Sometime last year, my friend Don (Lcpl Hughes) started telling me about the Skyline. A trail that climbs Mt. San Jacinto from the desert floor?! That's just awesome. At the time though, I was in the military and stuck in south-eastern Texas, in no-mountains-land. Thank god for google earth
Anyhow, this weekend seemed like a great time to do the Skyline. Let's do it!
At 3:20 A.M., the museum stood right below us. We saw a few headlights ahead of us as we reached the picnic tables. I immediately liked the trail a lot. It's really steep at first and you get to crawl on some rocks. The thousands of lights below and the orange-brown background behind the distant mountain ranges make for a great view everytime you turn around. We eventually reached the rolling hills that lead to flat rock. This is where things went a little wrong for me. Maybe it was getting drunk the day before, or maybe it was just one of those days for me, but man I started feeling ill. Once at flat rock, we took a break and I chugged down some gatorade and ate some food, which made me feel a lot better. Also, Zippetydude flew right past us, again
somewhere in the hills before flat rock. It was nice seeing you again dude, did you make it to top or settle for a tram?
Maybe a half hour later on the trail a fellow named Pat met up with us. It was really nice to chat with him on the way up. He had pretty bad blisters that were bothering him, but he mentionned the russian death marches in the winter, and how you die if you stop walking. "They got it a lot worse than us!" he said. That comment stuck with me for the rest of the day.
About halfway up the never ending ridge, things got more exciting. There were now a lot more people than earlier in the day, and coming up on Coffman's Crag blew my mind. Wow, what a rock. Just as I was contemplating if any routes were established on it, I saw a climber near the top. It must have been amazing to be up there. Ellen also passed us somewhere on the ridge. I had heard about her and it was really cool to get to meet her. We hung out at the top, below the tram station, then proceeded to have some cold ones at the bar.
I have been climbing for a few years now, but not very much on San Jacinto until recently. I have never met any professional mountaineers or legendary local hikers, or anything like that. It was a very amazing and humbling experience to meet some of you gurus. Hopefully I will run into you guys again, and meet more of you guys.
BTW, the first views of the East face of San Jacinto are striking. It looks like a commanding, treacherous fortress. It's mountains like these that made our early ancestors believe there were gods living on mountain tops!
Sorry I couldn't hang out longer with you and Don, I needed to get back home. Have fun on your next adventure and looking forward to seeing you on Skyline again soon.
