Day 97 – Etna Summit

Miles: 1580.0 to 1599.7

Trail Miles: 19.7

Miles Walked: 21.7 (2miles around Etna)

There was a climb straight out of camp this morning. I started eating breakfasts 1 through 3* as soon as I could, but was still running low on energy. I had to stop after an hour to eat some Fritos and drink some water with Nuun electrolytes. After that I was good to go.

Fritos – they are the true super food of the long distance thru-hiker. They have salt, fat and crunchiness, three attributes most lacking in backpacking food(note: I dehydrated and prepared my own food, so no salt was added). The chili cheese flavor is my current favorite, even at 0715 in the morning.

After the last two days, 28 and 30 milers respectively, my feet were a bit achy, the ball of my right foot particularly. I need to order my next pair of trail runners when I get into Etna today. I’m pretty sure it’s not a bigger problem. More likely the cushioning is wearing down in the shoe. It’s been over 300 miles on this pair. I just need to get another 100 or so miles out of them.

Today the trail weaved along connecting ridge lines between granite peaks. It was interesting to see granite again after the volcanic rock of the last few weeks. About 5 miles went through an area that had burned in a fire a few years back. Only small manzanita shrubs had started growing back. Besides birds, I saw no other evidence of animals returning to the burned area. The contrast between the burned and unburned steep mountainsides was stark.

There’s a saying “the trail provides.” I’ve seen it happen many times. A few days ago, during the hot and laborious climb out of Castle Crags, I saw a spork laying on the trail. A spork is a cross between a spoon and a fork. It was a gold-bronze color by Vargo. It costs about $12-15 online. Few hikers carry back ups to a spork so I knew someone would be missing it (although I suppose you could use tent stakes like chop sticks in a pinch). I picked it up, thinking I’d ask everyone I saw if it was theirs and leave it in a hiker box in Etna if I didn’t find the owner.

For four days I asked everyone – although truth be told, I wasn’t passing people. I was actually asking hikers who were passing me, so I wasn’t surprised when no one claimed it. Today a young, ultra-light (UL) hiker named Chia passed me. I hadn’t seen him since the Castella Post Office when I tried to pawn off my extra food on him. He’s a fast hiker so on the off chance he’d taken an on-trail zero, I asked if he’d lost a spork. He said no, he hadn’t, and besides he uses a spoon. He went on to say he’d lost his spoon a ways back and had been using plastic spoons since. Noticing he was UL, I mentioned it was a titanium spork – the lightest weight kind you can buy. That was the hook. He asked if I was just going to put it in a hiker box, and when I said yes, he gladly accepted it. He jokingly raised his face and hands towards the sky, as if it was a gift sent from heaven. He’d been talking to his Mom about needing a new plastic spoon just 20 minutes before when he had cell service. I laughed and said, “the trail provides.”

That held true a few hours later when the trail crossed Sawyer Bar Road, 10 miles west of the town of Etna. Per Guthook, it was a hit-or-miss hitch into town. Some folks got rides quickly, others spent hours waiting for a car to come along. As I walked up to the trailhead, there was Chia. His mother lived in Etna and would be there in 5 min. Did I want a ride? Heck yeah. The trail provides.

Chia’s Mom dropped me and 2 other hikers off at the P.O, plenty of time to pickup my resupply box and mail some old maps home. I’m one of the very few people who still carry paper maps. I’m probably one of the few people who is carrying an actual compass too. Call me old-fashioned, in the age of ultra-light hiking, smart phones, Guthook app and Garmin/Spot devices, I like having a back-up. Maps don’t require batteries – unless it’s at night. And I don’t hike at night, that’s when mountain lions are out.

It was a hot 98 deg in Etna. I wandered around in search of air conditioning and found the grocery store. The store sold $5 tokens for showers with towel (a real towel – I didn’t have to use my bandana to dry off!) and also keys to lockers at the local city park. The city allowed hikers to camp at the park ($5), shower and store their gear in the lockers. I stashed my gear and headed for the laundromat with my stinky clothes. I detoured by Dollar General to buy a charging cord for my cell phone and then hung out in the laundromat air conditioning until nearly sunset. Clean clothes and a charged phone later, I walked back to the city park and set up my tent near other hikers as the sun set. It was still 85 deg out, too hot to sleep, so I tossed and turned on top of my sleeping bag for what seemed like hours. Eventually the temperature dropped and sleep, glorious sleep, overcame me.

* Today’s Breakfasts 1-3:

1. 2 -Nature Valley granola bars

2. 2/3c of my homemade blackberry jam granola with blueberries, oats and pecans

3. Trail mix of coconut, walnuts, pecans, dates, pumpkin seeds, choco chips and more

I estimate the calorie total to be 700-800 calories