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| Hiking | 21.78 Miles |
10,804 AEG |
| | Hiking | 21.78 Miles | 11 Hrs 22 Mns | | 2.24 mph |
| 10,804 ft AEG | 1 Hour 39 Mns Break | | | |
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| no partners | | I've wanted to hike C2C for 5+ years and was getting to the point where I was going to just hike it on my own soon, but my brother was interested and our schedules lined up for late May. I drove to Palm Springs on Monday and picked him at the airport after his late flight was delayed even later, so he landed a little before midnight, and we started the hike behind the museum a little after 3AM on Tuesday morning.
One benefit of starting in the dark was not seeing how much "up" was above us--it forced us to focus on the next few steps that we could see in our flashlight beams. I worked up a good sweat over the first few miles as it climbed steeply and consistently, and it was nice to get better and better views of the lights of Palm Springs, and eventually the sun rising over the mountains.
Around sunrise, ~4 miles over ~4,000' in, the terrain transitions into more yucca and taller foliage. We passed three people on their way up and then got into more manzanita as the steepness increased. The last few miles leading up to Grubbs Notch were the steepest and toughest of the day, and my brother felt like his legs were on the verge of cramping. I had serious doubts that he was going to be able to finish the hike if he started cramping, and it wasn't looking good with 12+ miles and ~3,000' of elevation ahead of us.
But he pushed through, and we took a break once we reached the Notch, where the terrain changed again. We stopped at the Long Valley Ranger station, which was closed at that time, and filled our bottles from the hose in back (there was a sign warning about haloacetic acid levels in the water, so we filtered the water as we refilled). We had five or six more miles to the peak, and it was a relaxing hike through pines with water flowing in the creek (in hindsight, we could've filtered that more easily than the hose water), and the grade was much less steep.
We encountered the first snow along the trail at ~8,500' and more as we climbed, but it was generally well-packed and easy to cross without sinking in. We took another short break at Wellman Divide and passed another person in that area. The terrain changed again, with more boulders and low brush along both sides of the trail and fewer pine trees over the last two miles to San Jacinto peak.
We encountered deeper snow on the final scramble to the top, and we arrived a little before 11:30AM had it to ourselves. The views were fantastic in every direction...I wished that I'd brought a big DSLR camera to zoom in on all the landmarks. Baldy and San Gorgonio both had a lot of snow on top, and there was a thick blanket of low clouds over the Pacific. We spent ~40 minutes on top eating, relaxing, and taking pictures before we packed up and started down.
We talked briefly with the guy we'd passed near Wellman Divide as he was coming up, then started to see more people from the tram farther down. One couple on their way up asked if we'd come up on the first tram, and when we told them we hiked up from Palm Springs, the woman had the line of the day: "Motherf*****...congratulations!" 
We cruised down at a good pace and saw more and more people as we got closer to the tram...it felt like a different place with crowds and left me feeling grateful that we'd seen so few people on the way up and had the peak to ourselves. We dropped off our permit at the ranger station and headed into the swarms of tourists at the tram station and rode down...I could've done without the music and singalongs, but it was cool to see the mountain from that angle.
Overall, it was a great day and things worked out as well as we could've hoped. The weather was perfect from start to finish and I was comfortable in a T-shirt all the way, including at the peak. And I felt great physically--food and water made a big difference...I have a bad habit of not stopping often enough to eat and drink on hikes, so I made an effort this time to eat/drink before I got hungry/thirsty. I carried ~180oz of liquids (and a purifier) and ended up drinking a little less than that, and my brother drank close to 240oz. I finished the day with more energy and felt better than I typically do on much less demanding hikes.
C2C lived up to the expectations--it was a fun challenge, and it was beautiful seeing the sunrise over Palm Springs, and I enjoyed hiking up through so many different environments between ~500' and 10,800'. It was great to having my brother join me for this. In addition to his near-cramping, he was battling pain in a tendon in his foot and had to stop fairly often to take his boot off and stretch it, but he fought through it and did great  . Hopefully I can hike this one again sometime, and next time I'll pack a little lighter and bring a better camera . |
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