Walks A Ways: PCT Day 37

Wednesday, June 22, 2022

PCT Day 37

PCT Day 37, 18 June 2022 (Saturday)

“Mooving Day”

Start Location:	Campsite at S. Fork Kern River at Monache Meadow	Destination:	Wilderness Campsite
PCT Miles Day 37:	22.6	Cum PCT Miles:	739.0
Non-PCT Miles Day 37:	0.8	Cum All Miles:	769.6
PCT Miles Remaining:	1,913.6
Elevation Gain Day 37:	5,082	Cum Elevation Gain:	130,076

Just as I thought, last night was very cold. And it’s very cold this morning. In fact, I noticed there was some ice on top of the water in the calmer parts of the Kern River. You know if river water has ice on it, it has to be really cold.

I got a much later start than usual, and than what I wanted. But it was just so cold I couldn’t use my fingers very much, so it was hard to get everything ready to go.

It seems that every day something interesting or new happens. Today as I was walking up the trail, I looked up and saw a cow. It’s not that unusual to see cows--I guess it would be more correct to say cattle--on some parts of the PCT, but I didn’t expect to see them here. And it wasn’t just one or two, it was a small herd of several dozen, broken into smaller groups.

It was a little bit of a sketchy situation. You would think that cows on the PCT would be used to seeing hikers. But some of them seem spooked when they saw me, and some of them weren’t looking at me in a very friendly way. Each time a group of cows would come, I would move off the trail as much as possible. But even then, some of them would still get spooked. Maybe it was because there were some calves in the herd. But more than once I thought I might get charged by one of the older cows. After a while, they had all passed. But it did slow me down a bit.

Weather wise, it was a bluebird day, with comfortably cool to warm temps, until later in the day when it started getting cold again. It was pretty pleasant Sierra scenery today, but nothing too spectacular.

Even with the late start, it was a day to move and get miles in. I did five more than planned, and I’m now about 8 miles ahead. Once again, I could have gotten more miles in today, but I find myself setting up camp earlier than usual due to the cold temps in the late afternoon. A lot of the hiking today was done above nine and ten thousand feet, so it was a good acclimatizing day. It’s going to be another very cold night.