Days 24 - Angels in Wrightwood

Sunday morning we hiked 17 or so miles down to Highway 2 to catch a ride into Wrightwood.  On the way we passed a trail that drops down 2500 feet or so off the side of a ridge directly into the town.  But most of us didn't want to hike back up that crazy trail the next morning to return to where we left off.  So we opted to go until we hit the highway, then hitch the 6 miles back to town.  When Stride, Dayhiker, Caveman and I reached the road we found a group of 4 trail runners relaxing after their run.  They'd just done 20 miles and all acted like it was no big deal.  Sure, I can do that many miles, with a pack, but I'm certainly not running.  And it takes me all day.  Unfortunately they didn't have room for us, but they did give us some bananas.

Caveman hiked on but we were joined by Dayman and Castle.  The 5 of us moved up the road to start trying to get a hitch.  After a few minutes a large, white van pulled up.  The couple driving it were on their way back home from some chainsaw training; they do maintenance on the trail.  The van was all fixed up to be an RV.  They made room and we piled in; "piled" is a perfect word for how crowded it was, but we made it to town.

I bought a few days' worth of food at the store, then we went to a restaraunt for dinner.  There we met a couple, Tracey and Brian, who had earlier given Opus and Joe a ride to town.  They generously offered us showers, laundry and a night at their house.  They drove Joe, Opus, Castle and me back to their house.  A shower felt great, I focused a lot of attention on my feet.  Clutch, Dayhiker and Dayman came a while later.  I got to sleep on the hide-a-bed which had an air mattress and was super comfortable.  I can't say enough about how awesome it was for our angels to host all 7 of us like they did.  Tracey even gave us a ride back out to the trail the next morning.