Wind was the name of the game today. We were a little worried about the temperature as we started hiking, but the breeze soon picked up and helped cool us off. In a few miles, and later that afternoon, we would be cursing it as we struggled to move forward.
It was an easy hike to the Cottonwood Creek bridge on flat dirt roads. We passed a cache for hikers stocked with cold bottles of water – a welcome treat after drinking from our lukewarm bladders. After 5 miles we reached the bridge over the nonexistent creek. There were a bunch of other hikers hanging out near the water cache there. We took a short break and then headed north again, towards the hills and the massive wind farm before them. Before long we were out in the open enough to catch the wind that powered the turbines. It was nearly 7 miles of constant struggling, trying not to get blown over. Sometimes all we could do was brace and wait for the gust to let up a little. We cursed the Tejon Ranch the whole way. At the end we had a brutally steep climb up into the lower mountains. We stopped partway up to take a rest and were surprised to find out we were less than a mile from the next water. It felt like we had been going much slower than normal since every step had been so tough.
A little more climbing brought us to Tylerhorse Creek, where about 20 hikers were resting in the shade. We’re not used to seeing so many in one place all the time but that’s what we get for dropping back in the herd. We made lunch, replenished our water, and did a little laundry before lounging around. I tried to take a nap but only got a few minutes in before the group woke up. Frustrated and tired from this morning’s fight across the wind farm, we left soon after.
We skirted the side of the ridges to the east on sandy, mostly level trail for a time. The entire area was criss-crossed by dirt bike paths that cut directly up and down the slopes. Eventually we reached our second big climb of the day out of Gamble Spring Canyon. Of course, before we could hike up out of the canyon we had to hike down into it, so we lost 400 feet of elevation in full view of the switchbacks we would climb in a few minutes.
The climb wasn’t really too terrible until we got to the higher elevations above the surrounding ridges. Then the wind picked up again – strongly, and then so fiercely that we were a little worried for our safety. We were traversing sandy, eroding slopes along steep cliffs. At one point I was caught off guard by a gust and fell, nearly rolling off trail. If not for my hiking poles I couldn’t have gotten back up. It was bad enough going uphill but trying to fight what must have been 60-mph gusts was impossibly frustrating. Going with the wind wasn’t much easier since it literally shoved us along the trail and we had to make our legs work fast enough to keep up. If it caught us at an angle, it would twist our backpacks around and nearly tear them off our shoulders. It was brutal and there was no place to rest out of the gale until we got off the mountaintop. As bad as we had it, it might have been worse on the desert floor we left that morning. As we reached the ridge we could see enormous plumes of sand blowing across the Mojave basin. They were dark enough to blot out our view of the San Gabriel mountains across the floor.
At last we reached a nice little cache that was slightly protected by the ridge. In addition to the water, it was stocked with delicious little green apples. There were only a few left and we felt lucky to come across them before they were gone. We took a rest in the provided chairs for a few minutes but got cold quickly once we stopped moving. We wanted to make it to 4 miles from the road into town but after struggling with the wind all day I was completely exhausted and needed to stop. It was hard to admit, though, and frustrating since we would easily have reached our goal of 25 miles without interference from the weather.
The trail stuck close to the ridgetop and looked pretty exposed for the next few miles, but Keith found a little flat spot downslope from the trail. It was surprisingly protected from the wind even though we couldn’t escape the noise of it all around us. For a while all I could do was lay in my bag and appreciate not having to use my muscles. After a while food started to seem appetizing again and we dug into our snacks, too tired and cold to cook a meal. The clouds above our heads were turbulent and ragged from the same weather front that was causing our wind problems. Later we would hear that there were high wind warnings for the entire surrounding area: Tehachapi, Mojave, and the desert we had just crossed. At least it hadn’t been hot. We are really looking forward to town – to being out of the wind, to new shoes, and to washing our shockingly filthy clothes.
– Posted from the PCT
Location:Pct mile 552