PCT Day 7
Mile: 77.3 to 77.3 aka rest day
Start: comfy hotel room at the Oak Hill Inn, Julian, CA
Finish: comfy hotel room at the Oak Hill Inn, Julian, CA
When we woke up at 6:30am, our bodies were still extremely sore and we decided that we still needed another day of rest. From the laziness of our room we texted the owner Laura to ask if we could stay another day and thankfully she said absolutely.
We spent the day sleeping, showering, blogging, watching TV, eating two breakfasts like we were Hobbits, swimming in the pool and day drinking. It was absolutely lovely and a much needed rest day. In the morning I met Treebeard at a free Aikido class that was going on at the Julian brewery down the street. I thought I was just meeting him and maybe one or two other hikers, but as he came walking down the street with his pack I could see that there were like 10 more PCT hikers who were trailing behind him, which made the lesson all the more awesome. We learned how to defend ourselves with wooden swords and the sensei, who had studied in Japan for 14 years, gave us all sorts of lessons on how to defend ourselves and got us really interested in doing Aikido. Some of the hikers afterwards were even practicing with their hiking poles downtown which was hilarious! At first I was paired up with Crystal from Toronto and we sliced and diced our way through Aikido practice like the game Fruit Ninja.
After class was over, the Trail Angel lesbian couple teaching the class invited the PCT hikers back to their place if they needed a place to stay, do laundry and then they ended up buying everyone pizza! They were so kind and told us that they were going to open up a dojo in Julian to give the community and the local kids something to do besides drinking, drugs and teen pregnancy. It sounded like a good idea to us and we hoped that they would be successful!
Shannon worked a lot during the day while
I caught up on journaling. In the afternoon, we met the hikers staying in the RV that is set up outside the Inn for a bunch of hikers to stay at. Carlos from Mexico City had some tendonitis he was trying to take care of with a local physical therapist. Scott, who is recovering from a case of sun poisoning, had some really killer Taco Bell shorts and made some very wise purchases at the gear store in town buying more sunscreen and a hiking umbrella to stay out of the sun. His sun poisoning was so bad that he had to stay out of the sun and kind of walk in the shadows so it wouldn’t be painful which was nuts.
Apparently PCT hikers can camp in the town graveyard in Julian for free which was a little scary. I guess it would be a quiet night’s rest! Since it was getting closer to the weekend, the tourist activity picked up and we spent most of the day at the hotel instead of town. It was a great day off and much needed after 70-80 miles of hiking.