[pct-l] KO Video by Nat Geo

[Timothy Nye]

How true.  I learn something every year.  This year it was the changability
of the So Cal weather. Last year I was lulled into a false sense of
complacency with warm / hot days.  After KO this year I filled in for Mike
Hererra at his place on mile 127 at 5000' feet in the north Santa Rosa
mountains for 5 days. Three of those days had temps that had lows below
freezing and highs that didn't get above 45 degrees with winds to 50MPH.
 Two of those days consisted of whiteout conditions as if in a non-stop
cloud. If Thursady at KO didn't get my attention, then this certainly did.

Wednesday morning at 7:00 A.M. a hiker showed up at the door as I was
serving breakfast.  He'd camped on the saddle north of the house in an
exposed location.  During the night his rain fly was ripped away and his
tent collapsed with a bent pole.  His bag got wet and he was soaked when he
arrived. In short, hypothermic.  Warm drink, fire and food.  This could have
easily gone the other way, I fear.

But for a nagging injury I could have been out there with gear based on my
own previous, and limited, experience with the area.  A friend from last
year is hiking and had sent all his foul weather gear up to Idyllwild.  A
number of hikers showed up that way at Mike's. Much less room for error than
last year.  In that circumstance lack of conditioning and inappropriate
gear, the latter sometimes abetted by unscrupulous outfitters, can combine
to produce unfortunate consequences.  For myself, I'm re-assesing my base
back yet again.


On Sun, May 2, 2010 at 9:04 AM, Joseph Anderson <joedaddy44 at gmail.com>wrote:

> On Sun, May 2, 2010 at 8:13 AM, Don Billings <dbillings803 at yahoo.com>
> wrote:
>
> > EVERY hiker was inexperienced at some point.
> >
> > nuff said.
> >
> > Don
> >
> > You're absolutely correct Don. Nothing wrong with being inexperienced. I
> > hope I didn't give that impression. We ALL were inexperienced at one
> time.
> >
> My point is that that's probably NOT the best time to attempt a 2,600
> trail.
> > You gotta walk before you can run.
> >
>
> - Joe -
>
> Life is good!
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