The ferry to Catalina Island gets cold. Equipped with a pair of running shorts, a Marlboro cutoff, and flip-flops, I had to sit and act like I wasn't freezing my balls off on the back deck as we departed from Dana Point. A heavy shroud of marine layer engulfed us as we entered deeper water, and it took an hour for my hands to thaw once we arrived. When I told a British buddy of mine I was going to Catalina to run the TCT, he asked, "Mate, like the Catalina Wine Mixer?" That was about all I knew of it as well.

My mom and dad were visiting from Colorado for her spring break. For the past few years, my dad and I had been planning adventure projects to train for and conquer together. This year, I signed up for a Hardrock qualifier as well as a 200-miler to prove to myself that my Ouray finish in 2025 wasn't a fluke. Pops had recently regained his spark for trail running after overcoming another catastrophic knee injury skiing, and we'd gotten some beta on the Trans-Catalina Trail being an epic send. I train in the hills of Laguna Beach every day, but something about this island—inhabited with herds of buffalo across the water from LA—was alluring. With 25 miles and 6k vert point-to-point from Avalon to Two Harbors, or 38 miles and 8k depending on how you link it, and sun exposure as the crux, it would be a perfect run to cap off this training block.

To me, ultra is about the journey of the spirit through the necessary extreme effort, as well as experiencing the zone in which that adventure and exertion takes place. Catching a sunrise and running across an island to the pirate town where cold Coors Lights would be waiting seemed like the perfect objective.

Naturally, we got shitfaced drunk our first night in town at a dirty dive called the Marlin. A real local woman bartender scolded my dad after he Spartan-kicked the barn doors a few times announcing his arrival from taking a piss outside. We shot some real nice pool and were aggressively pursued by a 6'7" peacocking gay guy from Seattle who we ended up befriending by the time we reached Two Harbors. This was the first night of my mom's vacation, and there was nothing we could do but sit and laugh while she argued with the old guy at the bar who was the biggest Grateful Dead fan as she rounded up our Irish Car Bombs. I had this philosophy, inspired by the fighter Jon Jones, where before a big event, a proper dance with the Dionysian is the perfect send-off.

A few days later we departed, but only after chasing down more beta on the island and figuring out the shuttle system we'd run to get back to the start line. We discovered a ferry that ran from Two Harbors back to Avalon at 4:30 in the afternoon, and it only took my dad running around shirtless to a few different stores in town to get everything dialed.

4:30 a.m. is the perfect time to be on trail for any long run over 20 miles. You get a good mix of having to fight through being tired, using your headlamp, and finishing the morning exposed without losing an entire day to training. After sipping on the hotel lobby coffee and lighting a few pre-send bowls of flower, we snapped our kitted-up mug shots with a disposable camera and took off right on time. Only we went the wrong way to begin with.

Those early morning hours were quiet. We ran into a family of deer picking through a trash can who fled the scene in a perfect single-file line as we passed by. Avalon began to shrink behind us as we came up on the first camp, where we passed through like phantoms, only identifiable to those who sleep by the shine of our lights and the sloshing of our water.

Upon entering the TCT, you are immediately met with a climb that takes you up into the 87% protected land. There is a cool, breezy silence as the harbor hums with orange light in the distance. I felt a heightened alertness looking out to our left into the chilled darkness of hills and a sharp drop-off before the unending ocean. I punched a few early morning spiderwebs off my face, as often happens in the morning when you're the one breaking the trail that day.

As we climbed, a glow of orange and purple began rise from the mainland. I stopped to take my first piss of the morning as redden rays warmed the low marine layer blanketing the ocean as far as the eye can see.

Our first stop was at one of the main water stations along the many different spouts on the TCT. We made our first fill of bottles and popped our first salt tabs, making sure to keep each other accountable for the nutrition that we had to get down that day. I had brought something like eight Gu's, 25 salt tabs, a bottle of Tailwind, and a bag of dry powder, anticipating using a few of the spigots along the way to get myself to Two Harbors.

Weirdly, Catalina Island is known for their wild herds of buffalo. The bars throughout town even offer a drink called Buffalo Milk—a too-sweet rum drink full of milk and topped with whipped cream, something I surely had several of before my time on the island was up. Light crept over the landscape and brought the greenery alive, as well as the sounds of birds and swarms of bees. We kept our eyes peeled and listening for buffalo sign. We'd been warned of running into a bull protecting his females, and to be careful of the oddly larger rattlesnakes here on the island than those I see frequently running just across the water.

The sun slowly reached higher in the sky and the heat began to settle in. Salt pill in. Take a swig of sweet, salty water. And we continued onward towards the airport, our first aid station.

We passed through another camp and saw the first people we'd seen for hours that morning. It looked like a group of high school kids with their teachers on a trip for some kind of outdoor ed. They wandered around aimlessly trying to pack up their camp, waiting to be told what to do by the adults. We received curious looks from the campers. Just two guys running without backpacks, moving quickly and efficiently, and having a damn good time while doing it.

Mushroom pill in. Oh yes. We had three mushroom caps each, and we were planning to space them out for the trip to really settle in the last several miles before we descended into Two Harbors, where we could crack those cold beers in celebration and vibrate in the little thru-hiking pirate town.

We began to understand the crux, which was the sun. As the toads no longer croaked and the birds no longer cawed, a white crust of salt was beginning to develop on both of our shirts. We could see what they called the Airport in the Sky in the distance. There was one final climb before we would get to take off our vests and refill out of the sun for a few brief moments.

It's an airport for pilots and the rich, but it's really an outpost for tourists and hikers. As we strolled in, there was only one other party of hikers who had just arrived before us, both drenched in sweat from where their backpacks had been pressing against their backs.

We used a spigot again to fill up our bottles, and I sat and listened to some of the conversations of the people who had arrived shortly after us. A mix of thru-hikers here on spring break, and rich boomers here to do the final inspection before selling their timeshare back in Avalon.

Mushroom pill in. The back half of the TCT begins with a winding downhill. I pointed, "Look, there!" An enormous beast, some 2,000 pounds, seemingly out of place here in California. As we continued to move, it was revealed that there were ten of them amongst the bushes.

I could feel the sweat building on my arms, and my already reddened skin tanning deeper as we continued onwards and down towards Little Harbor. We passed parents and kids, solo travelers, and even a group of old ladies, all who had started at our destination and were working their way to where we had come from. I felt fit, and I looked with admiration onto my father who was currently leading our way along this winding trail, kicking up dust and moving lightly, the fittest he's ever been.

There was a group of vagabonds around my age set up as the only campers in all of Little Harbor as we descended. A pristine, near-perfect half-circle of sandy beach with roads and trails shooting up into the hills that surrounded from all sides.

There were two girls and two guys, and the girls were nearly naked as it seemed they were just waking up from their party the night before. I'm never one to complain about seeing some skin in the middle of a hard effort. Sometimes it's the morale boost you need on the trail. I think my dad felt similarly as we encroached upon their camp at the spigot nearest to them, posting up for a few minutes while we filled our waters and fueled up.

A few puffs of flower. Third mushroom cap, chased with a hot Gu and a swig of lukewarm spigot water. The perfect cocktail for our punt out of here and onwards to Two Harbors.

I was starting to feel good. My body felt strong. My muscles relaxed. My busy mind and my pent-up soul were at ease, as often comes with being in nature and putting in a hard effort on the trail. A jolt of energy and life force came over me as we began our ascent. The sun was now at its highest point in the sky. Our skin tightening as the heat, which we were now sure was the crux, beat down.

I could tell my father was feeling goofy himself. We started yelling obscenities at each other as the vert began to pile up. "I hope we have at least a thousand more vert!" he exclaimed in a high-pitched, emphatic Canadian accent—he's not Canadian.

"I hope my Gu's get even hotter!" I responded. "I wish this was even steeper!"

The vibrancy of the colorful landscape increased. To our left, the cliffs dropped off sharply. The earth looking to be slowly crumbling away over thousands of years down into the depths below. It wouldn't be long before the trail we were on would crumble too.

We passed a trail crew doing some maintenance on the route. A fat one sat with a sun hat on and his legs crossed in the dirt while eating his lunch. He glanced at us as we passed by, confused, and I think it's because he must have heard us speaking Canadian.

As we finished what would be our final climb, Two Harbors was revealed, and we knew our adventure was soon complete. That last summit had a dusty conservancy truck filled with gallons of water in the bed, waiting for weary hikers getting beat down by the Cali-Mexi sun. I traced a set of large tits into the dust on the side of the truck and slugged the final half of a gallon straight from the bottle. Who knows who had done the same before me, and I didn't care.

We descended and passed several groups of hikers, complimenting the kids who were conquering the trail and making memes amongst ourselves while making fun of the guys holding umbrellas above their heads to keep themselves from being exposed. "What's the point then?" I asked myself.

We finished out strong and in stride through the end of the pier, and brought it in with a "hell yeah."

Stripping off most of our gear down to our shorts, barefoot, we walked in with zero complaints and bought a couple of tallboys. A long-haired, mustached guy in cowboy boots named Randy was impressed that we had just run here. He told us stories of another guy who owned the record for the TCT.

This was a place where the people who work it live there and rarely leave, and everybody else was just passing through—hiking, biking, or boating in for the day. Or in our case, for a few hours and a few more beers.

There is a feeling of bliss that comes during those crisp blue sips after the clarity of a difficult physical effort. It's the purest form of dopamine I've ever experienced, because it's one of the only times where that drink is 100% earned.

Laying in the sand we repeated a saying, one we stole from Mark-Andreas: "No send is complete until the beers go clink.