C2C/SKYLINE: CLOSED FOR THE SUMMER. COME BACK IN OCTOBER.

[Mountaingoat]

Great posts guys! Will be diverting my energy to the old "Grey back" (Gorgonio)

The Goat (Berne Mettenleiter)

[cynthia23]

I'm surprised by the numbers you quote from NOAA. All other forecasts I've seen, including the local TV meteorologist (who is usually fairly reliable) have Saturday going 'down' to 99 to 101, with night-time lows at 68 to 70. No one I've heard has temps going down by more than that.

IF it were really going to be 93 on Saturday, a forced journey downward would not be fun (at all), but I'll admit that well-conditioned people who've done it before would probably be okay. A degree or two above 93, I think you've crossed into the death zone if you have to go down.

BTW, I know some people on the board do C2C in summer and I'm not criticizing them, but readers should realize that these are also people who do other high-risk activities (i.e. rock climbing, ice climbing, et al) which involve a real risk of death. The average hiker wouldn't knowingly take such risks and shouldn't be misled by the seeming casualness of summer C2C TR's posted on the board, into thinking it's an ordinary hike for regular hikers. I wouldn't know how to quantify the risk of a high-temp C2C--safer than bicycling across Somalia, more dangerous than drag-racing down a curvy mountain road? Dunno, but IMHO it's just not worth the (real) risk of death when you can do it more safely other times. It's also much more fun other times: when it's hot, it's miserable and sickening and you can't get a decent work-out because you have to go too slow. So why not just wait? As Cy always says: the mountain isn't going anywhere.

[bcrowell]

People look at me like I'm crazy when I say I like to start a springtime C2C at 2:30 am, but the advantage of starting that early is that if something goes wrong, I have a pretty decent chance of being able to escape either up or down without encountering life-threatening temperatures.

I hate to criticize other people for disagreeing with me about analyzing risks, because the human brain is fundamentally not good at dealing with risk. I've messed up on assessing risks many times myself.

Maybe a constructive thing to do would be to alert people to the fact that driving from LA the morning of the hike is not their only option. If they think of that as their only option, then you're going to get people starting up Skyline at 9 am in crazy heat. If they share a room the night before at Motel 6, it's only $25.

[ziplinesd]

Yes I agree bcrowell. We are coming from San Diego the day before and staying at a cheap hotel in Palm Springs.

-One issue I haven't figured out is, How do I wake up at 3 am and also get a solid 7-8 hours of sleep?? that puts me in bed about 8 pm the night before.......any advice from the C2C pros??

[zippetydude]

Yes I agree bcrowell. We are coming from San Diego the day before and staying at a cheap hotel in Palm Springs.

-One issue I haven't figured out is, How do I wake up at 3 am and also get a solid 7-8 hours of sleep?? that puts me in bed about 8 pm the night before.......any advice from the C2C pros??

Skyline feels a lot like a marathon in terms of energy expenditure, and in marathon prep they generally teach you that you should get a good night's sleep the day before - the sleep you get on the actual night that you get up early and go appears to have little physical impact on your performance. I have found this to be true personally.

Hi Cynthia! Here's a NOAA link showing the hourly breakdown:

http://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.ph ... eadDay.y=8

z

[KathyW]

It was hot at 8 am this morning in Thermal and then hotter than hell at 3 pm this afternoon in Yuma. I'd surely die before the picnic tables on the Skyline Trail in this weather. I'm happy to be back on the west side of the San Gorgonio Pass in Redlands where it's below 100 degrees.

[bcrowell]

Yes I agree bcrowell. We are coming from San Diego the day before and staying at a cheap hotel in Palm Springs.

-One issue I haven't figured out is, How do I wake up at 3 am and also get a solid 7-8 hours of sleep?? that puts me in bed about 8 pm the night before.......any advice from the C2C pros?? :?

I'm not a C2C pro (hey, is that a paying gig?), but I just get up an hour early on Monday, an hour earlier than that on Tuesday, and so on, so that by the time I get up on Saturday it's not that painful.

It is kind of funny when my kids have to put me to bed at night :-)

[KathyW]

Yes I agree bcrowell. We are coming from San Diego the day before and staying at a cheap hotel in Palm Springs.

-One issue I haven't figured out is, How do I wake up at 3 am and also get a solid 7-8 hours of sleep?? that puts me in bed about 8 pm the night before.......any advice from the C2C pros?? :?

I think the intent of this thread was to stop people from heading up the trail this time of year because it's getting too hot.

The forecast isn't always perfect - if it ends up being closer to 70 degrees overnight and you don't get out of bed until 3 am.......

[cynthia23]

Right now in Palm Springs, at 9.23 at night, it's 96 degrees. It was 108 today. I agree KathyW, that although forecasting is much better than it used to be, but still, there is a margin for error. Zippety, thanks for the NOAA link, loved that groovy hour by hour thing! I think it's a questionable forecast, though, and don't think ziplinesd should rely on it. FOUR other forecasts (Accuweather, Weather Underground, Weather Channel, and the local news meteorologist) have the day variously at 101/73, 97/64/, 98/68, and 97/64.

When your safety is at stake I think it's better to think pessimistically and take the worst forecast, in this case Weather Channel's 101/73. That to my mind is a dangerous number and I wouldn't recommend anyone venture out in those conditions. Even a three a.m. start time is doesn't make you safe--suppose you get a slightly late start (most people do, so let's say 3.30), and hike up for four hours. The hike is much harder than you'd anticipated, or you get a little lost below the picnic tables, and 7.30 finds you only at five thousand feet (I know, it's probably impossible for Zip or Fern or Bluerail to imagine this, but it certainly isn't hard for me!) Then something bad happens--you start vomiting, a knee gets blown, or one's hiking partner just says he or she can't go on.

As I said above, what is our imaginary hiker going to do? It's ALREADY too late to turn back. Coming down Skyline takes every bit as long as going up. I don't know what the exact cut-off time is to turn around, but I know that one time in July (108/78, with humidity) I made the mistake of going up for a partial hike on Skyline, planning on turning around at 6.30 am (which I did), the idea being I would be back down at the parking lot by 8.30 (which I was.) I thought that was being safe. I literally almost did not make it. By the time I got to my car I was bright red and wringing wet. I was sick and screwed up the rest of the day. Had I been just a half hour later, I think I might have passed out on the trail and not made it.

Another time (years ago) I did Skyline in June, and at around 4500 feet started realizing I was feeling ill--nausea and the runs. I looked at my watch and saw it was eight o'clock. That was when I suddenly 'did the math' and realized with horror there was no way I'd make it down in time, that it was far too late. So I sucked it up, pretty literally, and somehow climbed four thousand more feet with food poisoning. Oh wasn't that a fun day!! By the traverse I was literally holding onto trees to stand upright. Oh yes, and I also had no water the last two hours. By the grace of God I somehow made it. My point here is for others to learn from my profound stupidity and not repeat my ignorant mistakes. When people who know Skyline well and have done it multiple times in various weathers decide to risk a high-temp day, that's one thing, but what concerns me is people who haven't done Skyline at all, or only a few times, who try it on a high-temp day. They just don't understand the risk they're taking and that's why I'm trying to convey in this post.

Ziplinesd, do you really have to do C2C this weekend? Can't it wait until a better time, i.e.the fall ? As I said, a three a.m. start time in no way makes you safe. Sure, that's a good start time, if NOTHING GOES WRONG. But what if it does?? Have you done C2C before, or recently? If you haven't, you should definitely wait until cooler weather. This weekend is not the time to discover your conditioning isn't up to this incredibly challenging trail, which Zip correctly compares to a marathon.

[Nick-SJM]

I sense that there are a number of people who just don't get it. The risk is too high to climb Skyline this time of year. Don't do it. I'm with RMRU and I don't want to go to Skyline for a body recovery- your body.