July 19, 2008 Pacific Crest Trail

Destination: Wild Plum Campground, Sierra City
Miles: 0

Adrian:
We took a zero day because the bikes would not be ready until tomorrow and if for some reason the bikes did not work out, the bus from Quincy to Chester does not run again until Monday (tomorrow).

Today was fun. We went for breaky and I had a nice large stack of pancakes topped with fresh strawberries. After resupplying and hanging out at the Country Store for a while, we got a ride from Tigger and Chuck to a swimming hole on the Yuba River. There we hung out with Johnny Cache and Chris enjoying a swim and some cliff jumps.

We bought tickets to a Bluegrass concert at a local gold mining museum called the Kentucky Mine. The band was named Past Due and Playable. Nothing special, a bit too pricey but a nice venue and mellow night with Chuck, Tigger, Paranoia, Accent and Ridgewalker.

Tomorrow we leave early for a big day to get close enough to Quincy to make it the day after before 10 a.m. Cache and Chris will join us loosely.

Kirsten hopes the bikes will be ready and I secretly hope maybe we can take the bus instead. I hate to admit it but I feel a bit lazy and don't really want to ride the miles. I know it's the right thing to do, to walk or ride the road detour, but sometimes it's just easier to follow the masses. Good thing Kirsten is around to keep me on the straight and narrow.

We'll see how this plays out.

Kirsten:
For all of those grammar nuts out there, I realize reading our journal is frustrating. Our entries are practically dripping with improper punctuation and spelling errors. It doesn't help that we occasionally drop random made up words like "breaky" in our entries (note Adrian's above). Breaky means breakfast, by the way.

OK, moving on. I forgot to mention we met up with Emily's dad yesterday. We saw him for the first time in weeks about two days south of Echo Lake and then again in Sierra City. Many of our readers have asked us about him. He has a journal on trailjournals.com and I encourage people to read his entries.

Emily's dad seems to be doing well. I wish he would put some weight on though. Emily's dad left moments after we saw him in Sierra City so I'm not sure if we'll bump into him again.

Some more hikers arrived today including the Three Amigos, Mrs. Potato Head, Lil' Wrangler and Circle. The group of PCTers we'll be hiking with over the next week or so are all people I enjoy being around. It would be even better if we could catch up to some of our friends up ahead.

I love the solitude Adrian and I have on the trail. It's also a huge boost when part of the day is spent with funny, lighthearted folks. The trail always flies by on the days we hike with our favorite PCTers.