mountain rescue

so, after the excitement of san jacinto, which, quite frankly, was pretty jolly exciting, and a chilly cowboy camp at fuller ridge trail head (cowboy camping is just tarping it - sleeping under the stars), we were cruising our way down towards the desert floor.
en route we met a hiker - quijote (yep, there's this tradition on long trails over here i've giving people trail names - my name seems to be sliding towards 'phantom jimbrick' - wasn't going to mention that but there you go...) hunched over with no pack on the side of the trail (not track - i keep getting corrected - apparently a track is only something you run around)... she'd been vomiting since 7am (it was around 10). she urged us to go on - said she'd be fine, but annie and i walked with her. it was a beautiful day, and at this stage i was just thinking it would be a good opportunity to take more photos of flowers.
every so often she would need to stop and vomit, and sit down and rest. we made it 2 1/2 miles and then she collapsed in the shade. (one of the guys in our little group had taken over carrying her pack down.) we attempted to get some fluid into her, but she was throwing up violently. i gave her my brand new (less than 2 days old) down jacket, and tarp and sleeping bag liner - all of which received a good coating of vomit. her vitals were deteriorating steadily, and we were 5 1/2 miles from the nearest road, so eventually we called search and rescue and the sheriffs office. and they sent a helicopter out (this all took 6 hours at least). (alex and wiz had returned by this stage - so there was four of us with quijote).
it was incredibly windy, and we were on the side of a steep mountain, so initially we were wondering how it would land. it hovered near the rock we were standing on (they asked us if we had bright colours to attract it - my photos do this no justice but i was wearing bright blue, alex bright green, wiz bright yellow and annie purple and pink, and we were holding fluoro gear and bandanas up)and a dude looked like he was going to jump out, then it swerved away and they told us over a loud hailer that they'd be back in 30 minutes.
when they returned the pilot hovered just above the rock, and a third fellow jumped out, supported by the dude who was originally looking to jump. the jumper came across, briefed quijote on how to climb into a hovering helicopter off a boulder, and then they did it. it all sounds rather prosaic when i write it here, but it was ridiculously exciting. we were all grinning our heads off. after ringing quijote's father in kentucky (he was a physician - he asked me what my job was, and said i should come to kentucky - he wasn't sure what we could do together maybe drink a beer) we had to walk the 5 1/2 miles down the mountain.
the ubiquitous sugar moma was at the bottom (she's everywhere)- i'd called her originally before we realised how serious it was going to be, and she took us and a dude called nolan to a strange town called cabazon (in yogi's guide all the overview says is: kinda creepy. we had tea at ruby's diner, and then sugar moma dropped us back to the trail - where we found a box of oranges, and walked in about 3/4 of a mile and slept next to the trail below san jacinto.

quijote's still got my jacket, and last night i cowboyed above big bear (still possibly higher elevation than anything in australia), with my broken zippered sleeping bag, and awoke to a coating of ice. and a ridiculously swollen face - every time it's really cold my face swells up weirdly...

[marcus, i don't know if you're reading this, but i thought of you all the way up san jacinto, and i wrote you a post card during the helicopter rescue, which i left in sugar moma's car - wanted you to know i was thinking of you on top of that tough climb)

ah yep... more random shots...

this is the way down fuller ridge - coming down off san jacinto...








looking down into the desert, there's mesa wind farm - 460 wind turbines - 30 megawatt output... it's hot and dusty, and a quick transition between the snow and the cactuses... cacti?








this is annie, another chick i've been hiking with, approaching a creek crossing. the creek was full of ice sculptures - looked fantastic...








and this is wiz 'using' one of the dunnies which were submerged in the snow - the other one was more traditional and deeper, but we were too lazy to go down to it...

some more random shots

this is on top of san jacinto. it was more spectacular than it looks - absolutely beautiful. we used microspikes to climb it which feel really hardcore until you remember old people in scotland use them to collect their mail at christmas time...
san jacinto's about 3300 metres...

what's really crazy about san jacinto is that it's freezing, and you're up in the snow, but you're looking straight down into the desert and these huge wind farms...


this is alex, one of the guys i've been hiking with a fair bit, being hard core with his ice axe... people told us we needed ice axes for san jacinto, but that was overkill... we slid down the other side - so much fun boot skiing, path was obliterated by the snow...

i don't think the text is quite lining up with the pictures... this is my funky snow style - waterproof pants tucked into spandexy style gaiters - and trail runners...

this is wiz demonstrating a self arrest with ice axe...

on american food

had my first experience of biscuits and gravy this morning, sadly didn't have a camera to document what the guys ate. contrary to my presuppositions, an american biscuit is like a large soft scone, and the gravy was like a weird white sauce. much weirder than this is american cheese. it is this vibrant orange colour and involves non cheese ingredients. i've eaten a variety of chilli dogs, and pop tarts (apple strudel & brown sugared flavoured)... in fact i have really struggled to buy decent cereal, gave up on muesli and went for granola. i've had home made granola before which was good, but the stuff out of the packet tastes like dessert topping.
(i've also eaten some amazingly good food - but it's not as weird - it's like americans decide something is good and then figure out a way to homogenise it, package it, and mass produce it) (and the weird processed stuff is much stranger than eating dog cooked in monkey poo quite frankly, and no where near as tasty)...
there are hikers waiting for this computer so i'd better hop off...

zeroing in idyllwild

i'm in a little town called idyllwild, sort of mountain cutesy-redneck kind of joint, and it's unbelievably cold. i'm still hiking with wiz and alex, and yesterday was long, freezing and beautiful. there's a lot of snow up top, and we came down off the mountain in the drizzling dark. today, just below the line of mist all the trees are frosted over.
i was intending to go over san jacinto tomorrow - it's over 10000 feet, but it's covered in 4 foot of snow (i am constantly converting between their ridiculous imperial measurements and metric), so haven't quite decided what to do there... beyond san jacinto (which eveyone bar me probably realises you pronounce san hacinto) there's a ridge - fuller ridge, which descends from over 10000 down to something like 1300 - back down to the desert, so i'll leave this icy land of snow and squirrels and chipmunks for the desolate heat and rattle snakes.
i'm at about mile 177 here, and all is well except achilles tendonitis in my left heel, and maybe a little tib tendonitis in my right ankle...

some random shots...

working out my maps in bendigo prior to leaving... i've posted them to various towns up the trail

before a place called scissors crossing, there was a great breeze here which was great at cooling off some of the sweat...

bad example of the kind of stuff we were walking through last night. i'd borrowed one of wiz' poles cos i've got tendonitis in my achilles, pretty handy for some of the snow crossings... wee bit cold in the holes in my shoes...

this is a bit of ridgeline which was looking remarkably lord of the ringsish... hard to take photos cos it was freezing with crazy misting winds, and we'd climbed 10000 feet, which is quite a bit when you're not so fit...

some legendary individuals have cached water in the long dry sections - very very handy... there's a note on this sign suggesting the bones belong to a 2010 thru-hiker - but dad, i think it's a coyote, and i've been looking everywhere for a coyote jawbone in case i'm ever in trouble - you'll be glad to know such things can be found, think the desert stretches are pretty failsafe as long as you've got you're coyote jawbone...

g'day from warner springs

g'day g'day. i'm in a place called warner springs. i shared a room with 4 other hikers last night - walked in at 9pm under the setting sun and a crescent moon, and soaked in the hot springs for an hour. i'm having troubles with technology - right now i'm attempting to upload photos but the computer won't recognise the presence of my camera usb...
the walking's been beautiful. a crazy riotous proliferation of wildflowers everwhere - almost lumescent green & pink catcus flowers and every colour and kind of flower you can imagine. swam in some pools near a cascade one day with 2 other guys who i've ended up hiking with a fair bit. it's all ridiculously social at this point. a huge amount of people attempting a through hike start out at a similar time, so i'm regularly bumping into people. nothing like the solitary experience it often is in australia.
i've seen 3 rattle snakes, which i was really looking forward to, along with a number of other snakes, a gopher, a vulture and lots of squirrels (still exciting to me).
in idyllwild, which is about 4 or 5 days up the track i should have better contact, which hopefully will mean i can uplaod some photos. we've got the san jacinto mountains ahead - lots of snow which is also pretty exciting.
i've learnt a few northern constellations, and i'm learning to pronounce my name in a way that can be understood, although mostly i just have to go with carly cos they can't hear the i sound...
there are people waiting for these computers so i'll finish up...
for those who have been concerned about my safety, even though my us phone is a bit of a dud currently, i'm travelling with people who are ridiculously connected, so there's little chance of trouble.
everyday i feel so incredibly blessed - so much beauty, so many seredipitous moments, so much love and goodwill from people we meet.
i will try to write soon...