Mile 265 – Lions and Tigers and Grizzly Bears, Oh my!

San Jacinto

Jeesh… Where do we begin! It has been 6 days since our last post and it feels like it has been at least a month! Currently (Saturday), we are sitting in a laundry mat typing wearing an Exon employee shirt while Justin wears a Disney Tram conductor shirt that we are borrowing from the hiker friendly Nature’s Inn in Big Bear City.

Dental Hygiene admiring San Jacinto

After departing from Idyllwild, we descended from the San Jacintos towards Interstate 10, and we left behind snow to be greeted by dry warmer temperatures and incredible wind. We hiked nearly 10 hours and without exaggerating we probably had 20 minutes of wind under 20 mph. I suppose that explains the strategic placement of the wind farm we hiked passed.

After another rattlesnake dance, we were happy to arrive and enjoy camping with fellow hikers at a the Nature Conservancy, a small private park nestled up a steep desert canyon. We met the terrific Sir Mix Alot, who generously shared a bag of sunflowers seeds, peanuts, and some of his homemade protein mix with us after we spoke of purchasing too little food for the push to Big Bear.

Each day that passes we learn a little more about ourselves and a lot about the trail. One such lesson came from some of the smallest critters in these dry places, our dear ant friends. After some early morning miles we stopped for our first snack, to be enjoyed in some precious shade beneath a creekside tree. We placed our packs down and within moments had dug into some triscuts while slicing some cheese (one of Melissa’s favorite snacks). Seconds later, I complained of something crawling on my leg and upon looking down l was blown away by the number of ants EVERYWHERE! My legs, our shirts, food bag, backpacks, basically everything we have was covered with ants! I had failed to see the pile of no longer identifiable goo next to our food bag that was attracting them and they let us know.

After our ant dance, we splashed around mission creek before starting the ascent up the creek into our next mountain range.

While ascending into the San Bernadino Wilderness, we constantly skipped back and forth across Mission Creek. We had little difficulty in crossing the remaining snow patches in the range and never tired of the incredible views of the desert floor and the now distant towering Mt. San Jacinto.

Now, you may be wondering “What is up with that title?” Well… As we hiked into Big Bear City, about 15 miles out, Melissa stumbled over the word “bbbb bb bb Bear!” I was about 30 ft ahead of her and stopped in my tracks thinking a Black Bear was near me. Instead, about 40 ft away from us, there was a grizzly bear looking over – behind a metal cage. Not only that, there was a huge African Lion and two tigers caged behind the bear! Our mouths dropped and we stood there for about five minutes shocked by what we were seeing in the middle of the Alpine desert forest. Turns out, these are the animals you see in movies that a man by the name of Randy Miller owns.  His website is http://predatorsinaction.com.

2010 Predators In Action Work Reel from Randy Miller on Vimeo.

So now we rest in Big Bear City, eating delicious food, doing laundry, eating more delicious food and resupplying food for the trail. Today (Sunday) we will have a lazy morning before setting back out on the trail this afternoon.

We have been uploading videos to our Youtube account which is located at http://YouTube.com/user/inspireout. If you have a YouTube account, please subscribe!

Enjoy and happy trails!