Day 3 - Post IBR (2/2) - California

Once I set everything up, I took some time to enjoy the scenery. I couldn’t see very much from my campsite, but if I walked over a ridge, I had a decent view of the surrounding mountains.

After a little exploring and picking up some supplies at the “local” store (which was 9.7 miles away), I went ahead and took a shower at the camp shower house.

The first shower door I opened lead to a small room filled with mosquitoes. When I say filled, there were hundreds of them covering the floor, looking dead, but there hundreds more along the walls of the damp and dark shower room; I left feeling disgusted. The next door I opened lead to a much cleaner shower room (there may have been 2 or 3 mosquitos, but it was nothing compared to before).

After the shower, a man approached me asking about my bike. 

I often meet people who used to ride. They’ll come up and introduce themselves, compliment my bike, then proceed to tell me they stopped long ago because of an accident or they got married. This happens at least once a week usually, but while I was traveling it seemed to happen every few gas stations.

The man was friendly enough, and after a few words I told him I’d stop by later to chat once I’d rested a little more.

I came back around 17:30. The older man was inhis 50s or 60s, lookking healthy besides his sunburnt, peeking skin and round figure.

He was hiking the Pacific Coast Trail (PCT), which ran through the campground. This explained why I had seen so many people wandering the campground in full hiking gear. Most people on thetrail went by trail names and the older man introduced himself as “Papa Bear.” He told me aboutthe life he lived, his life of retirement, and how he was planning on hiking the entire trail (which goes from Mexico to Canada) in approximately 6 months.

We chatted for about 45 minutes about various things, with an occasional hiker from the PCT dropping in to say hi. Papa Bear has been hiking portions of the trail for over 27 years, and knew 100s of other hikers.

After my dinner/chat, I went back to camp and prepped for the following day. After tightening my chain, checking the tires, and wiping down the bike, I got out tomorrow’s clothes and loaded the bike with what I could.

I fell asleep around 20:20. I hadn’t slept for morethan 7 hours in the past 65 hours, and fell asleepquickly.