June 8, 2018 There and Back Again, A Meeting With Mission

Granny Hat and Dad are completely worn out after driving almost 700 miles there and back again to Kennedy Meadows to meet Mission.  We had to laugh at ourselves for being tired after driving the miles instead of walking them.  Mission sent home his 700 mile shoes for a long rest.   These Altras were once navy blue and rated at REI for 500 miles but  they are still whole even after the extra 200.  It was wonderful to see our son looking so well, smiling and eating fresh home cooked food.  Mission is a lean, mean, hiking machine, very tan and an extra bit of grown up.  By the way, do you see any meadows in the photos?  That’s because there aren’t any, so Granny Hat will refer to this PCT milestone as simply “Kennedy”, the real Kennedy Meadows is up the trail a piece.

Kennedy is famous for its off-road vehicle trails and is a thru hiker friendly community. There are two general stores, one simply called Kennedy Meadows General Store and another called Grumpy Bear General Store.  Grumpy Bear is smaller and often overlooked so it sends out shuttles to pick hikers up at the big general store and transport them to Grumpy’s which has a different menu and better WIFI but you have to pay $2 per hour for it.  The PCT thru hikers congregate on the porches eating, drinking, resting their tired feet and waiting for re-supply packages.  Granny Hat had fun observing the culture of the hikers.  They are a friendly, smiling, bohemian, relaxed bunch.  They cheer and clap when a new hiker walks in off the trail.  Kennedy is considered the first big milestone and the gateway to the Sierras so it is worth celebrating when hikers reach it.  PCT hikers are thrilled with simple luxuries like running potable water, showers, grilled food, sodas, ice cream and mirrors. There is a generous supply of cast off items that hikers leave for others that might need them, shoes, cooking gear, freeze dried meals, clothing etc.

The General Store has a rough and tumble outdoor amphitheater for movie nights on Saturdays and a church service on Sunday.  There was a regular bathroom with flush facilities for the women but a row of outhouses for the men.  This is the one area where I saw the hikers be super fastidious. We watched several, including Mission, check each one, declare them unfit and then most decided that they’d rather do their business in the woods.  The woods have truly become home to many of the hikers. Granny Hat also noticed a strange gait that many of the PCT folk share as they walked around the general store and campground.  Mission explained that it is a stiffness that sets in after many miles of hiking, “you can hike 30 miles and everything is working fine but when you stop at the end of the day paralysis sets in and you hobble around.”  Granny Hat totally gets it, she could barely walk to open the gate when she got home after driving 700 miles.

Here is a sample of the log book at Grumpy’s where Mission signed in.  You will enjoy reading some of the hiker names.  Mission said he has met a “Gilligan”, a “Popcorn”, a “Whistler” and an interesting guy named “Day Hiker” who hikes ultralight and completes up to 50 miles a day.  Behind his back some of the other hikers call him “Danger Dan”  because he seems to willingly defy the cautions of the wilderness.  He also met “Goldilocks” who is from the Czech Republic and hikes with a giant pine cone named “Connie” which she found in the Angeles Mountains. “Connie” is hitching a ride with “Goldilocks” all the way to Canada.

After our long picnic complete with boysenberry pie, Mission began the process of swapping out his lightweight pack and used clothing for warmer gear, a greater quantity of food, a bear can, ice axe and crampons for shoes.  He will be heading up the ridge toward Mt. Whitney and won’t have re-supply until Tuolumne Meadows.  Granny Hat and dad drove north on Highway 395 to circle back home via Sonora Pass.  We kept our eyes on those mountains, there are still quite a few snow fields so Mission will be in a very different climate for the next few weeks. The High Sierras with its lakes, granite peaks and snow fields promises some extra special views. Because so many of Granny Hat’s followers enjoy Mission’s beautiful photography, here are the last few of his high desert photos.

And here are some shots of wilderness creatures that Granny Hat approves of, much better than wild cats and rattlesnakes.

The drive up to Kennedy was very beautiful, spring wildflowers were plentiful.  Granny Hat stopped to get a photo of this gorgeous yellow flowering shrub that carpeted the hills along the highway.  Does anyone know what it is?  Wild forsythia?

Granny Hat could tell that Mission has become accustomed to his life on the wilderness trail.  He is well-named, certainly on a mission and it seems to suit him very well.  His new coordinates at his campground tonight are: 36.32163, -118.13150  These lines are from a song I love by Ralph Vaughn Williams called “The Vagabond”.  I hope this isn’t his life “forever” but I can understand what he loves about the call of the wild. As we said goodbye, he said “Well, I better break down my camp and start hiking or I’ll get stuck here.”  Even for a seasoned hiker who loves the trail a little bit of Kennedy comfort can seem like the “Last Homely House”.  But that road goes ever on and on….

Give to me the life I love,
Let the lave go by me,
Give the jolly heaven above,
And the byway nigh me.
Bed in the bush with stars to see,
Bread I dip in the river –
There’s the life for a man like me,
There’s the life for ever.