[pct-l] Checking for trail conditions

[Diane at Santa Barbara Hikes dot com]

One way to check for trail conditions ahead of you is to read the  
trail journals. I used the trail journals last year to figure out  
where people I knew were, to see if they were still on the trail,  
ahead of me or behind me. If you can find the time to read them, you  
might find some info about conditions, especially if you find a  
journal-keeper ahead of you that likes to put in a lot of detail. You  
could also assign someone at home the task of checking conditions  
reported by people well ahead of you and they can email you the  
details you might need. They could monitor journals and let you know  
of anything coming up. You won't get a lot of quickly-accessed info  
or 100% coverage, but you'll at least get something. In general, so  
much happens on the trail every minute that even from morning to  
evening half the things that happened are soon forgotten. I forgot  
completely that there were a few blowdowns on the section between  
highway 74 and Devil's Slide that I struggled over, and that was only  
a week and a half ago. Seriously, if you had asked me the morning  
after, I wouldn't have remembered them.

Another way to monitor conditions is through the PCTA on their trail  
conditions page:
http://www.pcta.org/planning/during_trip/current.asp

Again, you won't get 100% coverage and much of the information is  
quite time-sensitive (lots of snow could be no snow by the time you  
get there). After I complained to Warner Springs Monty one evening  
last year about all the downed trees down from Fuller Ridge, he  
admonished me to send in my reports to the PCTA rather than just  
complain or else nobody will know what needs to be done. So I  
encourage others to do the same.