[pct-l] Thru Hike planning around a wedding

[Joshua Pinedo]

Halfmile,

So after a few months I finally got my act together and started thinking the
logistics.  One of my best friends is getting married on July 2 in
Virginia.  We had planned to have his bachelor party before my departure
from home (my flight is on April 22), but due to scheduling it would be too
soon for a lot of our friends to make it.  Instead, the groom decided to
have it in Vegas and decided on the weekend of June 18.  He is planning to
fly to LA, pick up our buddy in Pasadena and come get me wherever I am on
June 16 and then we'd drive to Vegas.  We'd party till the 19th or so and
then everyone would fly home, and me and the groom and our buddy would back
track and they would drop me off from where they picked me up.  I was
planning on flying back to VA on June 28/29; I have to be at the rehearsal
dinner on Friday July 1st.  I was thinking that after Vegas I would have a
ten or so days to hike, but I was very nervous about where I would be, how I
would get off, and it was just stressing me out logistically how to get to
Reno in time to fly back.  All this talk of a big snow year isn't helping
either.  But..getting off may work to my advantage - I'm thinking snow melt
here.  So, I was thinking instead of the groom dropping me off where he
picked me up after the few days in Vegas, I would ride back with him to LA
and fly home with him.  I'd be home for about two weeks and figured July 4th
I'd fly back to LA and then back track back to the trail hopefully with the
help of my buddy that lives in Pasadena and get dropped off at the same spot
from where I left to go to Vegas initially.  Now, I don't know exactly where
I'll be when the groom picks me up on June 16, but my hike starts on April
26 or so that week and I'm sure I'll be at KM, but depending on the snow I
wouldn't know if I would be stuck there or not.

Has snow stopped hikers dead in there tracks in the Sierras on previous
years?

Worst case, if I left the trail at KM or somewhere around there and returned
on the first week of July, would I be too far behind the pack to make it to
Manning Park in time before more snow?

I'm starting alone, I'm young and consider myself a strong hiker, so if I
have to hustle for the few weeks back I will, but I just wanted to know your
opinion if this is feasible.

thanks, sorry for the ramble..

best,

J Pinedo

On 9 December 2010 18:50, Halfmile <halfmile at pctmap.net> wrote:

> JP,
> I was tracking hiker locations this year based on journal entries. See
> this link.
>
>
> https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=0AnjydhFdh1E2dFE4dTVWUFMxQmhtTVUyZjFRRWlzanc&hl=en&authkey=CIqz5fgC#gid=0
>
> Check the tabs on the lower left for details of a few 2009, 2010
> hikers and when they made it to different places.
>
> It should give you a rough idea of other hikers time lines.
>
> No way for me to know how fast or slow you are, but if your semi-fast
> somewhere around Toulumne Meadows in Yosemite might be a good place to
> aim for (I'm assuming you need to exit late June). They have Amtrak
> and YARTS bus service so it would be easy transportation to or from
> the Modesto or San Francisco airports.
>
> Only problem I see is if your running late it would be difficult to
> exit early from the Sierra (and it's an amazing section of the trail
> you don't want to miss or have to rush through).
>
> If your running really late you could exit at Walker Pass and it would
> be pretty easy to get to Modesto via Bakersfield by a short hitch,
> then local bus, then Amtrak.
>
> Exiting east to 395 (Horseshoe Meadow, Kearsarge Pass, Reds Meadow,
> Sonora Pass, etc) you would give you the option of bus service to Reno
> but I it only runs 4 days a week. You can get bus service from Mammoth
> to Modesto so that might be an option if you exited E to 395 N of
> Walker Pass. I don't think most of the Easter Sierra community buses
> run on weekends, so keep that in mind.
>
>
> http://easternsierratransitauthority.com/wb/pages/bus-routes/crest--lone-pine-reno.php
>
> If you need more info, let me know. I'm pretty familiar with the PCT
> public transportation options in central CA.
>
> -Halfmile
>
>
>
> On Thu, Dec 9, 2010 at 3:12 PM, Joshua Pinedo <joshua.pinedo at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > Hello friends,
> >
> > I'm currently planning my '11 thru hike and am trying to gauge how far
> I'll
> > be/should be to manage getting off the trail, grabbing a flight,
> attending a
> > wedding and returning to the trail with enough time to finish in Manning
> > Park.  I was thinking of starting towards the last few days of
> April/first
> > few days of May, obviously I need firmer dates, but I'm still in the
> > preliminary stages of my planning.  One of my best friends is getting
> > married on July 2 weekend in Northern VA (my hometown), therefore the
> plan
> > was to hike as far as I could, hitch into town, shower a few times so I
> > wouldn't crash the plane with my stench, and get on a flight a few days
> > before the wedding.  I figure I wouldn't have more than 6 days actually
> in
> > Northern VA (not including flights, and rides to and fro trail heads) to
> > spend at home before I got on another flight to the port from which I had
> > come to pick up where I left off.  I'd say maybe 9 days or so, total?
> maybe
> > 8?  I also don't want to miss ADZPCTKO.  I have to coordinate this pretty
> > well so I can buy plane tickets ahead of time, or at least would like to
> try
> > to save money by buying them early, and if anything at least give me a
> > guaranteed flight home since I can't miss this for the world.  I figure
> it
> > would also give me sort of a landmark to work towards.  Any advise or
> > guidance would be very much appreciated.
> >
> > best,
> >
> > JP
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