A Walk in the Woods

[Ellen]

Howdy

The three amigas (Sister Sally, Miracle Marilyn and the Bloody Blonde) planned to meet at the permit area at 5:4 5 AM yesterday -- women plan, life laughs.

At 4 AM, I turned on my kitchen sink faucet to heat up water for drip coffee and was blasted with spray. It took a while to turn down the deluge to a drip. Marilyn was also running late -- she had to change her driving route due to the toll road being closed. Hmm...this wasn't starting well.

After texting Sally that we were behind schedule, we hit a rock on highway 243 that blew out Marilyn's right front tire Limped into a turnout and tried to change the tire. Once the car was jacked up, we tried to loosen the lug nuts but made little progress. Marilyn called AAA but also made little progress -- "Are you in northern or southern CA? Where is hwy 243? What is the closest city or cross street? Are you near the Indian reservation?" I decided to try to let off steam by taking another shot at the lug nuts. After a lot of pushing and straining, success! Mounted the spare and started tightening the lug nuts. And, AAA still had no idea where we were

Finally met Sally at the permit station, drove to the TH and started hiking up the Seven Pines two hours later than planned. The "trail" was very difficult to follow (deadfall, brush overgrowth, stream crossings, etc.) but beautiful and peaceful. Route-finding made for a slower, more mindful pace -- which is exactly why we chose Seven Pines. We didn't meet any other hikers until we reached the Deer Springs trail. There was no water at Deer Springs crossing but the dependable Bed Springs crossing was flowing well. Enjoyed a relaxing lunch at the Granite Gully camp site in Little Round Valley (no water at the crossing) before heading down. We got off route on the descent, which resulted in crossing the stream at a different place. During this XC, I somehow managed a cartwheel and provided the obligatory blood offering to the San Jacinto wilderness

Celebrated a great day with dinner at the Lumbermill in Idylwild.

Miles of smiles,
Ellen

[Ed]

So AAA is still that bad. I had the same problem about eight years ago, when I blew out a tire on Interstate 8. I was parked on the side of I8 westbound, and could give them the names of the last and next towns, which were only about 7 miles apart. But not the nearest exit. They considered that a big problem. You would think that today they could get a GPS fix from the phone. I would have a lot of trouble changing a tire today. You girls are resourceful.

[Ellen]

Howdy Ed

If you had seen Marilyn and I changing the tire, you would not call us resourceful More like stooges.

And yes, AAA is still that bad. We used the location services feature (iPhone) before talking to an agent and the poor woman still had no clue. This experience was very similar to (and just as frustrating) as when we tried to report an active campfire near Deer Springs camp last year

Miles of smiles,
Ellen

[Ulysses]

Hi Ellen and Sally. I hiked Seven Pines last Saturday. Beautiful, but as you said lot's of downed trees on the trail. Was there still the case of Coors beer sitting by the trail about 2/3 the way up? Not sure how that got there, but it sure tasted good (I only had one).

[Sally]

Yes, Ulysses, there were about a half dozen of the beers left. We noted that they were cold and therefore consumable, but we passed! Now had it been Grapefruit Sculpin IPA.....