C2C this weekend

[devobrodie]

Just wanted to thank Zippity-Dude and Cy for more good advice! several years ago my wife and I did the Skyline trail and several of the regulars on this site gave us some good advice, we had a successful first trip to the tram. I wanted to return and do the whole thing(C2C) We hike a lot all year long, but several injuries kept us from being able to train to the point we needed to be at. This year things were looking good until my wife tore her knee up again in hockey, so I decided that I would do it alone. I had planed on doing it on Sat. this weekend but when I woke up at 2:00 and checked the weather it was 80 deg, so I thought I would wait until Sun, as it was supposed to be below 70 for the low. when I woke up this morning and it was 85 deg at 2:00, I was disappointed but Z-dude had given me a tip about bringing a water sprayer to help keep cool for the first few hrs. Then I noticed that it was cloudy and figured that the cloud cover had held the heat in, on the positive side I hoped that the trade off of hot in the first part would be balanced by the cloud cover once the sun rose. I started at 3:00 from Ramon road hoping to not have the problems with losing the trail a few times and wasting time recovering the trail like I did last time when I started from the Museum. Well that idea wasn't quite as fool proof as I figured as I did misplace the trail a few times before and after the intersection past the picnic tables! It was hot, and as several have mentioned the heat radiated off the rock for the first few miles, and the water bottle tip was a gold tip! (thanks again Z)
At 3500' I meet a hiker coming back down, he said he had some muscle issues at 4300 and was giving it up, He had started at 12:00 from the museum he said. A while later at 4000' I overtook a group of 7 20-something year old guys that had started at 2:15 from the museum and a few of them looked in bad shape already, I was worried that one or two of them wouldn't make it all the way the way they were stopping every few feet, I guess being young doesn't cover lack of preparation, hopefully they made it OK. I kept spraying water and moving along. At 7000' I meet a young lady alone, she said she also had started at 2:15 from the museum and had overheated early but was now going slow and seemed OK, I talked with her for a few minutes and she told me to go ahead and if I saw her companion let him know she was still moving and would meet him later, I was surprised he had left her alone, I overtook him several minutes later and passed the message on. (I later saw both of them above the ranger station when I was coming down so I know they were OK) I started to have some minor cramping in my right leg at Coffman's crag, and was worried that I would be forced to cut the hike short, it happened several times from that point on but it never went into full blown cramps that caused me to quit. On the way up to the Crag I heard yelling in Korean, I was wondering what was going on, when I got there their were two guys, one was yelling to try and encourage his partner, one was sitting there with his head hanging down, I talked to them for a few minutes, they were the partners of the guy meet earlier going back down. the tired one finally got up and his partner was continuing to prod him on and even was having to push him along.( I let the rest of his group know what was going on when I found them waiting by the rangers station.) The early heat seemed to take quite a bit out of me and the 5.5 miles from the ranger station was stretching on, the cloud cover was a God send and I was very thankful, it lasted until just before the summit. During the last few hundred yards I was really feeling not so hot and I needed to stop and take a few short breaks, but they did the trick and I was able to complete the hike to the summit, had a short break there, and took a few Advil, the trip back down I felt better than I had thought I would. I used Hiking poles for the first time on a serious hike and were awesome! I always have knee issues on down hills but they really helped me, they also really helped when My leg was starting to cramp a bit, I was able to transfer some extra weight to the poles and it seemed to really help. I brought about 160 oz. of water, some of it frozen in water bottles and that helped keep my bladder water nice and cold, I did need to refill at the ranger station to make sure I didn't run out. Thanks again for the good advice and I really saw that when people start on this hike with out proper preparation it can get bad real quick,

[cynthia23]

Congratulations for your sucessful completion, and for being thoughtful and careful in your preparations. I especially like how you kept checking in with the weather forecasts. It's absolutely amazing how few people do, but part of the problem is that people don't understand that just a few degrees up or down can make a huge difference.