We step off the train in San Diego and everything is the same as when we left southern California one week ago, and yet it’s totally different feeling too. But perhaps it’s just that we feel different now, like stepping into a new life. Slowly, by degrees and leaps the reality of what we’re doing sinks in. A dawning that’s lasted days and weeks.
Before long we’re picked up by none other than Frodo herself – one half of the famous trail angel couple Scout and Frodo. She is a petite stoic woman. By the time we swing by the airport there are five soon to be PCT hikers riding along in a minivan trying to make small talk as we wind into the hills above San Diego.
At the house people are milling about, there is a grocery store run for snacks, and people drift from room to room, uncertainty abounds. Everything is starting but not quite yet.
Over dinner Scout gently rambles to and fro, covering topics such as house rules, trail angle etiquette, LNT, and the history of the PCT itself while 25 thru hiking hopefuls eat tacos in rapt silence. 66 years old with an exuberant ease, childlike and joyful Scout is a delight to listen to, while Frodo plays the straight man, chiming in with small corrections and easing the topic back on track whenever her husband drifts too far afield. What people, what kindness, who could possibly ask for more than these remarkable folks are giving us. I could listen to them talk forever and a day, but soon dinner, along with the announcements, are over and a short time later people drift off to bed.
Tomorrow it all starts for real. Though what that will truly mean in the minutes and details of a thru hike remain a mystery, at least one last night.