Day 36 – Tehachapi and Trail Celebrities

May 16th

We woke up covered in sand for the second time on trail — at least this time less found its way into my mouth! Since we had such a big day yesterday there were only 13 miles to Willow Springs road and a ride to Tehachapi where we planned on zeroing. The next stretch to Kennedy Meadows is a longer one without town stops so we want to take advantage of Tehachapi : )

We finished the uphill we’d started yesterday over a few miles and then came upon a cache with water and chairs!

Tomtit, Amir, and Forest

We ended up hiking through another wind farm — Tehachapi has the largest wind farm in the world.

Thankfully not a water source

Then something very exciting for me happened — I met two hiking celebrities! GoalTech is a section hiker who goes southbound and hands out trail magic in the form of chips and other goodies. He is doing a week of the section we just hiked and he started his second day with Rockin’, another famous (to me) hiker. Rockin’ and GoalTech both know the triple crown hiker Wired in person, and she was the inspiration for me to hike the PCT. Tomtit witnessed my starstruck blabbering when I realized who was coming up the trail. We both got a bag a chips and a can of coke — so cool!

Rockin', GoalTech, and Bushtit

The last few miles flew by and soon we were standing on the road salivating for Taco Bell. Four cars passed by, but the fifth one stopped and took us the 11 miles straight to the Tehachapi Taco Bell. We ordered three burritos each.

We had each eaten a burrito before I stopped to take this picture

Our motel was a mile and a half away so we started walking. A few minutes later a truck pulled over and offered to take us the rest of the way there so we hopped in! The rest of the day was laundry, eating, and going to the movies (Mad Max was insane!). We are staying in the Santa Fe Motel tomorrow night as well to make tomorrow a zero : )