PCT Day 1: Hot, hot, hot!

I arrived at the southern terminus today at 9:30. My dad and brother drove me from Yucaipa to the trail head and spent some time taking pictures and sending me off. I feel incredibly lucky to have such a supportive family.

When you get the terminus, you have to park at the bottom of a hill and walk up to a monument. There were tons of border patrol agents in the area, you can see the border fence right behind me in the picture below. I was so giddy and nervous that I forgot to sign the trail register! Oops.

And I'm off and running, er, I mean walking.

The trail starts in the Laguna Mountains, east of San Diego. Out here it's dry, rocky, dry, hot, and dry. I convinced myself to buy a hiking umbrella before I left home, despite it's bulky appearance, and it totally saved me on day 1. I forgot my sunscreen in my dad's car, so the umbrella kept me from getting fried today.

There are a bunch of old burn areas in these first miles. Burn areas suck because they leave no escape from the brutal sun.

At mile 14 I was feeling pretty confident. My foot didn't hurt at all (HALLELUJAH), my umbrella was keeping me relatively cool, and I still had three liters of water with only 6 miles until Lake Morena. Then I came to Hauser Canyon... dun dun dun.

The decent into the canyon is great, complete with a fully stocked water cache that was hiked in by some brave soul. The ascent out of the canyon was awful. It seemed to stretch on forever and the heat was brutal. I had to stop to rest, feeling nauseous and lightheaded a few times (hear stroke? dehydration? altitude?), but I made it.

At the top of the canyon I made friends with a super sweet hiker. I'm not sure what hiking ettiquite is for talking about someone in your blog. It's early though, so maybe I'll mention her again later. Anyway, we hiked together for the last 4 miles into camp. It's amazing how motivating it is to hike with other people. I'm so used to backpacking alone and having someone to chat with made the miles fly by.

At camp I meat a bunch of people, including RocketLama. Rocket Lama is a really interesting thru-hiker (and talented cartoonist) who is rehiking the trail this year after being forced off the trail by snow last year in Washington. Check out her blog- interesting story and a great hiking comic. 

http://rocket-llama.tumblr.com/page/27 

My foot feels great. In fact, my feet seem to be in much better shape than the other hikers who hiked all 20 miles in one day. Maybe my body is more capable than I realized? I'll see how sore I am in the morning, that will be the true test of whether or not this super long day was a good idea.

I'm so freaking happy to be on the PCT.