China Camp to Big Sur

This weekend was the 9^th annual China Camp to Big Sur backpacking trip on Memorial Day weekend. I went on this last year, but the weather was much hotter and my backpack was heavier, so it wasn't nearly as much fun as this year was. With Brian's help, I got my backpack down to 7 pounds without food or water, turning out to be under 20 with the full 3 liters of water. It also helped that I had a frameless GoLite pack which weighed less than one pound. I shared an REI QuarterDome tent with Matthew for the hike.

We left early on Saturday morning from the local Safeway parking lot at 5:30, after waking up at 4:30 and having a pancake breakfast. It was about an hour's drive to the start of the hike at China Camp in the Ventana wilderness. We soon left and hiked 7½ miles to Pine Ridge, which was planned to be our first stop for the night. However, do to predicted rain and wind, we decided to hike an extra 3½ miles to the Redwood Creek camp, some 2800 feet below in the valley. As it turned out, the rain didn't come until late the next day, but Redwood Creek turned out to be a nicer place to camp anyway.

Sunday morning was nice because we got to sleep in 'till 6:30, so I got to catch up on some much-needed sleep. This was by far the easiest day. About half way through, we came to a river crossing. Some people tried to get across dry on the rocks, resulting on a few full-body plunges into the river. I decided the easiest way across would just be to wade, and that proved successful. After drying off and eating breakfast, we continued the next couple of miles to Barlow Flats, the stop for the next night.

We arrived at Barlow Flats around 11:00, so we had a whole afternoon to relax and―at least we thought―swim in the watering hole. However, the water turned out to be so cold that all most could do was wade in about knee-deep. By about 1:00, we were all set up and ready to just do whatever we wanted, so a few of us started a fire in the fire pit from some embers left over from previous campers. After about 30 minutes, it had become a decent-sized fire, and we spent the next couple of hours sitting around it, getting wood from a nearby redwood log. After boiling water for freeze-dried Pasta Primavera that actually turned out to be quite good, we spent the evening until about 9:00 sitting by the fire before going to sleep.

This morning, the weather cleared up and got warmer, but luckily the hike was almost done. I had my first fall of the hike, but it wasn't that bad and I only got a couple of scratches. We finished the hike at the Big Sur Ranger Station about 10:30. I rode home with Matthew and on the way, we stopped to get food at the local Nepenthe restaurant.