PS, CA - 2 Bricks Short of a Load

Nanc and Gar went up the hill

To see if they could do it

They reached the top, forgot to stop

And that is how they blew it.

Oops

Nanc and Gar went down the hill

Around each rocky bend

They reached the ground, no car they found

It’s at the other end.

Oof-da

Nanc and Gar back up the hill

They reached the top again

They headed back, brains they lack

And went down at the other end

Now, I’ll tell he story in prose, and, when you reach the end, if you want to call us two bricks short of a load, I might agree. The goal was to hike South Lykken hill, from one end to the other. We knew it was 4.4 miles long, we knew it was 1500’ in elevation. What we probably didn’t realize was that the beginning and the end were both street level. That meant the trail was an inverted ‘V’, steep uphill at the beginning, level in the middle along the hill side, and a steep downhill at the end. But this end was 2 1/2 miles down the sidewalk from our car, or 4.4 miles back up the hill.

The first up was slow at times, or rather I should say that I was slow at times but we finally reached the picnic tables at the top of that section. Nice views, well worth the climb. The middle section, the flatter section along the hill side was easy and the views of the city spread before us for the whole length. Amazing, we were 1500’ up from ground level and we could still hear the leaf blowers being used in the yards down below. We couldn’t hear the traffic in the streets nor the planes at the airport but we could hear the whine of those blowers.

Here’s the middle section of the trail, nice, level and note all the rocks.

At the other end of the trail, before it plummeted off the hillside (at least it seemed that way to me) were some more picnic tables in what is called the Josie Johnson picnic area. Nice touch on the trail. Now the decision. It was 10:30, we had done 4.4 miles, and, hey, we could turn around and head back to the car. But the only way to finish the trail was to go down to street level and then turn around and head back up the hill we’ve just hiked down. I’m sure you all know what the decision was for two people who are sometimes two bricks short of a load. Yep we headed down the hill to street level. Ya can’t say you’ve done a trail if you don’t do the WHOLE trail. There have to be standards, ya know.

We met several couples hiking up the hill and we knew we’d see them again when they were on their way down and we were hiking up again. They’re gonna think we’re nuts.

But, this hike up wasn’t as bad as the first hike up at the beginning. We must have warmed up by now. Back at the top, we had lunch at one of the picnic tables. But we weren’t alone, we had company there - do you think these friendly little fellows have been fed up here before?

And, here’s Gary checking our e-mail 1500’ up and we have perfect reception, not for phone calls but for the web.

It’s all down hill from here and we relished it. We retraced our steps down the trail and reached our car about 2:30.

On the way home we stopped at Trader Joe’s to get some protein bars for our next hikes, picked up some TJ scones which are nothing short of heavenly and headed back to the RV where I planned to make an omelet and accompany it with scones. Oops, the scones did not make it back with us in the car. Shucks. How did that happen? The obviously didn’t get packed with everything else in the bags and must still be on the counter. You know how clerks sometimes put soft things aside to pack on top later?

Plan B for dinner. And, relaxation tomorrow.