Trail Day 39: Bird Springs Pass (mile 630.8) to Walker Pass Campground (mile 651.3)

20.5 PCT miles

I was packed up and ready to go a little before 5 am this morning.  Everyone who was camped at Bird Springs Pass was going to start their day with a long, exposed uphill climb through soft sand.  Brewhiker was trying to encourage everybody to get up before sunrise to tackle the climb before the sun hit that area and had offered to make people breakfast burritos starting at just before 4:30 am.

However, last night as I went to bed, the fuel canister to his stove had run out of gas so I figured there would be no breakfast burritos.  I still got up early to do the ascent, and walked over to his car to see if I let my sun gloves there the previous night.  To my surprise, he had a burrito ready to go, toasted and all.  He was able to use a frying pan with a different stove and had already made two batches of breakfast burritos for the hikers this morning.

I ate the burrito, thanked him for being so awesome, and left to tackle the climb. I’m glad I did it so early.  The trail was shaded, but I was still getting a little warm from effort.  I didn’t get the full sunrise that I would have seen back down at the pass, but the morning light on the mountains was still very pretty.  As I headed up, the three hikers that I have been hiking around this week passed me again.  First Taco, then Sunshine, then later on Jared, who like to take his time getting up.

Early morning light hitting the mountains.

Eventually I reached the top of the mountain and started heading down the other side.  I was expecting it all to be desert like yesterday so I was surprised when I hit vegetation and stayed there for a while, going up and down mini hills.

Looking east, just after crossing the top of the mountain.

Vegetation!

I was so happy to see all this forested area.

The forest I was walking through ended abruptly when I reached a dirt road. I would be following the dirt road for a couple miles until I reached the water source for the day, McIver’s Spring.  It was a little uncomfortable since it was a road walk and surrounded by desert shrubs again (so no shade).  My feet were also starting to bother me since I was walking 13 miles with minimal breaks.  I was going to reach McIver’s Cabin (and spring) around lunchtime, so I figured I would take an extended break there.

  

When I finally hit McIver’s Cabin, I definitely needed a break. My legs and feet were tired.  I saw some other hikers coming out of the cabin and asked what it was like.  A note in the Guthook app says that you can sleep in the cabin, but it is a popular place and you will most likely have to pitch a tent because the cabin will already be spoken for.  The other hikers told me to come in and have a look and I was not impressed. It was dirty and dilapidated.  People had used the stove as a trash bin. I think I would have worried about the hantavirus if I had stayed there. It was in a beautiful setting with water, pine trees, and mountain views so I would have just set up a tent had I stayed there overnight.

McIver's Spring.

McIver's Cabin.

View from McIver's Cabin.

After my quick tour of the cabin I went to the spring to grab a liter of water that I was going to put electrolytes in and drink with lunch. Soon after, Dan arrived at the spring and we ate lunch together.  After a nice rest and refuel section, I grabbed a couple more liters to filter and started heading towards Walker Pass, where I would be picked up today.

As I was walking north, I got great (but far off) views of the High Sierra I was heading towards.  You couldn’t miss it, it was entirely white. Hopefully it melts some more before I reach it. I’m up for the challenge of snow, I just don’t want it to be all snow travel.

I see snow.

Heading down. My first view of the highway.

Nearing Walker Pass.

Seeing as it was early afternoon of a hot day, I was pleased that I still had plenty of vegetation providing shade as I headed down in elevation. I was able to take small breaks in the shade to cool down and made it down to the Walker Pass Campground without too much fuss.  I could see a cooler at the trail register next to the campground.  The cooler had some empty gallon jugs in it, but that didn’t matter since I could see two different trail magic set ups at the picnic tables at the campground below.

Still nicely vegetated, even at a lower elevation.

The cooler by the sign. No matter, there is clearly good stuff going on down to the left.

I headed down to the campground and was waved over to one of the tables by Dan.  There were plenty of other hikers there hanging out in the shade and enjoying refreshments provided by a trail angel named Holly, who was a resident of Ridgecrest.  Eventually her husband, Steven, arrived to join in as well.

She had an extensive trail magic set up going including soda, beer, water, watermelon, apples, clementines, chips, cookies, baked potatoes, and hot dogs with all the fixings (including chili).  This was a great place to wait out the couple hours until my Trail Angel arrived to pick me up, since I had gotten there earlier than expected.

As I was waiting, we watching the other hikers come down the hill and trickle in until we had a nice sized group.  I was kind of happy to see that the other hikers, even the young and super in shape hikers, were all drenched in sweat when they arrived. It wasn’t just me!

After a while I started to get nervous about my trail angel picking me up.  I was at Walker Pass Campground, but there was also an actual Walker Pass, a place where the trail crosses the highway.  I had originally sent my Trail Angel a pick up time range, but almost and hour of it had gone by and I didn’t have any cell signal to contact him.

As I was coming down the trail earlier, it didn’t look like the highway had much of an area to pull out and wait for someone, so I went over to Holly to ask if she knew.  She said there was space to pull out, so I started to worry that my Trail Angel was waiting there and not the campground.  She offered to drive me over to that spot to look.

We made to to the highway section of Walker Pass and didn’t see anyone.  We did see the valley to the east, so she pulled forward a bit to see if we could get reception. We did!  I got a text message with an ETA of about the time it currently was, so I sent out a text to clarify he needed to go to the campground and we headed back.  Within a minute or two of arriving back at the campground my Trail Angel showed up and took me home for the weekend.