Onward to the Sierras

Sitting here at a german bakery in Tehachapi. We made it to town last night after two days in the Mojave. When we left the HikerTown Hostel on Monday, we definately didn't expect to be huddling for warmth on our journey through the desert. The temps went from 95 to 45 with a sudden cold windstorm. Travelling through the desert was like an extreme sport, hopping up on burms and pushing with all of our strength through wind gusts. Tehachapi has been a great town stop. Every single person here has been so friendly. We had read in the guidebook that it was spread out and hard to get around so we weren't sure how it would turn out. When we got out of the mountains and to te road, chilled to the bone and windswept, we weren't looking forward to hitch hiking on a quiet highway. We stuck our thumbs out, smiled, and the first car picked us up. He said that his church had told the congregation about all of us and that we would be needing rides into town! We dropped our stuff at a motel and rushed out into the cold to find a restaurant that was still open. We were coming up empty when we came to The Village Grille that was closing up. They let us in anyway and stayed open long enough for us to enjoy real food--burgers and fries. This morning, when we were walking out to run our errands, a woman, Joy, and her two kids stopped at the corner to offer us a ride to wherever we needed to go. She left her number, insisting that we call her when we were ready to leave the store. After we finished our grocery shopping, we were standing outside of the store, chatting with some locals and getting ready to walk the miles to the edge of town. A man who worked at Albertson's, Frank, came up to join the conversation, he was a backpacker himself and knew all about the trail. He was just getting off shift and offered us a ride. He even stopped to pick up another fellow hiker on the way. In the bakery, we met Daniel, who fills a water cache on one of the dryer stretches of the trail. When he found out when we had gone through there, he was truly bummed that we had gotten there right before he had delivered a basket of green apples to the cache. Most of our posts are becoming about all of the trail magic we have received. It never ceases to surprise and humble us.

This is the last major desert section and then we are in the sierras. I can hardly believe that it's happening. Graduating to a new chapter of the trip. And no more desert! For a while, at least. Hesitations about this section from before we set out on this trip are long gone now. We can totally do this!