Woke up shortly after the others left today and headed out into the cool air. The cloud cover left me this morning and for now it looks like the smoke is all to the south. First goal is Hart’s Pass, the last road accessible spot on the PCT. After that I’ll see how much more I’ve left in the tank.
I honestly don’t remember much from today. The trail was in good shape and generally stayed on the ridges, so I didn’t have to do much descent/ascend cycles.
Another Salty Approved Stream Crossing
One thing to note is that the area around Harts pass is well known to be a treacherous place in the snow. I totally get that. Have a look at this pic
Don’t Slip
A big chunk of this ridge walk is along a narrow, sandy trails on a steep incline. Occasionally it turns to a rocky one, but equally narrow and even steeper. While I’m walking, I’m imagining what it would be like in a foot of fresh snow. Folks often get hit with snow up here in September and have to either wait out the melt or roll the dice on hiking through. They’ve got my respect. It would be really hard to self-arrest on such a steep slope.
I make Harts pass at 4:30
Canada is Calling
Burned out Campsites
I carry on to the entrance parking lot and it looks like a junkyard.
LOL
KIA, Low Mileage
I’ve heard this dirt road is 17 miles long and very sketchy. There are lots of pot holes and boulders on the road. No turn outs and single lane most of the way. Looks like the car blew its tire and the driver just kept going on the rim. I bet more than just the rim is trashed. The tow bill is not going to be cheap.
I carried on to take down the next pass, Buffalo, then took down Foggy pass and finally Jim Pass. All these passes sound impressive, but basically each one is just a couple 100 feet of elevation. The trail is being good to me, staying on the ridges.
Stick to the Ridge !
Yet Another Wilderness Boundary
This Spot will do for the Night
I passed Halo and company a couple miles back. They were all tented up and bedding down, chatting away. Finally stopped a little before 9 at a tent site next to Jim Pass. It was a huge flat spot with lots of wind protection. I logged my first 30+ mile day! Git’er Done.
We got on the shuttle at 8am and it makes a stop at the bakery before heading to the trailhead. Hikers piled out to buy various pastries for the day. I grabbed a cold sandwich and something sugary. I run into Niko again and we catch up a bit. Haven’t seen him for a couple weeks.
Back on the bus, I met a few other hikers for the first time. A gal named Halo is hiking with her 17 year old daughter Chief. Dipper, a guy from Denver, is also hiking with them. Nice tight little tramily (trail family). Another tramily is composed of a tiny gal Sunrise and two dudes Viking and Wrong Way. She’s in charge, setting the hiking goals and stops for each day. The boys nod.
Interesting I’m running into my first tramilies for this hike. Must be on the leading edge of the bubble. While all the hikers are catching up with each other, I head over and talk to the shuttle driver. He is the opposite of the sort of person I normally run into in this role. He has no interest in thru-hikers. I think he considers them sort of a blemish on society, kids (mostly) who don’t work and feel entitled. Flipping my point of view, I can see where he is coming from. This is the last stop for most hikers. They are broke, at their peak hiking fitness, and feel like champions. This poor guy has to haul their euphoric asses back and forth every day. He seems bummed that the peak flow is about to arrive like a cloud of locust.
The Hiker Drop
Hikers take off in small groups and I finish up my conversation with Sullen Shuttle Guy. The trail follows a river valley gradually upward from 1500 ft to 6k over a 21 miles stretch. This is my kind of climb. I rack my hiking poles and decide to maintain a fast pace and start off.
I Need a Passing Lane
Around noon I run into this guy
Patches (Rear View)
He got an early ride from SVR and has been grinding uphill. We hike together for a bit and catch up. He’s got a friend meeting him at the next pass who is going to give him a resupply and hike with him for the last segment. We cross over this new bouncy bridge.
Shortly after that I stop for lunch with Patches around a set of nice boulders. My cold bakery sandwich turns out to be a disappointment. It is a giant bun surrounding 3 thin slices of roast beef and a couple sad looking tomato slices. Guess bread and sugar is all they got. Dog Bite turns up and joins us.
Dog Bite keeps working me on my target for tonight. I know he wants to hike together to the end, but it really isn’t my style right now. My goal is to hike until I can’t, nothing more or less. After lunch, I take off in the lead and turn the burners on, the other two guys slowly drop off behind me.
I’m feeling really good. I’m rested, motivated, got the music blasting through my earphones. The weather is cool and getting colder. Perfect hiking weather. On the way up I pass both tramilies I met previously plus a number of other rando’s. I’m smoking everyone today.
I hit the Rainy Pass trailhead at 2592 and run into Patches friend, Bone Spur eating a bunch of berries. I stop and chat with him for a bit. He met Patches a few years ago on the trail in California. They stayed in touch and now he’s doing a little Angel work. I told him Patches was about 30 minutes behind me and took off.
I took a break at the picnic tables to make a little afternoon noodles and talked to Dipper for a bit when he caught up. They are aiming for a site over the peak at 2600 and I figure that sounds like a good goal.
The weather continues to get cloudier and colder. I’m getting hit with little rain showers so I stop to put on my wet weather gear and add layers.
It is about 8:00 when I go over Cutthroat pass and begin to head down to the campsite. I get that cool spooky feeling of being alone on a mountain top late in the evening where the temperatures are dropping and the wind is picking up. There is a timelessness to these places that always sends some shivers down my spine.
I do the next 2 miles in a hurry and find the Halo Tramily all setup and comfy. There’s no room at their site, so I put on my headlamp and check some of the others. I find a good one and put my pack down, getting ready to setup my tent. Then I remember to look up and scan the trees….there is a big dead tree that has fallen but is hung up in the branches of a neighbor. Hmm. I move my pack and walk over to give that dead tree a push. It comes crashing down right where I would have put my tent. Strike that site off the list.
I finally head back to where the tramily is and find a flat spot right next to the trail. That will have to do. I’m finally in bed by 10:00. I’ve logged a good day.
Dog Bite and I grabbed the shuttle and hit the bakery again in the morning. Last night his mother and brother showed up to wish him happy birthday. He seems really happy.
We talk a little bit about retirement. He is was a school principal on some island off the Washington coast. I think he misses it. Now he splits his time between Washington and Palm Springs where his mother lives. Like me, he is finishing up the trail. He started in 2016 and had to get off in Oregon due to an injury. After breakfast we split up on the walk back. He wants to take pictures and, well, I’ve been there / done that.
I hit the post office following a long ling of hikers in. My man, McGriddle is there. We last saw each other at Steven’s pass when he jumped in the ride that had dropped me off from town. I finally get the McGriddle story. Apparently back in Southern California, he ordered a McGriddle at the McDonald’s stop at hwy 15. The place is kind of a PCTer landmark because you hit it at mile 341 when the hiker hunger is starting to come on pretty strong. There’s a reference to the place in my 2017 entry
Anyway, he can’t stop raving about it, so they suggest he try to hike the next 23 miles to Wrightwood solely on a diet of McGriddles. He buys 15 of the things and pulls it off. He says he will never eat another one again, heh.
Endless and QB are sorting through their boxes and will be leaving on the 3:00 shuttle with most of the others. I somehow miss saying goodbye. That is the way things go. As for me, I’m staying in town for another day to eat and give my feet a break. When I hit the trail tomorrow, I’m burning full speed for the border. I heard Patches is over at Sehekin Valley Ranch getting fattened up. Dog Bite, Patches and me will probably hit the trail together on the 9am bus.
I head back to a lonely night in the PCT camp
After the Hikers Evaporate, All that’s Left is the Salt
Got up at 5 AM this morning when I heard Endless and QB rustling. We don’t have much mileage today, so I lounge in my tent for 30 minutes making some coffee and oatmeal. I get packed up at 6 and we all leave together.
Last Night’s Campsite
Virtually all PCT hikers use the GutHook app to navigate the trail. One of the neat features in the app is the ability to put comments in at various waypoints like streams and tent sites. Useful things like “Nice flat spot to the left of trail” or “seasonal stream is flowing well”. Well in my boredom over the last 6 weeks I have been rating every tent site a score of 1 to 10 based on the quality of my stay. I call it the Salty Scale, a scientifically precise methodology encompassing all the important factors in rating your stay.
While we are walking, QB mentions that there was another of those Washington style pit toilets outside our camp. I explain the Salty scale to her and she agrees to be a guest rater. She feels that since the camp was next to a nice creek and the shitter had a nice private view of the water. After I probe with a few other questions, she assigns the site a Salty 7.
Couple hours of easy hiking and we hit the so called “High Bridge” over the Agnes.
Just over the bridge is the shuttle stop and ranger station. Stehekin is a weird place. Look it up on a map sometime. Stehekin is on the north end of lake Chelan, a 60 mile long natural lake that ends at a small town called Chelan on the southeastern tip. Stehekin is in the middle of a National Recreational area. The only way in is either a 4 hour ferry ride or walking in on a trail. There are a bunch of vacation homes here and the community has a small school.
There is a host at the Ranger station to answer our questions. Only problem is, he doesn’t have many answers. I ask about Stehekin Valley Ranch and their legendary cabins and 3 meals a day. He’s never eaten there. Someone else asks about the produce farm, he doesn’t know much about that either. Seems our host only knows about places that are government owned and operated.
Anyway, the shuttle shows up on time and drops a stream of fresh smelling day hikers. We are greeted by a grumpy bus driver and climb aboard with 5 or 6 other PCTers. We drive over a bumpy dirt road for 10 miles, then get on (the only) paved road and stop at the bakery. This place is privately run and serves a cornucopia of Danishes, pies, croissants, cinnamon rolls, and the like. Endless, QB, and I enter a feeding frenzy. I buy a ham and cheese, croissant, a Danish, OJ, and large latte. Endless and QB load up as well. Endless is laughing that he froze up at the counter and couldn’t order. Too many options.
We skip the bus ride to town and instead just walk the remaining 2 miles. Nice to stroll along the lake shore.
Last Call for Gumballs
About a half-mile before town we see this cool little wooden boat. Endless is into sailing and bought a wooden one long ago to restore, but never got around to it. His brother is a sailor and lives on some island off the coast of Maine (I think). Anyway, Endless is interested and he stops to take a swim. Me, not interested. The water is cold. I carry on to walk into town.
After a few inquiries, I find the PCT camp site on top of the hill and head there. Along the way I bask in the glory of a brand new, government issued bathroom at the welcome center. It is, well, wonderful. When I finally get to the camp site, Endless and QB are there setting up. I put my tent up and head back to village to grab second breakfast/lunch. While I’m there a ferry pulls up and off-loads a 100 visitors. Seems there are 2 or 3 which are doing runs all day.
I talk to a few locals and get a flavor for the Stehekin story.
Living in the West, I know places like this have a colored history. Usually it starts with homesteaders taking up residence, killing a bunch of Native Americans, and scratching out a living. It usually ends with the government taking over all the unclaimed land then squeezing out the homesteaders one way or another.
Stehekin is in the middle of squeezing phase. When a home comes up for sale, the gov buys it and either turns it into a cabin rental or tears it down. Of course, being the government, the cabins retain their “historic nature” which means they slowly decay under coats of “Forest Service Brown” paint. The gov owned store sucks, the gov owned restaurant serves generic over-priced burgers, and some of the empty ex-commercial buildings are slowly decaying into “historic” structures.
Anyway, the place is beautiful, I hear the fishing is good, and I’d definitely put it on my list of places to return to some day.
More hikers come in and begin filling up the PCTer site. Couple of young gals I crossed on the trail show up and we get to know each other. Bugeye and Short Stop. They are doing Washington northbound, so almost done. Bugeye is a teacher in Seattle, Short Stop is an Alaskan nurse who grew up on fishing boats. Dog Bite shows up and reminds everyone his birthday is tomorrow.
In the evening we all sit around and talk about completing the hike. What does it mean? What is everyone doing next? How to rejoin mainstream society. Interesting stuff, but like hiking, the answers must come from within. The circle of folks is next to my tent and keeps expanding as darkness falls. I lay down and keep the doors opened listening to the steady trickle of funny stories, side conversations, jokes, etc. Today is Sunday. Tomorrow the Post Office will open, folks will resupply, and take off. This is the last time I’ll be in a thru-hiker circle like this. I just want to savor it. I slowly drift off to the sound of laughter.
I woke up at 6:30am in a grumpy mood today. Last couple days have been through overgrown trails and over a bunch of fallen trees. Adding to my distress are these constant descents deep into river valleys followed by 4k climbs back out. Was looking at my plan today and took a pic
Another Shitty Salty Climb
I packed all my crap, rolled out of the tent, took that down, and finish packing. The gal I camped near last night climbs out of her tent after I put my pack on. She introduces herself, Jessie. She looks to be late 20’s / early 30’s and is full of questions. I yank my pack off and start talking. First thing she asks is “Do all you PCT’ers arrive late and get up early like this every day?” “Yup, it is all about getting the miles in”, I reply. We talk about gear for a bit. She is Southbounding the Washington section of the PCT which is around 500 miles. She is close to the start so probably has only been on trail for a few days. I have a look at her setup. Ultralight tent, bag, foam pad, etc. A long-distance thru-hiker in the making.
Bunch of questions about how many miles I average, where I started yesterday, etc. Then comes the the question everyone asks…. “What do you like about the trail and the experience?” I start down my usual spiel. “You meet wonderful people on the trail, interesting folks off the trail, everyone helps each other, beautiful views, blah blah. ” Then my bad mood takes me WAY off script and this comes spilling out with no filter: “…flies biting your ankles, inhaling clouds of mosquitos, 4k climbs up and down mountains sweating your ass off, fucking trees everywhere that are either blocking the trail or blocking the view…..Man, I just want to go home. I want to sit on a couch with my wife and watch movies for a week.”
I stop ranting and just look at her. She is processing. Finally she says, “It sounds like you are getting a little homesick.” Heh. Yes I am. I pick up my pack and mumble a “good luck”. Enjoy the outdoors.
In my darkened mood, I head off to climb YA4K (Yet Another 4,000ft hill).
The Magical Forest
I climb over a bunch of these leviathans
I’m bitching to myself into a negative spiral. Why the hell do the trail maintenance crews have to use two person hand saws to cut this stuff? It would take all day to get through the log pictured above…..if there is even a saw long enough. Give me 2 days with a can of gasoline and a decent chain saw, all of this would be cleared. Stupid Forest Service. Stupid trail. Then I hit this carnage.
Junk Yard
Yes, the trail goes right through the center of that picture. Takes 20 minutes to pick through this mess and get to the other side. When I finally get there, I drop my pack and sit on one of the many logs available to me. Never a shortage of those. A black fly lands on my arm. I watch it bite a chunk of my skin off.
I need to change my mood. I dig around my food bag and discover I’m all out of candy. My remaining meals consist of disgusting Breakfast Skillets and one Spaghetti which I’m saving for dinner. I have this taffy I bought somewhere and try it. Ugh, it it black liquorish variety and it tastes like dirt. I’m becoming desperate….this is a Bad-Mood-Emergency and it is time to bring out the big guns. Back when I started the trail in Oregon, I visited a Cannabis shop to buy a couple joints for special days. Before I left, I also bought one edible on a whim.
For Emergencies Only !
A few puffs of a joint is one thing. Edibles are a whole different level because the effects last all day. I never consume these things. Well, the day can’t get any worse and I need a reset. Plus, it is made with dark chocolate which is top on my list of things-I-wish-I-had-right-now. Save me, Han Solo !
I eat that, put on my 60’s hippy music playlist, turn the volume up to 11, and continue climbing. I finally get out of the dense forest and get some better views
Around 1:00 I cross this.
The Finish Line is Near
Yes, I’m in double digits now ! Counting down from 100. Cresting the Cloudy Pass, the trees fall away and I get some spectacular views.
Even the creek crossings are cooperating.
Don’t Get Swept Away !
After cresting at 6k, I’m on a long descent that will eventually end at 1,500 and the intersection to Stehekin. I figure if I do another 25 mile day, that will put me 5 miles from the Stehekin shuttle which picks up a little after 9:00 AM.
Dog Bite catches up with me later in the afternoon when we hit a big creek crossing. The bridge here is washed out, but fortunately a large log crossing is available. This one is a layup. Wide with plenty of traction. When I get to the other site, I video Dog Bite coming across.
Moving on are a few more easy crossings and good trail. The recent deadfall has been cut off the trail. Near the end of the day, I reach Agnes creek which carves a deep canyon through the valley. There is a pretty waterfall that I video.
Shortly after taking this video, I saw a couple stop at the side trail leading to the water fall. Both wearing light packs, the guy has an Orange hat. It is Endless and QB! I met those two at Scissors Crossing when I was doing my May shake-down hike in the desert. He is a firefighter from Boston and she is from Queens NY. He’s got that thick Bahhston accent, which I always find groovy. Super couple. Stormtrooper thought they might catch me before the end, they have been doing 30’s for most of the summer. We spent some time catching up, hiked together to the next camp spot, and setup. Spent the evening over dinner trading stories about folks we met on the trail.
And that is how it goes out here. Truly one of the things I love the most about thru-hiking. You meet someone you like, get separated for various reasons, then months later turn a corner and, there they are again. My day went from a lonely funk to hanging out with some old friends. Thank you Han Solo !
