Pictures from 8/26
Friday, August 31, 2012
Day 103 8/26 20mi.
We woke up and walked into an area that was closed because of a fire the day before, it was about a 30 mile stretch that we would have had to hitch around.
About six and a half miles into the day we came to a trail junction and stopped for a break. There we met a woman who put 50 items on her bucket list for her 50th birthday. One of those items was to climb Mt.Thielson she had her neighbor with her as well as to guys who are on the search and rescue team and volunteer to take people up the mountain about twice a year. After chatting with them for a bit they asked if we'd like to climb up with them, we declined and kept walking.
We didn't get very far, after 5 minutes of walking with views of the mountain I stopped and said to Chatterbox "that looks really cool and I might regret it if we don't do it" she said "well if you want to do it let's go" and so we went back up to the trail junction and stashed a few heavy items in the trees to lighten our packs, then headed up after them.
The trail slowly got steeper and steeper and we caught them about 3/4 of the way up, just before we had to put away our poles and start using our hands to help climb, because it was getting so steep.
All the way up the views just kept getting more and more spectacular. About 70 feet below the top we all stopped, from there on out we had to rock climb up to the summit. One of the guides free climbed up and secured a rope and then the bucket list woman and her neighbor took turns climbing up on rope and harness, they had never done any thing like this before just like we hadn't. Next I free climbed up, which was a little scary but not to bad, they said the pitch was 5.2 which I don't think is much in the rock climbing world, but to us first timers it was crazy! Chatterbox climbed up last on rope and harness it felt great to be on top of that mountain!!! The views were a little smokey but still amazing and the mountain dropped off thousands of feet on 3 sides which was incredible. Neither of us had ever done anything like that, it was very physically and mentally challenging and extremely rewarding! Today was probably my favorite day of hiking.
The guide belayed both of us down, which was another first and we carefully started down the steep mountain sides. Going down was a bit tricky than coming up, but we took our time and eventually made it back to the trail junction for a late lunch. On the way down we saw a bald eagle soaring below us!
While eating lunch a bunch of hikers we knew caught up to us and were amazed that we climbed all the way to the top of the peak. We hiked with them late into the night and found a really nice campsote next to a lake for the night.
Day 102 8/25 22mi.
About a mile into our hike this morning the PCT split into a "hiker" PCT and an "equestrian" PCT. Because horses are not allowed near the rim of Crater Lake there has to be a PCT route that avoids the rim. (they aren't allowed near the rim because Crater Lake is one of the cleanest large bodies of water in the world and they want to continue to minimize pollution in the lake)
We walked up to the rim village and got a small meal and a few snacks from the store, then headed over to a spot that overlooked the lake to eat brunch. Unfortunately it was rather smokey today which killed the view a bit, but it was still a great view!
We hiked along the rim for about 6 miles of steep ups and downs and awesome views. We also climbed up to the Watchman which is a little lookout tower on top of the highest point near the lake.
We continued on to highway 138 which we camped near.
Day 101 8/24 23mi.
We started the day with a 22.2 mile waterless stretch from where we woke up to a store in Crater Lake National Park. Carly and I got out of camp first, and didn't take many breaks throughout the day we made it to the store just after 4pm. One of the other guys we had camped with made it the whole way without taking any breaks!! And got there by 2.
We were able to resupply mostly out of the hiker box in front of the store and didn't have to spend much money that way. Once everyone we started the day with got there we all headed over to the restaurant across the parking lot and ate delicious hot food together.
Carly and I headed out about another halfmile late at night and found a flat spot to lay our sleeping bags down.
Day 100 8/23 26.5mi.
We moved along at a good pace today as the terrain wasn't to bad and didn't take many breaks. We hiked and breaked with some friends from the beginning of the trail.
Eventually we found a nice place to camp near a creek for the night with the 4 other guys we'd been hiking around.
Day 99 8/22 22mi.
My last post was incorrect we actually only took 4 zero days and today is day 99, not day 100.
We enjoyed our last meal with mom and Alicia, a continental breakfast, and then drove the 40 minutes or so back to the trail. Just after the car was parked we spotted Dr. Huss crossing the road, a guy we hiked with for a few weeks back in the desert! We were excited to see a familiar face, we gave him some snacks. Then said good bye to mom and Alicia and took off again north down the trail.
After a few miles we could feel our lack of hiking the last 4 days. Our legs were already sore, but we managed to cruise all day and surprisingly got good miles in for the day. We caught up to a few other fellow's who we had hiked with in the beginning and all camped together.
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Day 93 8/16 9mi.
We woke up today with lots of motivation to make it 9 miles we were meeting our mom and my fiancée Alicia!!! On the way we met a woman who's property the trail went through, she gave us a bag of fresh cherries!! We got to the spot we were to meet them a little early and managed to sneak a shower in before they arrived, which I'm sure they appreciated. It is great to see family, after 3 months without seeing any.
We headed back to a hotel in Medford to get cleaned up and relaxed for the night.
Day 91 8/14 30.5mi.
We heard a tree fall near us in the middle of the night, which was a good reminder to check for dead trees before setting up our tents!
We made it to OREGON today!!!! California is really really really LONG!!!!!!!!!!! California was full of spectacular country and great people, but it feels darn good to be out of the state and into Oregon!
We had a hard time finding a camping spot so we hiked farther than intended, but eventually found a nice flat spot.
We woke up and walked uphill in thick smoke for about 20 minutes until we got high enough to be away from most of the smoke. From there on out the smoke was not to bad but it was so thick in the valley below, where the fire was burning, that you couldn't see the valley floor!
We made it to a small gravel road for lunch where we met a guy sitting and stopping any cars from continuing on the road, cause the road was closed, so that they could fight the fire. He gave us some cold diet cokes and waters! It was nice to stop for lunch and have another peraon to talk to.
We continued on to a tiny road to sleep at with a new section hiker we met.
Day 89 8/12 33.5mi.
We woke up nice and early with plans to do big miles, we were both hiking before six and had put in nearly 11 miles by 10a.m.
There was a store 32 miles from our starting point at a really low elevation, which means it's always blazing hot down there, we wanted to at least make it there so that we could do the big climb away from the store early tomorrow morning. Well we made pretty good time and along the way I as well as another guy who had the same plan for the day got stung by a bee. We also had a 6.5mile road walk right before the store which was lined with blackberries! And we walked through a light cloud of smoke all day, we heard there was a couple of small fires in the area caused by lightning strikes.
When we got down into the tiny town there were fire trucks and firemen everywhere, apparently they had set up a fire camp in a park right next to town so everyone fighting the three fires in the area converged there.
After grabbing a bit for dinner and resupplying Chatterbox and I headed out into the smoke with two other hikers at about 9:30, now the smoke started to get thick, chatterbox and I only made it up another mile and a half before calling it quits for the night, but the other two kept going. We spent the night sleeping in a cloud of smoke, but we were so exhausted it didn't even phase us.
Day 88 8/11 24mi.
Thanks Kris for the great package of food!
We got up nice and early and took a couple bikes ,provided to us by the hostel, down to the breakfast joint. We got there right as they opened at 7 and stuffed ourselves.
After riding back and getting packed up we were on the road hitching by 9:30. In a half an hours time only 3 or 4 Forest Service vehicles drove by, but eventually a nice couple in a Subaru stopped and gave us a ride.
With a bit of a late start we did expect to get many miles in, but we kept moving along and endes the day with 24.
I saw another mother bear with her cub, as soon as they spotted me the cub scurried up a tree and the mom stood under it, once I got a little farther away from them the cub came down and they both took off down the mountain.
Saturday, August 11, 2012
Day 87 8/10 9.5mi.
We slept in a bit after our late night yesterday, but still made it to Etna summit road before noon.there was almost no traffic on the road, but after about 20 minutes the first car we saw stopped and brought us straight to the hostel in town.
We got showered up and rode our bikes into town to grab some lunch and get our other chores done. Then relaxed for the night at the hostel with a bunch of other hikers.
Day 86 8/9 31mi.
Today was our longest day yet, but not by choice haha.
We didn't move along to quick in the morning and only made it 13 miles by 2. After lunch we changed our tune we planned to stop at the 28 mile mark near a creek for the night. Well when we finally made it to the creek a little before 9 there were no camping spots anywhere around. We were both exhausted, but had to hike another 3 miles in the dark mostly uphill to finally find a flat spot a bit after 10! We cooked and ate as fast as possible and went right to sleep!
Day 85 8/8 27.5mi.
Today's walk was fantastic with nothing but great views all day and relatively flat terrain. We met a few day hikers in the morning who were absolutely thrilled with the fact that we were walking the entire PCT.
We pushed hard the second half of the day to squeeze in 27.5 miles before 8 and got to bed nice and early.
Day 84 8/7 23.5mi.
Chatterbox saw a bear cub just after leaving camp this morning, but apparently the cub never saw her and she never saw the mom. Later in the morning I saw a large black bear walking with two cubs trailing behind in a valley a couple hundred feet below the trail! That's 9 bears total that the two of us have seen on the trip.
We spent most of the day walking up high and saw massive amounts of smoke from the fire in Belden, which is at least 200 trail miles south of us now, that's a big fire!
We met about 8 people using their vacation time from work to come out and volunteer to do trail maintenance for a week, we made sure to thank them for all the hard work they do to keep this trail functional.
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