[pct-l] weather reality

["William M. Stenzel" <manjovin@concentric.net>]

I prepared for my first long hike on the PCT while living in Alaska; I
heard glowing reports of trail conditions, packed up my stuff and headed
south. Imagine my surprise as, riding on Amtrack south through the
Central Valley, I see snow-capped peaks looming up in the distance! 
	This winter, I live in Davis, CA, and watch those distant mountains day
by day. Yesterday, the Sierras received 10 feet of snow. There is no way
I would consider starting a through hike before mid-May without heading
up to the trail and checking the conditions out myself. Even then I
would leave prepared for late season storms. 

Living in the shadow of the range gives you added respect for its moods.
I have only seen the entire valley clear of storms for one day since
November. Analogy: very view native Nepali have any desire to climb the
great peaks; they know what the weather is like. 

will

Filters: I don't know why everyone is bagging on the MSR waterworks. It
pumped oodles of water from some very sketchy sources all through a
three month trip. It never broke, is easy to clean, and pumps quickly.
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Cc:            pct-mailing list <PCT-L@backcountry.net>
From:          Jeffrey Olson <jjolson@u.washington.edu>
Date:          Mon, 25 Jan 1999 17:26:04 -0800 (PST)
Subject:       Re: [pct-l] What about the tedium and boredom?
Content-type:  TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII

I used to hop up and down trying to get a shoulder strap or a waist band
stress point to tear so I could stop for an hour and sew it up!

Jeffrey Olson
Seattle, where if it isn't raining, its threatening to...



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