Warner Springs to the Paradise Café, April 18th-20th

Warner Springs to the Pines-to-Palms Highway, where the Paradise Valley Café was located, was my toughest stretch to date.  One factor was that I’d realized that I wouldn’t make it as far as Interstate 10 to grab my car from my family’s house and drive back down as planned and that I needed to get it in gear if I was even going to make it to Idyllwild by then, so I hiked the 42 mile stretch to the Café in less than 48 hours.  There were plenty of other people hiking at similar paces but it was the most intense hiking that I’d done, and the most intense heat that I’d hiked in.  Another factor was that I was sick of my food and getting sick of the desert.  I was ready for some lush green, or at least some change scenery, and was done being appreciative of the panoramas of chaparral.  In reality it was probably the heat more than anything, but I felt grouchy, and hiked along bitching to myself about the desert.  

The first night wasn’t bad, I hiked 8 miles across some fields that I pretended were an African Savannah, past an obstacle course, and a up a hill until I got tired and pitched my tent in the dark.  

In the dark with trees surrounding I didn't realize that I'd camped 20 feet from two of the people that I would spend the next two days with.  Eli worked in a veterinary hospital and was hiking parts of the trail with is dog Cleo, and Jesse was a hydraulic engineer who had wanted to hike the PCT since she was 14 and finally, after ending a long relationship, was doing it.  We would also spend those two days with Cowtar, who I had hiked past earlier that night, her sleeping bag stretched out right on the trail.  She was taking a semester off of college, hiking intermittent sections of the trail and hitchhiking in between.  Doubleshot and Wally were a veterinarian and a retired smoke jumper who had started hiking together their first day from the border on account of their mutual propensity to hike very quickly over long distances without stopping.  The second day we hiked 10 miles and stopped at the home of a trail angel named Cushy, and they caught up with us there despite having started the day in Warner Springs 8 miles behind us.  They would be the first ones into camp that night, and in the morning they would take off and we wouldn’t see them again.  

Trail Angel Mike, who went by Cushy, offered a place to relax in the shade, filtered water, and had beer available for donation.  I sucked down two but found again that no matter how much water I drank on trail, consuming beer resulted in an instant dehydration headache.  It was so hot that if I hadn’t had the motivation of everyone else leaving I could have easily stayed another day there.  

There were a couple of guys who had thru-hiked last year and were on their way south for the kickoff party.  One was planning to catch a ride from there to the start of the Continental Divide Trail and thru-hike that this year.  He had a beard and a tiny speaker on which he played the Carolina Chocolate Drops,

Corn bread, and butter beans

and you across the table

keep eatin’ beans, and makin’ love

as long as I am able

I can’t remember his name, so I call him The Hipster Hiker.

The Hipster Hiker (center)

Cushy (left)

We hiked another long, hard 10 miles in the sun, and camped together on a ridge.  I tried cowboy camping, and found that my pad was thick enough and my bag warm enough that I was fine without the tent.  The next day Doubleshot and Wally were far off ahead, Cowtar headed off on a truck road to hitch back to Warner Springs, and Eli had a crisis with his sub letter and stayed on a ridge where he caught cellular service to try to sort things out, and Jesse and I hiked together on and off.  I hiked faster in spurts but took more breaks so we fell into a pattern of her catching me each time I stopped and the two of us starting off together again on each section.  

Wally, Jesse, and Doubleshot

My first night cowboy camping

Cleo

Cleo and Eli

Jesse

Jesse spent the first part of the day hiking barefoot.

Jesse came up with the best suggestion so far for my trail name.  The previous day I’d stopped to pee, and been caught by Eli walking around the corner.  He’d continued on and I’d stayed there resting for awhile.  I decided to go one more time before I put my pack back on, and as soon as I squatted down, Cowtar walked around the same corner.  We had joked about it that night in camp, and I told them how the first time I stopped to pee my first day, the only hiker that I’d seen had walked around a corner.  Mortified, he had both turned his back and held his eyes over his eyes, his elbows out to the sides of his head, until I finished and told him to turn around.  Jesse and I were both hashers and naturally thought of dirty names that could stem from those events, but we had both noticed that trail names tended to be G-rated, so she suggested “Caught.”

“OK,” I said, “but it sounds like ‘cot,’ like the little bed – about ‘Busted’?”

Jesse agreed and I signed it in the trail register at the next water cache, but I generally neglected to start introducing myself that way and so I’m not sure if it really stuck. 

   

I made it to the Paradise Valley Café about 5:30, having given up on hitchhiking the mile from the trail and simply walked.  

The Jose Burger

I polished off the biggest hamburger I have ever seen, the Jose Burger, and showed the waitress my clean plate.

“I win, Jose loses.”

“You ready for dessert?” she answered.

“Jose wins.”

The dinner rush still hadn’t started, and Jose came out of the kitchen to talk with his staff.  I showed him what was written about his burger in the Yogi’s Guide:

“GLORY (2003):  The Jose Burger at Paradise Café is a MIRACLE.  It’s enough to inspire a following of cultish fanaticism to be rivaled only by politics, football, religion, and well, thru-hiking.

SUGE (2003):  The Jose Burger at the Paradise Café is the best burger on the trail.  Swiss cheese, bacon, avocado, mushrooms, green chiles, tomato, onion, lettuce, pickles.  I’ve got a fuzzy, out of focus picture of one.  Glory and I were in shock and awe when they came out.  Quite literally, I had to eat the burger in sections:  work on the top part, then in the middle, then attack a corner of the bottom, etc.”

Jose had never seen the Yogi’s guide, and seemed genuinely touched.  

Jose reading the reviews of his burger

The café accepts mail drops for hikers and I sorted through my food box, disgusted with nearly everything in it.  Jesse showed up just before closing and got her garden burger, and I joined her for another beer and lemonade.  I’d found that if I drank two lemonades per beer, a sort of un-mixed shandy, that I didn’t get a headache.  I didn’t get a buzz either, but I was stubbornly insistent on having my beer.  I gave Jesse most of the food from my mail drop, grabbed some instant refries from the hiker box, and we staggered the mile back to the trail.  We cowboy camped next to the small water cache maintained by the Café, and I laid in my sleeping bag under the stars, wondering if Warner Springs Monty had been right in telling me that I should ditch my tent to lessen weight. 

Warner Springs, April 16th-18th

Signs on a fence advertised the Warner Springs community center, but they didn’t prepare me for what was offered.  I stumbled into it only because it was located right off of the trail rather than up in town.  There I found Kobe, and Shannon, and others I knew from the trail, and a few more that I’d heard of but had not yet met; namely Delaware Dave and The Professor.  The center had free computers with internet access, eggs and sausage breakfasts and hamburger lunches sold at cost, a tiny store with only things that hikers would need, and laundry and showers for a fee.  It had an all-volunteer staff, many of whom seemed to work full time for the season, and all of whom were gracious and kind.  

Coletta drove me into town to the post office to pick up my mail drop and get some cash.  She was originally from Canada, and told me some of her family history.  The thing that stuck with me the most was that her mother had not expected to have a family because she was the youngest child in her family, and tradition was to keep the youngest at home to care for the parents in their old age.  I wasn’t clear on whether this was the youngest child of either gender or simply the youngest girl, but I thought of the North Caucasus in comparison.  There, the daughters are given away and the sons stay at home.  They bring in brides from other families to live with them in their parents’ homes, and when speaking Russian it’s common to hear parents speak of their son’s wife as “nasha nevesta,” “our bride.”  Families value sons over daughters because their sons will support them in their old age and carry on their household, while a daughter will be raised just to be given away to another family.  She will come as a relative stranger into a new household, and will gain status there only when she gives birth to sons, who are hers and will remain with the family. 

Coletta and I

I spent two full days at the community center, mainly using the computers there to write and publish blog posts and to sort out logistics for attending the kickoff party.  It was a funny sort of “inverse weekend” – two days spent at the computer as a break from being outside.  I was so absorbed in getting everything that I could done that failed to get to know the staff – Jackie cooked me cheeseburgers, and Barbara made sure that I didn’t leave without having pie and ice cream, but I didn’t learn their stories or even everyone’s name.  

The first night I walked back a half-mile with Delaware Dave, a quiet kid named Joe who was hiking a section southbound, and another southbound section hiker. 

Trading water reports northbound and southbound

Frost on my tent in the morning

  

 Joe headed south first thing in the morning, but the rest of us walked into the Community Center for breakfast.  I was in the process of sorting through the hiker box[i] and organizing my food when the section hiker started talking about how it was unethical to leave toilet paper on the trail, how it doesn’t biodegrade quickly, and how it needs to be carried out.  Now, I pack feminine hygiene products out because they have components that are not biodegradable and I use a bandanna for a peeing rather than using toilet paper 10 times a day, but it is considered acceptable to leave human waste and used toilet paper, provided you dig a hole before you do your business and fill it in afterwards.  

“Look,” I said, interrupting him, “realistically, I’m never going to do that.  He continued talking about how he’d seen paper a year old blowing around on the Appalachian Trail (so far I’ve found the PCT to be incredibly clean).

“Fine,” I said, “if I’m realistically going to modify my behavior in any way, I’ll be sure to dig deeper holes.  I should probably do a better job of that, but carrying shitty toilet paper around is just too gross.”  Delaware Dave nodded in agreement, and they guy countered by attempting to prove to us that it really wasn’t that gross – he pulled out a clear Ziploc bag of his own shitty toilet paper and held it up.  Right there, in the Warner Springs Community Center, standing over a table where food is served.  

Delware Dave's pack Dr. Seuss and my pack The Caboose, named in honor of Gio

That evening Delaware Dave and I went home with Warner Springs Monty, a trail angel and generally famous trail personality.  Monty let me use his computer, gave us space to sleep, let us shower and do laundry, and cooked dinner and breakfast with an abundance of fresh, crunch vegetables.  He was on permanent disability for a number of reasons that didn’t restrict his movement, and by his doctor’s orders he was actually encouraged to go hiking.  The only way that any of his conditions manifested themselves in our company was that he couldn’t tolerate noise too loud or high-pitched.  He showed me his signal that he made with his hand whenever a noise crossed the threshold, the thumb and pointer finger brought together, and whenever my shrieking laughter or excitedly loud voice made him cringe he would make the sign and I would speak softly for awhile. 

Monty was dry and went to AA meetings, but on the way to his house he stopped at the general store/post office and told me to buy beer if I wanted it.  

“You don’t mind it being in your house?”

“If you drink it, is it going to get me drunk?  If so, that would be quite a show – we could go on the road!”

We spent the evening together relaxing – me writing my blog post, Delaware Dave soaking his feet, and Monty playing the guitar and singing songs he’d written.  Most were funny, a few were heartbreaking love songs, and all were good.  

Warner Springs Monty and I

Monty playing  guitar

 When I finally finished on the computer and Monty went to sleep in the bedroom, Delaware and I lay in the living room, me on the futon, he on a fold out pad, a coffee table in between us.  Like little kids trying to go to sleep when they’re already deliriously tired, we fell into fits of giggles.  

“Dude, he showed us a bag of his shit!”

“I know!” Dave cackled.

“And what did you do after that?  You friended him on facebook!”  We both shrieked with laugher.

“I know,” Delaware said, “I’m too nice!”  It was true, I don’t think that Dave was physically capable of ignoring anyone the way I had ignored the hiker for the rest of his time there in response to the incident.  

“Yeah, you are,” I laughed, my stomach cramping from laughter.  “I’ll tell you what – I’ve crossed cease fire lines.  Hell, I’ve been to Grozny, for chrisstsake, and I have never had someone show me their shit!”  By now I was crying from the laughter, and I couldn’t see Delaware behind the coffee table in the dark but I think he was too.  

Delaware Dave and I get silly with the self-portraits

When the Community Center closed the next day I was still there and Monty invited me back to his house again, but I’d already been 48 hours in Warner Springs and knew it was time to move on.  He had hooked me up with Dirty Girl Gaiters to work her booth at the kickoff party so we would see each other again in a week and agreed to be in touch about transportation.  I tried to take pictures with the wonderful staff of the Community Center but most of them got away from me un-photographed, and I set off to get some night hiking in and bite off a chunk of the 42 miles to the Paradise Valley Café. 

The two Community Center staff I was able to catch for a goodbye photo

  

---

[i] Hiker boxes are found at many places along the trail.  Hikers can leave food and gear that they don’t want to carry anymore, and other hikers can find free supplies in them.  The food that one person is sick of eating or a piece of gear that doesn’t provide any value for one person may be perfect for another, so many hikers sort through the boxes with enthusiasm.