Three men under-estimated hike

March 17, 1985
Northern Slope, San Jacinto Mountains
1985-013

ForwardReturn to IndexBack

By Mel Krug

The call came very early in the morning to meet at first light to search for three men overdue on the PCT. The three started from Snowcreek the day before and were supposed to have gone up the Pacific Crest Trail and over the top to the Tram and down the Tram by the same afternoon. Sounds pretty unlikely to me , even for people familiar with the mountain and in good shape.

It seemed likely we would search by air for a while on this one so I figured if I got there early maybe I'd get to fly. Sure enough, Ray Hussey and I went up with Mike Donovan from Landells Aviation and searched the PCT up until we hit the road heading toward Twin Pines Boys Ranch and picked up their tracks. While we were searching by air and occasionally landing to check prints we got the call that they had indeed walked out to Twin Pines.