June 5
Arrastre Spring Camp to Big Bear Lake
Miles 256-266
10 miles
There were three other hikers camped at the same place as me. In the morning, they all woke up before dawn, packed up in a matter of minutes, and sped off on winged shoes. How do they all do that?
I had set my hopes on making my first 10 by 10. That’s ten miles by 10 am. And I am so not there yet. By 10:00, I had walked five miles. I imagined all the other hikers, already in town, eating burritos and soaking their feet. Be that speedy girl I told myself, and tried to move my legs faster.
By noon I had made it to Highway 18. I stuck my thumb up and the second car pulled over. Hooray! The woman driving told me, “I have an appointment in town but I’ll drop you off and you’ll be most of the way there.” Turns out, by “most of the way” she meant 8 miles away from the hostel. But I was near a bus stop so I got the long slow introduction to Big Bear. I went to the Von’s for resupply, then caught a second bus to the village. By the time I arrived at the hostel I had chatted with half the people in town and gotten full updates on their medical coverage.
I got a top bunk at the hostel but decided the shower was worth it. Big 5, I discovered, does not have single lightweight cookpots. I bought a pair of bike gloves to keep my hands from getting cancer. For dinner, I went to a Mexican restaurant and ate my weight in delicious food.
Spinstera 