Unless you’re living in the wilderness and just now have exited, you know California and most other states and countries are battling the COVID-19 virus. As events in the first half of March started to made some kind of quarantine or lockdown possible in California, I had started preparing for it at work and home.

In a sense, I was pretty well prepared already (or thought I was). I have an earthquake kit in my apartment (and a smaller one in my Jeep), filled water jugs for emergencies, all sorts of backpacking gear, and a bunch of dehydrated backpacking food. I’m confident I could survive for a month or more with what I had (I even had a water filter if I needed to filter water). And my cats had their own earthquake kit, so they would be safe with me as well.

But I made a point to go through my earthquake kits and make sure they were still up to date and would help me should the worse happen. I refreshed some batteries, replaced some food that was nearing their expiration dates, added a couple additional things (like putting one of my solar charging panels in it), and made sure it was ready to be used as needed.

I did go to the grocery store and get some additional food in case there ended up being multiple weeks of being unable to go out. This was still early before the stores really got cleaned out, so I even snagged some toilet paper to add to what I had on hand already.

I also ended up buying some more dehydrated backpacking food, but mostly since I was worried that I might not be able to get it in June when I was preparing for my John Muir trail trek. But since it can be kept for years, it was a safe purchase since I’d eventually use it. I also got a few extra gas canisters for my backpacking stove, just in case I had to use it to cook. Again, they would be used eventually, so what the heck.

And although I don’t think it will come to it, a passing thought was that with my Jeep I could head into the Sierra Nevadas (after the snow melts) and find a private spot in the wilderness to wait out the apocalypse.

Then Monday, March 16th arrived and San Francisco and most other counties in the Bay Area announced a shelter in place order was going to be implemented at midnight that night. It was a ridiculously short time frame, but I did my best to prepare my company for working from home. We had started some work on that the previous week, but things went into overdrive.

Making sure to take a laptop and some other items I might need from my office, I took a trip home on BART. As I went though my supplies to verify what I had, I ordered a pizza (which would actually feed me for several days-plus who knows how long the pizza shop would be open for business).

Getting myself and the end users I support up to speed to be able to work from home was the focus of the rest of the work week, but at least I was still employed and being paid.

As for wandering, since I wasn’t taking a bike to BART or walking from BART to my office any more, I did have to make a point to get out and get some fresh air. Fortunately, the shelter in place orders understood that people had to be able to exercise and get out of their homes at least a little. So as long as you made a point of not getting too close (6 feet) or interacting directly with people who were not in your household, you could get out of the house. Going for gas and food was also allowed. I even found some milk at one store, so froze one bottle and will use the other mostly for breakfast cereal over the next week.

So I did manage to get some little walks (and even a longer bike ride in on Friday afternoon) in during the week. Just had to be careful of where I went and keep my distance as I passed people.

It didn’t help that the previous weekend was very rainy, so I didn’t get my usually long weekend hike in. That led me to already being sick of being at home during most of the first four days.

Saturday was supposed to be nice, so I did get out to Mt Diablo State Park to do a decently long hike. Again, that was allowed as long as you did your best to avoid contact with the people and kept your distance when passing.

Please see my description of that hike in my March 2020 day hikes post: https://wandering.earth/index.php/2020/03/01/march-2020-day-hikes/

Of course, this shelter in place order could also affect my planned backpacking trips in spring and summer.

In fact, it has already caused my 3 night trip through the Ohlone Wilderness in early April to be canceled by the East Bay Regional Parks. Kind of sucks, because being in the wilderness should technically be the safest place right now. But the Ohlone wilderness is still pretty close to civilization and you have to camp in designated campgrounds, so they don’t want people congregating together in the camps and along the trails.

Since I was going to use that trip to test out a possible new backpack, that was already a blow to my plans for this year. I haven’t decided if I will get the new backpack after all, but I may still since REI has a pretty good return policy.

My hope to climb Mt Shasta in late spring was also at risk and my short Pt Reyes backpacking trip in June is also in the cross-hairs (but hasn’t been canceled yet).

Of course, my main concern is my John Muir Trial trek being affected. Hopefully things are under control by July and August and I can go forward with it. At the moment, I’m still going through all the planning in the hope that it will happen. Most of my planning will not really cost me any significant amounts and can be applied to next year (assuming the Human Race survives).

With Yosemite now closed, it will have to reopen to even have a shot to do it. Not to mention Inyo Forest would have to allow through hikers. The group managing PCT permits has already advised those trekkers to not start their treks and to end their treks if they have already started. The PCT goes from Mexico to Canada, so people generally start in spring and take all summer to reach Canada.

So while there are a lot of more important things in the world, hiking and backpacking is a big part of my life and I don’t see any way I can enjoy life as much if I can’t get out and wander the world…

I’m lucky to still be working (from home) and being paid. And virus free (as far as I know).

Not being able to hike much is a problem, but I am getting bike rides and walks in around the neighborhood (I’m getting used to knowing where to go where I Don’t run into too many people).

With the nice weather this weekend and still some nice snow coverage in Yosemite around Badger pass, I might have been headed there this weekend for some late winter backpacking, but naturally that is off the table now.

I’m probably going to bike to Mt Diablo and then do a long hike there. Since I’m not driving, it’s allowed as long as I keep my distance from others.

It will depend on how things are in July and beyond, but I’m still planning my JMT trek for this summer. Most of the planning can be applied to next year, if need be.

I actually have a Glacier Point to Whitney permit for mid July and just landed a Happy Isles to Whitney permit in mid September in the lottery. That is a bit late and not what I was aiming for, but this year things might not be fully open to allow a JMT trek until that late. Mid August would be a NOBO from Cottonwood Pass as the third choice.

What kind of sucks for next year is I was planning on going to Japan and doing some hiking in the Japan Alps. The kicker: I didn’t want to go this year due to the Olympics.

So the virus has already disrupted two years of my plans.

Hopefully I can salvage some of my plans for this year once the virus is under some kind of control.