June 3rd - Ridge to Jackson Flats Campground

I woke up at 2:45am to thunder. Crap! We were cowboy camping on a ridge. I woke up Tom and we frantically packed up. It started hailing and the thunder and lightening was right on top of it. We stumbled around - trying to figure out where to go. We were in a really exposed area with steep terrain. It was difficult enough to find a flat place to camp - never mind trying to find somewhere with decent cover. We ended up going down the trail about 1/4 of a mile and buried ourselves in a bush on the trail. Tom rigged the shelter up on the bush/tree in order to keep us dry. It actually worked quite nice and we stayed warm enough to get some extra zzzz's.

Woke up about 7am to Kobie and Tom stumbling past our make-shift shelter on the trail. They had been awoken by the storm and were hurrying to bail out at Wrightwood. It was hard to take down our dry shelter and hit the cold trail again, but we knew we had to keep moving. Unfortunately, as soon as we had finished packing up and we hit the trail, another round of the storm hit - with lightening, thunder, wind, and hail. The hail pelting us in the face with wind power was enough to stop me in my tracks. We found another bush to bury ourselves in. We waited another hour or so. The storm appeared to pass again and we headed on our way. Made it several miles and then another round of the storm hit.

There were big black clouds like I had never seen before surrounding us. We knew what to expect - more lightening/thunder and hail. We happened to be walking by some ski lifts and spotted a ski lodge. It was all boarded up, but offered at least some shelter from the hail and a little protection from the lightening. We stayed under the deck of the ski lodge for several hours - the storm clouds ever changing, but not going away..

As the afternoon grew on, we became antsy to hit the trail even though the hail, lightening, and thunder were still present. We dodged the lightening for awhile - eventually making it about 5 miles down the trail to Jackson Flats Campground. We didn't want to go further since Mt. Baden-Powell was coming up next. At 9000 feet and the tallest thing around, the storms seemed to be hitting Baden-Powell the worst. Although we only got 15 miles total for the day, we were glad to be in a sheltered place with water.