Just when I was resigned to an afternoon of relaxation and munching soft serve ice cream at the very middling Kennedy Meadows North, an opportunity presented itself! Merlin, Marble, Lucky Charm, Half and Half, IPA and Lavalamp were a bit behind us and only made it into KM North that morning. As we were having lunch, Merlin mentioned that a woman was going around looking for people to stay at a trail angel’s cabin that night. It would mean getting to trail tomorrow instead of today, but considering that every time I had agreed to such an offer I’d had some of the best evenings on trail, it didn’t take long for me to decide. Andy, Spice, Mouse, Stinger and Fitz didn’t join, splitting the group up again.
The woman introduced herself as Sailor. She and the trail angel, Scott, were here with a car to take people back. Mash, me, Lucky Charm and Half and Half didn’t fit, so we got a fairly easy hitch to Pinecrest, where the cabin was located.
It was a wonderful evening. Our group were the only ones at the cabin along with The Swede, a somewhat quiet guy. Scott and Sailor cooked spaghetti with salad for us and some pizza’s for those still hungry. This was Scott’s first week as a trail angel and he still had to get used to the copious amounts that hikers ate. Sailor, a hiker herself, had been there the first night Scott invited people over and decided to stay for a week to kickstart and guide things. She was quite the character. She got her name from sailing around the world twice in her own sailboat. This was her fourth time doing the pct, after having also done the AT, the CDT, the colorado trail, the arizona trail and undoubtably many others. Her prime tip for getting hitches was to jump in front of a car and pretend like you’re starving of hunger and thirst. I thought at first that she was joking, but she was not. Even though she had been on so many amazing adventures, she was very humble about it and was equally interested in us as in telling her own tales. Sailor is my hero and I hope I can ever be half as cool.
Scott himself was an amazing host, kind and funny. It was good that Sailor was there though to coordinate things and put us to work, as Scott seemed to just do everything himself. It was special to see someone who was just starting out to host hikers, trying to figure out everything. The trail angels I’d seen up until then had been old veterans like Terry, Poppa Joe and Grizzly Gramps. I hope everything works out for Scott, I really want him to succeed.
During dinner, people from the house across the street started shouting.
‘Eeeellmeeeer!!’
And no, apparently they weren’t looking for a missing person named Elmer. Scott explained, ever since the 40’s, people on this campground had been shouting Elmer in the evening and the tradition continued on to this day. Legend says that a woman was shouting and looking for her husband Elmer back then. It was only proper that we joined in as well.
Afterwards, Scott got out his bat and invited us to a game of wuffleball, some variant of baseball. We played on the street and I felt like a kid again, having a blast. During our game, a car pulled up next to the cabin and out came Bard. I’d only heard about Bard before from Merlin and the others who met him when I wasn’t there. Bard had really managed to get under her skin. It didn’t take me long to figure out why. The guy just kept talking and talking and had a god awful laugh that rasped through the air and probably shredded leaves from trees and feathers from birds in its passing. He had also written 6 songs about the pct. I decided I did not want to hear them. Sailor had met him earlier, when he was dangerously low on food in the middle of a section. This turned out to not be an isolated occurence. Mash had seen on the Facebook pct group that a mother often posted emergencies about her son Bard. After some research we found out from these posts that he’d been out of food 3 times on the desert and had to be airlifted out from the way up Whitney. This on top of a bunch of embarassing posts from his mother worrying that her son wouldn’t find any friends and trying to recruit them from the group.
After dark, we sat out on the porch while Scott got his guitar out and sung a few songs. Such peace. I felt more rested and recovered from this afternoon than from our actual zeros in towns. I slept outside on the couch as the cabin was quite old and stuffy and I didn’t want to trigger my hayfever. I watched youtube and looked at the stars until I fell asleep.