by this point. We pass through several sandy spots, which is just the same as trudging through beach sand. Laborious. 

Dad is waiting by the road for us. He stands and we begin the walk to Paradise Valley Cafe. 

My feet are like broken sticks. Pained and pressured. I walk along for a while — it’s less than a mile to the restaurant — and soon begin to run. It’s surprisingly easy to run with my pack… hiker math. My thoughts are that if I’m on my feet less time, then I can soon be off of them to relieve all this pressure. 

At last! We make it to Paradise Valley Cafe! We set our bags to the side and are seated. I order a barbecue burger and a chocolate milkshake, which was thick, chocolatey, with creamy,  dense whipped cream — the most amazing shake ever. 

The burger is okay, but I’m happy to be there. It was tough day. Plus, we get to meet the mayor of Idyllwild: Max the dog!

Maung sits with us for dinner. While I wish I have more energy to give to the conversation, I’m wiped. My eyes are glassy, my legs are like wooden planks with pockets of pain in my glutes and thighs. 

After dinner, we walk to the field behind the restaurant. I set up my tent — which my setup is getting quite perfect, by the way — and I brush my teeth, wandering past Rafiki and Denis, who are cowboy camping. 

“Why are you brushing your teeth right by us?” Denis asks. 

“You’ll have to educate me on the toothpaste-spitting etiquette by people’s tents,” I say. 

“Go spit next to Journey’s tent,” Denis replies. 

I really need to learn where to do this stuff when other people around. 

I crawl into bed, start journaling, when a group of people join Rafiki and Denis. It’s quite funny actually, that even when Rafiki plants himself twenty feet away from everyone one else and under a street lamp, other hikers still seem to corral around him for conversation. 

I reach for my earplugs. I moved them to my tooth brush bag from my first aid kit. To have them on hand would be easier, since I don’t get into my first aid kit so often. Apparently when ear plugs get wet, they don’t compress. I didn’t even think about them getting wet from my tooth brush!

My AirPods are a substitute, but they hurt my ears, and I can still hear the conversation. 

Through some help from other hikers, I’m getting a handle on the navigation system — FarOut. The learning curve is huge out here! Each day, I’m becoming more and more proficient in trail life. 

Today was exhausting. I get halfway through my daily journal, close my phone, and throw my fleece over my eyes. 

I’m exhausted, but I’m so glad we decided to hitch into Idyllwild tomorrow. Otherwise, we’d be hiking five miles today and 20 tomorrow, just to check in late to Idyllwild Inn and leave early the next day!

So, we basically get a zero day (zero miles hiked). I close my eyes and slip into the world of welcome sleep.