A windy day in the San Filipe Hills on the Pacific Crest Trail, California (#PC0001)

      They are about as different as can be - these southern reaches of the Appalachian and Pacific Crest Trails.  Sweeping deserts, brush-covered hills, and towering fault-block mountains are what the hiker encounters as he travels north from the Mexican border on the Pacific Crest Trail. With such extremes in topography come concerns related to moisture and climate.  In low-lying areas, water sources may be more than twenty miles apart, and it becomes necessary to carry a gallon or more of water (in addition to everything else) through the stifling desert heat.  Elsewhere concerns about dehydration give way to concerns about hypothermia, as the hiker may have to struggle through spring snowfields at the highest elevations of the San Jacinto, San Bernardino and San Gabriel Mountains. But with such extremes in elevation, comes the dramatic diversity of landscape and natural environment common to the American West.  On one day, a hiker may exhilarate in the pine scented air on the crest of a fault-block mountain, and the next, be mystified by the spiny, thorny world of cacti and yucca found on the floor of a desert valley.

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© Berkshire Wild Publications & David Gafney 2004

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