Pacific Crest Trail Day 18: So Much For Conclusions

PCT Day 18 — May 14, 2025
Cleghorn Slope to Interstate 15, Cajon Pass, McDonald’s
Trains and Planes Camp to Back In SD Camp
PCT miles: 6.4 miles
Total miles: 348.5 miles
Elevation change: 722ft gain, 1230ft loss

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Was I losing my grip on reality, or was it tightening? A wash of uncertainty scrubbed my brain into a turbid morass. I was either on the verge of my great epiphany or hopelessly lost in philosophical purgatory. And I hadn’t invited this exploration. It just happened.

The PCT was all done for 2025. The plan worked perfectly, and I was back in San Diego, walking to my friends’ place on a perfectly pleasant, predictable, and boring afternoon. The shaggy palm trees rustled, underappreciated like so many wonders of this paradise, where residents are lulled indifferent by the perpetual gorgeousness that defies the seasons. At least, I didn’t appreciate how good I had it when I lived here. Every time I visit, though…

I had a burrito in my belly and a bag of them in my hand. My backpack was light, with minimal food and water, and the hip belt buckles dangled behind my knees, unneeded for the casual stroll. My left knee was still funky, but not bothersome on the flat sidewalk. My blisters were done giving me a hard time.

So what thought intrigued and perturbed me so on this idyllic amble? Welp, here I was, back in San Diego, where this whole shindig began a little under three weeks ago. It was almost like nothing had happened at all. Aside from a few minor details, it could have been three weeks ago. Where did those days, weeks, miles, and experiences go? I had hiked 350 miles on the PCT, finishing just this morning, but holy shit, what the heck did it matter? I came back to revisit and remember, to commemorate and celebrate my thru in 2015, and I had. However, for all those 350 miles and 18 days of revelations, I had no more to show for it than I had before I started. Eighteen days ago, there were memories of 2015 swirling in my skull. Now this trip was done. My memories of 2025 were no more vibrant than those of 2015. The near past wasn’t so different from the distant past after all. Memories were memories only, and I could have mistaken this new collection for a particularly powerful sneeze. Had the trip been worth it? Did I gain anything? Maybe I lost something, some marbles perhaps? What was the purpose? Did there need to be a purpose?

As you know, I’ve been thinking a lot about memory and memories these past few weeks, so I was primed to be weirded out. And coming back to where I started wasn’t helping either. Having gone full circle now, down to the burrito, it really wasn’t difficult to pretend that the hiking hadn’t happened at all. Time stretched and compacted behind me. At once, 18 days and an hour simultaneously. My memories were the difference. Well, I was suspiciously stinky and my feet ached too, but everything about this hike, except for what I could presently feel, was abstract. It had both happened and not happened. I could trust my memories or not. And I didn’t want to feel this way. I just did. In 2015, I benefited from finishing the PCT in Canada, a very different place from where I started. There was no way of explaining that away with a sneeze, and I was jealous of that now. I wanted to feel like I had done something great without needing to convince myself that it had happened at all.

Yet for as flawed as my memory might be, it’s all that I have. The alternative is amnesia, so I cherish, covet, and recycle my memories for more than they are worth. A cup of water has unlimited value to the thirsty hiker in the desert, even if they’d prefer a margarita. When the alternative is death, no price is too high. And in this way, I desperately cling to memories, because they’re free and the only things separating me from oblivion. I’d gladly take one of those cool memory savers that Dumbledore uses in Harry Potter, but all I have is what’s between my ears. It could be better, and it could be worse.

Later that night, I was talking quietly with Sophia after her kiddos were in bed, trying to explain all of this. Turns out, I’m not the only one. As a young parent of a toddler and an infant, time was a disturbing concept for her too. And to paraphrase, humans partner up, have kids, hang out with each other, because there is security in shared experience. We can laugh, cry, and reminisce about our lives together in ritual reassurance that it was all real, that it all maybe meant something. We build our castle of experiences, sifting and sorting, placing the blocks that we like best on the outer facade, while leaving the others entrenched in the foundation, only to be revealed when the time and personnel are right. The folks that were there when the stones were carved are also the mortar that holds them together. And without that, they shift and crumble. And let me tell you, my 2025 PCT tower was feeling pretty flimsy. I left, I hiked, and I came back. There was this world and that one, and I couldn’t reconcile the two. It was just me, like an astronaut returning from a solo mission to the moon. How could I be sure that what I thought happened had actually happened? There was no mortar, and a wind was rising.

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Uh, hello, hiking?

Yeah, right! I tried, I really did try, to sleep in on my last morning. I made it until 5:30am, but the coolness was too good to pass up. The prime hiking time was here. I packed up all my damp gear and got moving, wondering how my thermometer could read 41F when there was also frost on my stuff. That was a good question that I promptly forgot to consider.

My knee was in scary shape, or it would have been scary if I had 2300 miles more to hike this summer. It didn’t look swollen, but it didn’t feel like my knee either. Hiking 28 miles on it yesterday had clearly not been good rehab, but I didn’t need to hike 28 miles to figure that one out. Once it warmed up, it was fine on the starting uphill, but I wasn’t stoked for the big down that I knew was coming.

However, that discomfort was, like, 20 minutes away at least. And before that, check out this sunrise. There was humidity in the air. I could see it. Hah, take that Missouri person! It hazed in the way that it does, airbrushing the layered ridgelines smooth of features and moving them further away. Spectacular. I was glad to be up and hiking instead of pretending to snooze.

I ran out of that smooth uphill shortly after. Cresting the ridge, it was all downhill to the interstate. All downhill to McDonald’s. All downhill to the end. But what a downhill. Now this place, I remembered. It was a badland of steep fins, erosion in sharp progress. The trail found a way through the maze, following the narrow ridges, and I gritted my teeth against the pain in my knee during the steepest parts. I tried to enjoy every moment, precious as they were, but that wasn’t possible. I stopped a few times to admire the yellow flowers, then the short final section through a rocky gorge carpeted with cottonwoods, but I was relieved when the parting walls revealed the rushing highway. Finally.

Despite the pain and directional irrelevance, I hobbled down the embankment to the wide concrete underpass. It wasn’t built for hiking, but this was where the PCT continued north without me. The modest flow from the gorge spread to a wide sheen of darkness across three-quarters of the eroded floor. A hiker entered ahead of me, and I watched them disappear into the gloom around the subterranean bend. Then I listened to the footsteps fade, easily drowned out by the rumbling traffic above. I followed a dozen yards to where the shadow started, crossing the threshold for only a second, then quickly stepping back into the sunlight. It’s where I belonged. I didn’t want to walk through that dark tunnel or find out what lay on the other side. I wanted what was on this side. I wanted the light.

Before joining the flotsam of hikertrash caught in the McDonald’s dining room, I squatted on a curb at the edge of the parking lot. I laid out some gear to dry, popped off my shoes, and popped a couple of Advil. Then I ate from the dregs of my food bag. There was nothing for me to eat inside, so I filled up before heading in. 

With cooled feet, I followed some friends inside and took a seat at a booth. This place had been remodeled since 2015, and it was nice. I grabbed a coffee and watched the others eat their fill. It took a few rounds, but they pulled it off. Then it was time to say goodbye. First two of them, then to three more after a trail angel picked us up and brought us to Wrightwood. Just me.

They’d all congratulated me, knowing that I was done with my hike. That was cool. For them to acknowledge my achievement, even though it was small in comparison to what each of them hoped to accomplish. They were kind, and I hoped that they would all make it to Canada. And I was glad to be done hiking, not just for the sake of my knee, but for the sake of everything else too. Time to rest, recover, and go home. Time to keep rolling along. The PCT wasn’t my path forward anymore. It wasn’t that simple.

The plan went off without a hitch, and by 3:30pm, I was sitting outside El Zarape, halfway through a seriously dank burrito. Not much longer and I was reeling, deep in philosophical inquest, confused by memory and time. Hours later, a two-year-old had shared all of his germs with me, and I was exhausted. Nothing had quite gelled in my mind, and I went to bed ready for further percolation while I rested.

My conclusion for now? It’s all about the present moment. I don’t really know what that means or what to do with it, but I bet that meditating would help me figure it out. Problem is, I’ve never meditated before, and learning how sounds hard. If only this hiking thing worked better, right?  I guess I’ll keep trying and look for a route that I haven’t done before to avoid all this memory business.

*ALERT ALERT: Tour du Mont Blanc in July. Tour du Mont Blanc in July. Tour du Mont Blanc in July.*

Hrmmmmmm.

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That’s a wrap for PCT 2025. Thanks for coming along, and I hope that it didn’t get too weird for you. If it did, sorry. I didn’t see it coming.

In a lot of ways, I got more from this experience than I expected. Some were tough — more blisters, more fatigue, more knee pain. But there was also more of the pleasant stuff — more confidence, more friends, more appreciation for the life I’m living, and way more flowers. However, the best part of this exercise, and the least expected, was my exploration of memory. Often, it felt like gobbledygook to think about, and it wasn’t until I tried writing about it that anything made sense. Not that it all makes sense now, but I think that I at least have a grasp of what I’m confused about. There’s more thinking to be done, more stuff to figure out. In the meantime, thanks for letting me make a mess. Without you, I wouldn’t blog. Without this blog, I wouldn’t write. And without writing, many of my thoughts would blow away like the scent of warm sage in the breeze.

All the best and happy hiking,

❤ Owen