Zach and I headed out to Wrightwood by 4:15 AM. Hit the acorn trail at 5:40AM to do the Wrightwood to Baldy Traverse, or W.P.D.B. peaks. Wright, Pine, Dawson and Baldy.
The Acorn Trial is a fun little starter to approach Wright Mountain, we had a pleasant surprise at the summit, 100 feet from the register log a 12 point buck went bouncing off in the distance, he circle completely around the summit and came up the other side of us within a stones throw. Tried to take a clean picture but he got spooked and bounded off in a hurry.
The temps were still doable but it warmed up quickly, by the time we dropped down to the “V” that forms that part of the road where the “Traverse Trail/Devils Backbone – Wrightwood side Devil’s Backbone”, the PCT and the road all come together and started heading up the first ridgeline I knew it was going to be a hot one. We hit the summit of Pine Mountain by 8:45 AM and the temp’s were climbing, by 9:25 we were on Dawson, spend 20 minutes fooling around, before heading down to the saddle that separates Dawson and Baldy – we stashed some of our water just below Dawson as we knew we had to return the way we came.
300 feet above the saddle on the north flank of Baldy I knew I was going to hold up Zach so I said I wanted to head back, it was just too damn hot for me, I was consuming more water than what I would need to get to the top of Baldy, come back down and go over Dawson, Pine and reach the road just below the summit of Wright Mountain to take us out. As it turned out it was a good decision, Zach made the last 790 feet in 30 minutes, summated Baldy while I retraced my steps to the water cache and packed all of it up and headed over the last 100 feet of Dawson thru the saddle between Pine and Dawson and took a 30 minute break at the summit of Pine waiting for Zach to catch up, which he did by 12:30.
I don’t know about anyone else but when it comes to hot weather hiking, it takes way too much out of me. I prefer hiking in 30-70 degree tempts, I can cover more ground, go to higher elevations and not feel tired or sick, hot weather just drains me to the core – and I understand why the “Skyline Trail” is such a risk to people, that is why you will never find me on it in anything reaching 90+ tempts what-so-ever. The massive amounts of water (almost 6 liters) that I was carrying yesterday was for good reason, in high tempts I consume more water, problem for me is it makes me get ill from consuming so much, even if I’ve hydrated properly for the week leading up to the hike. I just cannot cool my throat enough to compensate for the high tempts, I do suck on “Sugar Free” cough drops to help keep my mouth “salivating” as that’s also what makes me drink so much, I cannot keep enough moisture in my mouth, which causes me to slow down more, drink more, etc… etc… etc…”vicious cycle”.
I grew up in the Midwest and the intensity of the “sun” here is always a factor for me to consider when hiking.
Moral of the story is I like to go early, when’s it’s cool, know when to throw in the towel and yet not be a burden to any of my hiking partners. We had a great time and as we approached the turn off to the “acorn trail” on the way out, we ran into three car loads of people coming back from one of the camp grounds, they gave us “Ice” for a our water bottles and one extra water each, that was the best part of the whole day. Half the ice went up under my hat to cool off my head, at the same time the “clouds” rolled in off the coast and cooled things down even more. Cannot wait for the fall when I can go back and try this in cooler weather. Thank you kindly to those campers
Pictures here - http://s728.photobucket.com/albums/ww28 ... =slideshow
