Where, Oh Where, Has My Water Gone?

(Thursday May 8, 2008)
Last night I slept at the Heart Bar campground which was a ways off the PCT down a California Hiking and Riding trail. Problem was, after walking for about a half hour down the trail, there was no campground and the spring that was supposed to be a half mile down in case you didn't want to walk all the way to the campground, was either dry or I'm blind. Probably blind, but either way I didn't see it.

So after a 24 mile day, I was ready to settle in, but unfortunately there was no campground at the end of the line, so I just parked it in a flat spot and sat down to rest.

Scratch that. I never really sat down until I climbed in my sleeping bag because it was after 7:00 and I was somewhere around 8000 feet which means that when the sun starts to go down the temperature doesn't linger for even a second at anything close to comfortable. It's warm until it's not. Then it's freezing.

Adding to the problem was my sweat-soaked clothing and empty stomach, so when I found the flat spot to camp, it was like a grenade went off inside my pack.

Stuff went everywhere. Clothes, bags, equipment strewn about this tiny area while I "made" dinner, which consisted of me eating a piece of cold pre-cooked chicken breast and a bag of Pop Tarts.

Then because I saw a spider on my bag, I figured ants couldn't be far away (how I reasoned that one is beyond me) so instead of packing away my garbage, I strategically placed it at points a good bit away from my stuff to lure the ants away from me (again, the basis for this reasoning is slightly less than sound).

So after crawling into my bag (completely ignoring my pre-sleep trail cleanliness regimen) I realize that by not packing the stuff away, I could be attracting animals that otherwise wouldn't smell the garbage in the first place...then I decided it was too cold to get out of my bag and went to sleep. Luckily no animals appeared, at least that I know of.

Morning wasn't much better. I decided to eat the Pop Tarts with dinner because I thought I had two packages left. Well, my last package was devoured as the side to my chicken à la antarctica, so wouldn't ou know I had dinner for breakfast. Except this time it was pieces of chicken instead of a whole breast - pieces in icy cold broth that I was fishing out with my finger because I was too lazy to get out my spork. The whole experience was enough to make me want to vomit the entire meal despite being very hungry. Weirdly enough I would have been happy in a way if that happened, but quickly enough there were other things coming up to distract and anger me (of course based on my excellent planning skills).

Because of a lack of campground or spring the night before, I was down to one and a half liters of water to start the next day. It really wasn't too big of a deal because Coon Creek was 4 miles away and I could get some from there.

Fast forward to 8:30 and I start loking for some water flow. I head down the jeep road which is supposed to intersect with the creek, and pissed off and tired, I return waterless at 9:50.

So now I've got just over a liter and 9 miles to go before the next definite water source. After that experience, I think I have a small inkling of what it might be like to be an addict.

Because I'll be in Big Bear City Friday morning, I knew I would be able to get whatever I wanted to drink short of absinthe, so I was fixated on anything cold. Ice water, milk, apple juice, beer, Gatorade, you name it - I was ready to sell my soul to quench my thirst. I vowed that the second I got into Big Bear, I'd head to the first restaurant I could find and order a large glass of milk, apple juice, a pitcher of ice water and tell the waitress to keep them coming.

It was taking every ounce of mental strength not to down every bit of water that I had, to sip slowly and in small gulps. Absolutely tortuous. Like being stranded at sea. Water, water everywhere and none to drink. Even a bear wasn't enough to distract me.

I'm walking around mile 249 and all of a sudden I hear this noise that sounded like the noise Barry White would make if he were a massive yawning dog.

I thought to myself, that kind of sounded like a lion or a bear. And it went on for like 30 seconds, but because I didn't want it to be a bear, I convinced myself it was someone starting up their weird sounding dirt bike.

But, lo and behold, I come to a jeep road and I look up and see a woman hosing off a bear in a cage. Talk about your surreal sights. Apparently there is a ranch there in the middle of the woods with - pardon the overused phrase - lions and tigers and bears (you probably said "Oh my!" on your own, so I didn't write it).

I don't know what they do with these animals, but there were cages with massive bears in them. Unfortunately I didn't get to see my 2nd favorite animal and former school mascot the tiger, but I guess I could always go back if I wanted to. That or India. Or Africa. Or a zoo. Whichever way.

So of course the woman was hosing the bear down and I thought for some time whether she would do the same for me if I asked her, but decided to just keep trudging on.

And let me tell you that a mile later, I literally gasped and let out some other weird noise before quietly exclaiming "Water!" to myself as 50 feet in front of me was a water cache left courtesy of the Nature's Inn and Big Bear Hostel. A shrewd tactic, but effective nonetheless as my current residence is in fact the Big Bear Hostel (sorry Nature's Inn, this place was cheaper and closer to the action).

I only took a liter from the cache (so much for my endless flow of drinks for breakfast on Friday), but after fillig the bottle with Gatorade powder, it felt like I had just been put through my first orgy. Overly satisfied, slightly damp, unsure how I got there, and thanking the Big Bear Hostel and Nature's Inn for their gift from heaven. Although I think after (and probably during) an orgy people thank God and not independent California hoteliers, but then again, what do I know about orgies?