Day 13
Start: Forbes Saddle
Finish: Idyllwild
Daily Mileage: 15
Trip Mileage: 179.4
The night started calm but soon became windy. My tent was getting condensation, but the wind cleared that out. Didn’t sleep the best with the draftiness.
Justice and I broke camp, and I had high hopes for the day with the apparent snow-free condition of the peaks ahead. We hit the trail together due to the potential conditions ahead. We were able to follow the tracks of a couple that kept going ahead of us last night. On the southern side of Spitler Peak, the trail was good and we made good progress climbing. However, as we wrapped around to the east and northeast sides of the mountain, the snow built up and became icy due to less exposure to the sun. The trail disappeared under the snow at times, and we had to pick our way forwards. In addition, there was a wildfire in the area in 2018 and there were many blowdowns and new growth covering the trail
Progress was slow due to all of these factors. The icy snow slopes were ok to cross, but I knew they were supposed to be much steeper on the next peak.
We took a break at the saddle between Spitler and Apache Peaks, and I did some thinking. Apache Peak is where a thru-hiker died in a fall down a chute in 2020, and there was already a rescue of another hiker there this year. Though I was carrying an ice axe and microspikes, the trail report for the area recommended actual crampons and mountaineering skills for some sections of the route ahead up to 9,000 feet. Given the conditions I already saw rounding Spitler Peak, I decided it was most prudent and safe to hike around the remaining unknowns of the San Jacinto range. There was a side trail down here, and it was the last side trail for a while, after several reported challenges ahead.
I discussed this with Justice, and we both agreed it would be best if we took the side trail down and hiked around the area. Perhaps I could have successfully completed the traverse, but I was left with the question of why I would do that. It would mainly be for the bragging rights of completing the difficult traverse, and that is probably the worst reason for a dangerous hike like this.
I do intend to complete a continuous hike from Mexico to Canada, and that could still be completed if we hiked around the area. I already hiked through Warner Springs not on the PCT, and will likely on trails ahead to avoid summer wildfires. There are probably few, if any, hikers each year that complete the full, actual PCT. I’m not trying to justify deviating from the PCT, but explaining my thinking. I think it was definitely the right decision to go down, and I have no qualms with it at all.
We headed down the alternate trail, and the snow quickly disappeared, leading to an easy hike. It took a while to lose all of the elevation that we had gained, but eventually we were dumped out at a trailhead.
There is no official way to get back to the PCT, so I had to make it up using topo maps on Gaia. There were two options. One using a trail and 4×4 tracks, and another using a road and 4×4 tracks. The road route was a bit shorter, so we selected that. After a couple miles on the road route, we encountered a sign that the road was private and no trespassers were allowed. Oh well, it looked like National Forest according to my map, so we continued on cautiously. We passed a number of houses and every one had no trespassing signs of some level of aggressiveness, and we had a particular feeling of unwelcome. Towards the end of the road, a truck did stop and talk to us and warn us that the people along the road didn’t like outsiders, but we were already through the worst of it so we should be fine. We were shortly on official forest roads and I breathed a sigh of relief.
We navigated the forest roads for a couple hours and got some good views of the range we were hiking around. It didn’t look bad from here, but it would be impossible to see the exact trail conditions.
The forest road eventually became paved roads as we entered Idyllwild once again and headed for the San Jacinto State Park campsite I stayed in a few days before for the cheap camping. Tea and Juicy Popsicle were the only other hikers there and we chatted while Justice and I figured our our next move for the hike ahead. It was not a real town stop since we still had trail food and didn’t need all of the chores, so it was a relaxing evening.
Looking back on the traverse we went around, there are already several reports from other hikers of extreme difficulty just after we turned off the trail, and a hiker even needed to self-arrest today. Another hiker messaged Justice to not go past Spitler as well. It definitely seems that we made the right decision today, and I will fully stand behind it with no regrets.