The Pacific Crest Trail: Southern California
The Border. Spring Storms. Desert Solitaire. San Jacinto. Cajon Junction. Powerlines & Coyotes. Hikertown. KMS.
“As the sun dropped behind the surrounding hills, we realised camp was a mile or more down trail. The vibrant colours of the desert became muted in the evening light and it was still besides the sound of distant frogs and crickets. Dusk was drawing in and stars started to appear in the night sky. At that moment I looked up, noticing there was something taking shape. At first glance it resembled smoke from a distant campfire. As I followed its shape transformed, propelling itself across the sky.”
The Pacific Crest Trail, Part one
In this multi-part series I’ll be writing about my first through hike on the Pacific Crest Trail. Focusing on key milestones, encounters and thoughts on the trail, in an attempt to unpack a walk that took 127 days to complete but could take a lifetime to process. It’s been cathartic revisiting my journal and photos, recounting some of the life affirming moments that unfolded on the trail.
The Border
After days of scrambling together equipment and supplies I made my way to the southern terminus trailhead at Campo, a small settlement near the Mexican border. I had been working in South America for three months prior and hadn’t been able to get hold of all my equipment beforehand. I always recieved the same question “Will you be okay on your own?”. In truth part of me was desperately seeking solitude, well versed in solo travel I was ready to spend some time alone.
As it went, I wouldn’t be walking by myself, I’d met Monty from London at Scout and Frodos (a trail-famous couple who have hosted over 4000 hikers) and was starting the same day as me. It was April fools day. I tagged the Southern Terminus and approached the huge corrugated iron wall that draws the line between the States and Mexico, I reached through to place my hand on Mexican soil. I grabbed some dirt and rubbed it between my hands, marking the start of my modern day pilgrimage.
After years of imagining the start, one of the strangest realisations was that there was nobody to check in with, no volunteers, no park rangers — just three wooden poles marking the terminus and a small metal box containing a trail register. That was it. I jotted down my name, took a breath and started walking north. Perhaps it was naive to think there would be a welcoming party, though more than anything it emphasised that nobody really cared. After all, I had made the decision to attempt a 2650 mile trail.
Monty and I were both as excited as each other, that first evening is more vivid than many other days. I remember crossing train tracks and the first stream where I collected water, there was a large boulder perched above the stream which Monty scrambled up. We were strangers, out in the desert. Undoubtably we shared some similar interests, including bouldering, though Monty was very obviously a much more natural climber than I was. That first day on trail would turn out to be just as surreal as my last. Nervous energy radiated from me, picturing what challenges might lay ahead, I knew this was a different kind of fix and a new beginning.
As the sun dropped behind the surrounding hills, we realised camp was a mile or more down trail. The vibrant colours of the desert became muted in the evening light and it was still besides the sound of distant frogs and crickets. Dusk was drawing in and stars started to appear in the night sky. At that moment I looked up, noticing there was something taking shape. At first glance it resembled smoke from a distant campfire. As I followed its shape transformed, propelling itself across the sky.
It took several seconds to finally make sense of it. I’d been hoping for a UFO sighting, after all it was the American West. There was no sound. We realised at that moment it was a rocket launch, as it moved across the sky a booster fell back toward the earth. It was one of Elon Musks satellites heading into orbit, as it moved away it left an imprint in my retina.
Spring Storms
The first week would be an adjustment for anyone and those early days consisted of slow miles, an overweight pack and sore feet. Overhead it was common to spot turkey vultures and fighter jets patrolling the skies. What I lacked in trail experience I made up for with enthusiasm, there wasn’t a single day in those first few weeks where I didn’t want to be out there in the desert.
Parts of Southern California had been experiencing uncommonly early spring storms. The early rain transformed the desert floor with golden wildflower blooms, sage green shrubs and freely flowing water sources. If there was a river or creek we never missed an opportunity to swim in it. The days were warm, the nights on the other hand were colder than anticipated. My pack originally weighed around 13 kilos, it was a time for testing out gear, a lot of which was new to me.
The first test came in the form of another spring storm, bringing 80mph winds close to Mount Laguna. We headed into the winds against the advise of local folks, being so early on the trail we had no intentions of paying for a room just yet — in fact in those early days it was my prerogative to avoid hotels the entire trip, at the time it felt like a natural challenge.
On the outskirts of Mount Laguna the trail opened up with views down to the desert floor below. Looking north-east it was possible to view the Salton Sea, a place I knew only through Richard Misrachs series Desert Cantos, photographs that had drawn me to the American West. On the horizon to the south storm clouds loomed, the wind flowed all around us.
The weather persisted all day, we marched twenty miles along the ridge that mirrored the Sunrise Highway toward Julian. The most curious thing I noticed was an oak tree that had been stuffed with hundreds of acorns all across its trunk. As daylight began to fade, the trail finally dropped back below the ridge line and out of the storm, the air fell silent and the light from my headlight caught the snow as it drifted to the ground. The next morning there was a thin blanket of snow covering my tent, the desert was full of surprises.
Desert Solitaire
The desert holds more beauty than I imagined, but enough people talk about the beauty of this trail, less about it’s ugliness. There is a rugged, unruliness to it. Walking through vast wind farms where the turbines reverberate throughout your eardrums, along the L.A. aqueduct where people sweep aside used needles and find bags of dead bunnies (more on trail names in Pt 2) or passing through the remnants of burnt out forests. I would often wonder, how did I get here?
As the trail skirted closer to towns and industry, there was something about being so close to society yet feeling almost invisible — a feeling of being an outcast, traversing the borders and edge lands of these docile towns without anyone knowing. Standing under the I-10* at 11am, hundreds of cars passing overhead every minute, commuters blissfully unaware of the hikers warming themselves round a fire below. At times it was impossible not to imagine you were in some sort of alternate reality.
*The I-10 is the fourth-longest Interstate in the United States at 2,460 miles, 200 miles shorter than the PCT.
San Jacinto
After two weeks there was a core group of three, Monty, Suntory and myself. Around 175 miles in we met Suntory near the top of the San Jacinto mountain range. Journal notes read: “Magic light at the end of the day ascending Spitler and Apache peaks. Met Santorini at campsite”. It was rare to spellcheck your notes at the end of a long day.
Monty led the ascent, with several sections like Apache and Spitler requiring micro-spikes on the icy snowpack — in 2021 a hiker named Microsoft had fallen to his death on this steep traverse. Setting up camp around the myriad of blowdowns, trees creaking in the wind, Suntory emerged from his tent to introduce himself. Behind him in the distance you could see blinking lights from Palm Springs city.
The next morning I left Suntory and Monty who were resupplying in Idylwild. In an attempt to push through the San Jacinto range, I planned to detour around Fuller ridge which most people were avoiding due to the recent snowfall. Whilst descending the Seven Pines trail, with no boot track I lost the path, quickly realising it was not a well known trodden path at this time of the season.
I fell through waist deep snow, having to dig myself out, somehow narrowly avoiding a broken ankle. My portable charger cable snapped leaving my phone critically low on battery. Not that I had service. After hours of trudging through thick snow I made it out of the woods, the map showed a cut through back to trail, a small unassuming settlement named Pine Wood.
‘Beware Bear’ signs aside, I was glad to be back on a road. On the approach to Pine Wood however, I was met with what I can only describe as a Hills Have Eyes greeting. The road was private, with more than enough signs stating so. The gate was heavily padlocked with barbed wire fencing and signs reading ‘Violators will be shot on sight’. Drained and exhausted, there was no way my delicate British sensibilities would allow me to trespass on this property today.
By turning around I was able to hike out to the state highway and hitch a ride back to Idylwild with a local, Kerry. She explained that a couple of hikers had gone missing in that area last year. I knew I’d had a close call, even being just a couple of hours from town could land you in trouble. Vowing never to go it alone (at least in the mountains) I rejoined Monty and Suntory in Idylwild.
Cajon Junction
Certain moments and places could feel dystopian out in the desert, thats not to say they weren’t remarkable. Over the years many artists, film makers and photographers have drawn inspiration from the liminal spaces of the American West.
On the approach to Cajon Junction (a small unincorporated town near San Bernandino) the surrounding landscape felt tired from the array of traffic passing through it, the morning fog carried with it a sickly washed out green that leeched into the hills. The only beacon of hope in the area was a McDonalds, dropped in the middle of a sprawling junction. Part of the joy of this trail is the obscure places you end up in, places you may otherwise have no reason to visit.
Staring out the window, eating a triple cheeseburger (sucker for punishment) I sat watching an endless stream of freight and cargo trains that ran parallel to another interstate. ‘Prime’… ‘Walmart’.. cart after cart. This was one of the main arteries of industrial America. I was both a part of it and an outsider looking in. People would often look at you sideways when entering a restaurant — “Who is this creature emerging from the hills for sustenance?” — We quickly scuttled away, through a network of tunnels and across the train tracks, back into the wilderness.
Powerlines & Coyotes
Looking back through my photos, parts of the trail feel estranged or absent from my memory, time moves differently in my mind. I was taking less photos than I had imagined, part of it was fatigue, other times I wished there wasn’t a camera strapped to my chest. Another part of me wanted to soak up every moment of being in that place at that time. The smells, the warm evening winds. The sunsets. The crackling powerlines and the coyotes, the light that made the hills glow gold.
For the first time in years, time seemed to truly slow down, like those days as a kid where time felt infinite. It didn’t take long to reset my circadian rhythm, waking at first light and falling asleep just after sundown — otherwise known as ‘hiker midnight’. Without the distractions of the day to day my perception of time became an experience in itself. Seeing somewhere completely new everyday, my only routine was to walk, life was magnificently uncomplicated.
The longer days brought with them warmer nights and lunch time naps in the heat of the day. One day outside Big Bear we sat taking a break from the midday sun. A hummingbird appeared, mistaking another hikers cap with a colourful flower graphic for the real thing. It hovered for a moment at eye level with her, checking for nectar. We shared the trail with roadrunners, jackrabbits and an array of different snakes yet it was almost 700 miles before I spotted my first rattlesnake.
After a month of hiking there was an opportunity to meet one of my friends from home, he was on a roadtrip with his girlfriend from San Francisco to Vegas. Somehow the timing worked out and I got off trail to meet for the day. The traffic, sounds and smells of the city were exaggerated due to my absence from populated places.
There was an altercation at a taco joint, an unhinged lady had screamed in my friends face, this was my reintroduction to city life. Rejoining the trail gave an immediate sense of calm, perhaps this walk was going to change me in ways I hadn’t considered yet.
Hikertown & The L.A. Aqueduct
As the trail moved around the fringes of Los Angeles the trail hits Antelope Valley, a plateau at the foot of the Tehachapi Mountain range. Hikertown served as a temporary refuge before the start of the L.A. aqueduct, the open plateau brought gusty winds that rattled the wire perimeter fence all night. This section is exposed to the elements, it follows an open canal and pipeline which syphons water from Owens River in the Sierra Nevada mountains, providing water for most of Los Angeles.
The flattest continuous section of the desert, the trail winds through desolate RV campgrounds, abandoned shacks and follows a long dirt road to the second largest wind farm in California. In the afternoon a man pulled up alongside us in a pick-up truck, checking we had enough water. Beside him sat a tiny elderly woman, who owned most of the surrounding farmland. She claimed that there had not been this many wildflowers in Antelope Valley since 1948.
Camping inside the Tehachapi wind farm we found shelter in Cottonwood Creek, other hikers had not been so lucky and slept out in the open. Rumoured to be the hottest section of the desert, naturally we woke to another dusting of snow on our tents and permitted ourselves a lie in. In the morning I spoke with a Belgian hiker Bobcat, we had been leap frogging each other for 300 miles. Looking slightly disheveled, to my amusement he claimed “It was very windy in the wind farm man.”
Walker Pass to Kennedy Meadows South
At Walker Pass near Lake Isabella I said goodbye to Monty, who was (reluctantly) heading home for a wedding. He vowed to catch us up on his return, but we knew that would be a stretch. It was a strange feeling to be parting ways after all those miles, I would have to learn to get used to many goodbyes on this trail, with stats pointing toward a 25% completion rate.
I began to experience intermittent pain in my right foot, I was only managing it with the wonders of Advil. My friend River had given me a heel insert which helped, but my shoes were in urgent need of replacing. Kennedy Meadows marks the end of the desert and start of the Sierras. It would also mean new shoes and a chance to rest up for a couple of days. Suntory and I sensed the end of the desert was in sight, so we pushed for our first thirty mile day.
‘Kennedy Meadows, population 200, elevation 6427ft’ read a sign as we stumbled back onto the tarmac and off the trail. It was big moment to reach the infamous general store, but this injury was starting to give me serious doubts as to whether I could make walk the entire trail. I’d seen countless videos of hikers being cheered in, greeted with ice cold beers — we arrived at dusk to a ghost town, an empty balcony, closed bar and restaurant. Not a soul in sight.
Before there was a chance to despair, a buggy appeared in the distance. We were greeted by a neighbour of the general store, it was almost like she was waiting for us, she delivered us home-cooked Coq au Vin, walnut apple salad, a loaf of buttered bread and sparkling apple cider. This was one of the many acts of the kindness I encountered from complete strangers. I sat, legs shaking and my foot throbbing, the feeling of reaching Kennedy Meadows outweighed all the pain.
As I crawled into my tent I tried to recount the 700 miles I had just walked, almost the distance from London to Florence in a straight line. As I flicked through the photographs on my camera it was difficult to comprehend that this was only the first section. Resting at the foot of the Sierras, this was really only the beginning of the journey.
Thanks for reading along so far — It’s difficult to summarise the first seven hundred miles in one post. There will certainly be some loose ends, some of which you might feel inclined to ask about in the comments. I Met a cult. Witnessed a solar eclipse. Found the Ten Commandments Sign. Hitched a ride with a tweaker and was introduced to dirty ramen (ramen with plastic cheese).
Thanks for joining me on this new platform Substack. You can support my work by becoming a paid subscriber or purchasing prints from my website, thanks for following along!
Well done, Rory! Beautiful images and words.