They wandered the desert for 40 days. On the 40th day, they discovered the promised land. A land with coffee. A land with bacon. A land with sausage. A land with pancakes. Yea. Verily, they were delivered unto Denny’s.
We tried to find a way to get back to Paradise Cafe. This is California. Aren’t all roads supposed to lead to Paradise? We thought we could get a bus to Mojave where we could get another bus to Palm Springs. It turned out the bus from Mojave would take us through Bakersfield, which we were trying to avoid, and the price for the bus and travel time…yada yada yada, we are going to rent a car and get there more directly, faster, and cheaper than the bus.
After we finalized our travel plans, we celebrated with an ice cream stop. From my vast dairy experiences from last year on the AT, I wasted no time in my selection of a banana split. For a mere $0.20 more than a triple scoop of ice cream, I get a banana, whipped topping, 3 cherries, nuts, strawberries, and hot fudge. There’s not a better bargain on the planet. My 3 lame companions claimed they were too full for such a great bargain. Everyone knows ice cream only fills in the voids and does not actually take up any stomach space.
Bunny claimed she had work to do and went back to the hotel room (where I eventually found her napping) while we went to the Maturango Museum which has a few exhibits on the history of the north Mojave including the geologic, animal, Native American, and early European settlers.
While we were still full and Bunny was not with us, we went grocery shopping to get enough food to make it to Idyllwild. Funny, for the first time, I am not weighed down with a crapload of extra food. I wonder if there might be some connection to Bunny’s absence.
Kevin (Hike Alone) texted me yesterday and said he was only 30 miles from Walker Pass and he was planning on making the 1:20 bus tomorrow. I texted him today and told him we have a car and can pick him up if he steps it up a notch and gets in by 10. There will be 5 of us heading to Paradise tomorrow.
Just one more meal and it was a day. We ended up walking a couple miles in town today so we burned off some of the excess calories we wanted to carry out with us. It’s tough to stay on top of food on the trail. The only task left for us is to eat the microwave popcorn we have been carrying for the last hundred miles. Work work work.
EFG