[pct-l] Ray Day

[Sean Nordeen]

I figure most people would like some background info on where Ray Day
actually comes from.  I posted the following in a pre-trip entry on my
2009 PCT journal on Postholer.

Ray Day is June 15th and is considered the optimal entry date into the
High Sierra from Kennedy Meadows in an average snow year in terms of
snow encountered and the difficulty of fords while still finishing up
in Canada before the Winter Stroms hit the Northern Cascade mountains.
But where does it come from?

I dug through some used bookstores and found a 1st edition of Ray
Jardine’s PCT Handbook to find out. From reading his book, he actually
envisioned June 13th as the optimal start date with people arriving at
Kennedy Meadows around the 11th for a ADZPCTKO type get together. So
Ray Day should be June 13th and not the 15th. So where did June 15th
come from? It came from the 5.5 and 6 month itinerary charts from his
book. All other charts had an earlier date listed. The 15th came from
the long itinerary hikers (who were the majority back then) passing
the date forward by word of mouth. After all, when the book was
published in the early 90’s, most people were still carrying
traditional gear and lightweight techniques hadn’t really caught on
yet so those were the planning charts most people used. But since most
people today are carrying less weight and now take 4-5 months to hike
the trail, shouldn't they be using the shorter itineraries with an
earlier entry date? You'd think so, but those intinerary charts were
no longer published after '98 when Ray Jardine changed his book to be
more about long distance hiking in general rather then just a PCT
oriented book. Everything about Ray Day has since been passed forward
by the grapevine. And anyone who has ever played that game in school
knows how corrupted things become with each telling.

But how did Ray Jardine come up with mid June in the first place?
Surely, it comes from heavy research and his own PCT experience. Well,
when you look at his 3 PCT hikes, you find that he never used Ray Day
on any of his hikes. On his first PCT hike, it took 3 weeks from
Kennedy Meadows to Tuolumne Meadows and was done entirely in May. His
second hike was described as another early entry hike though not as
early as the 1st one and only took 2 weeks to cover the same ground
with a lighter pack. I personally believe this was either a late may
or beginning of June entry date, but I can’t prove it. It certainly
was before mid-June. His 3rd PCT hike was a southbound one so Ray Day
never came into the discussion.

Well, if Ray Jardine never used Ray Day in his own planning, why did
it come about? It seems to be an attempt to delay entry into the
Sierra as late as possible (and thus encountering less snow in the
Sierras) for the longer itinerary hikers but still giving them a
chance at finishing before the big snow storms hit the Northern
Cascasdes. This isn’t a bad idea. However, if this was his main
reason, then why are the 3 month internary people also entering in
mid-june rather then a later date. After all, on their schedule, they
will finish up long before late September when the snow risks start to
go up. In fact, he has them finishing in early to mid-August. So
surely they could enter in late June to early July and have an easier
time of it. But since he doesn't, this reason seems to be out. Many
people think that Ray Day has also taken into consideration the
difficulty of the major fords. But I find no mention of this in Ray's
original book when talking about it.

>From what Ray has written, Ray Day mainly came about as an attempt to
artificially create a gathering of all the hikers on the trail. People
could relax a few days in preperation for the difficult Sierra
crossing and teams of hikers would form so that less experience ones
could pair up with those more experienced. And in one way, Ray was
successful. Only instead of a gathering forming from June 11-13 at
Kennedy Meadows, one was created in April 25-27 at the border. A date
that someone on a 5-6month itinerary would be using as a start date in
order to reach Kennedy Meadows on June 15th which has wrongly been
called Ray Day. So instead of having people start spread out and
slowly converging at the Sierras. We have most people starting at the
same time and staying converged all the way to the Sierras, negatively
impacting the southern environment, trail towns, and trail angels
(according to one famous trail angel). Fortunately the Sierras manage
to start to spread out the herd from that point north.

So in conclusion, Ray Day is just an arbitrary day. People have
successfully hiked by entering a month earlier and a month later so
one's start date should be determined by when you want to finish and
how long you want it to take. It shouldn’t be determined by listening
to someone insisting that this is the only way but who never tried to
do it any other way themselves. The only time restriction on the PCT
is that from late September on, the risk of heavy snows in the
Cascades goes up. In 2007, anyone who wasn't done by Oct.1 was forced
off the PCT and had to road walk to Canada to a point far from the
northern PCT terminus. In other years, they were able to hike until to
Mid-October. In some years, a few have finished as late as Oct.23
though they did encounter snow. It depends on the weather that year
and what risks you are willing to run.

-Miner