[pct-l] White gas at ALL resupply points?

[pcnst@oakapple.net (David planning PCNST)]

This (and many other questions that keep coming up) can be answered
fairly well with the PCTA's Town Guide and Data Book, two inexpensive
little books so
handy that I carry them with me all the time - except when I am actually
dayhiking on the trail - when I carry xeroxed pages of the Data Book.
You can order them right off the web at pcta.org, and I can vouch from
experience for the fast efficient service.    I refer to them much more
frequently than to the actual Wilderness Press guidebooks (though they have
their place too, a section at a time).

One would want to be  cautious in any event about relying on white gas
supplies - a little country store might happen to be out when you come
by, or still or already closed for the winter.    And then there's the
problem that little country stores that do have white gas usually have
gallon cans of Coleman fuel, which you probably will have to throw away
a lot of.     There's a lot to be said for mailable fuels - gas cartridges
and alcohol are said to be mailable though I haven't tried.

Big all-year towns (Idyllwild, Big Bear, Lancaster,...) are probably safe,
but I don't know if I would count on e.g. 
Campo or Mount Laguna or Kennedy Meadows or Stehekin,
especially early or late in their seasons.

By the way, the Town Guide mentions Soda Springs briefly, but omits mention of 
the Sierra Club's Clair Tappaan Lodge, about two miles
west of Donner Pass and open to the public with advance reservations, 
and the Club's various huts in the Tahoe and Southern California areas,
open at various times under various circumstances for Sierra Club members;
see
http://www.sierraclub.org/outings/lodges/
for particulars.    Clair Tappaan doesn't sell white gas but it's probably
available at Soda Springs a couple more miles west.