In the morning I quickly packed up and headed up trail to the highway at Santiam Pass. Along the way, I ran into Twig, a through hiker from Minnesota. We hiked together until the highway, chatting about our hitching luck. Apparently he has the same luck as me. Nobody wants to pick up the old smelly guys :).

When we got there, we repositioned about a mile up the road so folks would have a pull-over spot and stuck our thumbs out….for like 30 minutes. At least a couple hundred cars passed us before finally a dude stopped and picked us up. He had through-hiked in 2018. We had a good chat into town.

I asked him to drop me off in the sketchy area of town for the cheap motels. Found one, not cheap, but plenty sketchy, and made myself comfortable. Walked around bend a bit. This inner tube floating down the river thing looks fun!

When I woke up this morning, I noticed the girls-gone-hiking pair were setup near me. They must have rolled in late last night, which is pretty impressive mileage. Didn’t chat with them, just packed and left. Walking over a bunch of lava rock for a couple miles. This stuff is harsh, but anything is better than more green tunnel.

Dropped into a little meadow below the lava rocks, turned a corner, and found my buddy Gnocci with his kid in a perfect lounge spot next to the water. We chatted for a bit. Looks like they will be going to Timberline on the same route as me. Gnocci doesn’t seem to be in a big hurry. He seems to be enjoying time with his son.

Passed by another exclusion area at Scott’s lake. Not sure what this is all about. There must only be a few Oasis up here between the lava fields. Passed some other local hikers who were going on about the complexity of figuring out what permits they needed to hike through the limited use area, where they could camp, etc. I feel their pain. The Forest Service does not make this very easy.

I could see I was approaching the lava fields the Old Timer told me about. He said “Better hike that in the morning, because there is no shade and those black rocks hold the heat.” Well I timed it perfectly, hitting the fields at high-noon. Heh.

Check out this picture

If you zoom in on the mountain, you can see lava poo all over the mountain speckled with tree lined spots.  These are areas that have been broken down over the millineum to host a decent ecosystem. In the lava fields, the only thing living is a bunch of moss and the occasional sad little bush/tree. My hike through the lava fields took me down into a couple of forested areas similar to the pic above.

I took a bunch of pictures of the lava fields, but none really capture the scale. It was huge. There is something eerie about standing in a middle of this gigantic dead rocky wasteland with the wind blowing at 20 mph+. I suppose Mars might be a little like this.

Walking on this stuff is sketchy. The whole trail is composed of fist sized pumice just waiting to roll your ankle. Hiking poles are pretty much useless, so it 100% concentration trying to hop across the service without mistep. Falling in this stuff would be ugly. The stuff is so abrasive, I could not even find a comfortable place to sit down. It is like sitting on 60 grit sandpaper wrapped around every rock.

Finally left the lava rocks behind to re-enter yet another burned forest. Man half of the trail in Oregon seems to have been burned up over the last 5 to 7 years.

Last time I saw water was Scott’s lake, so I took the by-pass and hiked into the Big Lake Youth Camp to fill up. In years past, they have been a wonderful host for hikers. I believe they have a building setup specifically for hikers to stay in. Well this year is a different story. I don’t know if it is the Covid thing or something else. I was met over and over again by smiling, yet firm, camp counselors asking if I was a PCT hiker and, if so, I should go to the water spigot next to the horse corral. Get your water and get out. On my way out, two more counselors checked up on me. Ok, folks, I’m leaving.

I walked another couple miles to the last camp site before the highway and setup next to a small lake. Mosquitoes were bad here, but fortunately the wind was blowing pretty hard. Unfortunately, the wind is also blowing all these dead trees around. Spent a few hours worried about that in my tent then fell asleep.

I woke up around 6am today and quietly dropped my tent while stepping over and around my two new friends. They woke briefly and said good bye. I think they are staying an extra day. I’m sure we will meet again in Ventura.

I decided to switch to my new shoes this morning. My old ones have been worn smooth. Put on my new shoes, relieving me of another 4 pounds of pack weight.

Had some climbing to do today. First to get out of Elk Lake, then some more on the trail. First 5 miles were exposed burny areas. It was early and it seems the temperatures are beginning to moderate. Overall a pretty easy morning hike.

The terrain began to change from all forest to a mix of forest / alpine meadows. Each clearing I got a peek at the surrounding mountains, AKA the Sisters. It was spectacular…. Here was the first clear view

This opened up into a huge alpine walk with occassional forays into the forest. Had to take another crappy selfie. To the right is the South Sister (I think). Shortly after that I stopped for water at a stream and ran into two gals who were doing their annual girls-go-hiking-for-a-week thing. Their packs looked so heavy. While I was filtering out some water they kept asking me questions about stuff. Do you have rain gear? How much does sleeping bag weigh? etc. It is kind of nice to have my equipment mostly dialed in right now.

So up here in sister-ville, we have the North, Middle, and South Sister. Then sitting off to the left we have “The Husband”. Not sure what’s going on with this family.

Wish I there was a geologist around to explain some of what I’m seeing. There were some huge lava flows around those craters. Mountains of the stuff. Earth Poo. I’m curious why there are so many craters next to each other.

Continuing on, I walked through the obsidian limited use area. Cool water fall, but I only snapped a passing photo.  The bugs owned this spot.

While watering up at the falls, I spoke with an Old-timer who told me the next 15 miles would be on/off lava rocks, with a crescendo of a 5 mile stretch with almost no break. Got that to look forward to tomorrow. I setup at the first tent site outside the limited use area and crashed. It’s a nice spot. No mosquitoes today, great scenery, and 23 miles + 1.5 from Elk Resort.

So I’ve been thinking. I’m starting to bust out some good mileage and I’m fast approaching Santiam Pass at (2001). When I get there, I have to get around the fire closure. There are three options: 1) Ignore the closure and jump over a million blowdowns + potential fine 2) Try to find someone to get me into Olallie lake at 2046 which is a 2 hour drive down crappy dirt roads. 3) Hitch to Bend and take a bus up to timberline lodge at 2097.

I might try the first option if I was with someone. I hear the area is not patrolled. The second option is a no-go. Seems there are few trail angels that want to make that drive. So, I’m left with the recommended route to Timberline. That will cut 90 miles of trail walking. In fact, when I get there I’ll only have about 55 miles of trail left in Oregon.

Well if that is to be my route, I had better take in what I can of Oregon’s hospitality ! I decided to Nero into Elk Lake. It was a short walk of 6 miles plus a 1.5 mile access road. Got there at 11, had a shower, setup my tent on a campsite and spent some time in the restaurant.

The resort is nice. Seems to be a destination for Bend folks to play on the beach, sail, and paddleboard. Some hikers milling around here and there. While I was munching on my (delicious) Rueben I met a couple hiking together named Mitch and Gem. Turns out they are from Ventura and hike a small section of the PCT every year. I told them they were welcome to share my site if they could not find another good one.

Later in the day, I’m laying in my tent reading and Mitch shows up asking to take me up on the offer. The last hiker campsite they offered was terrible. So Mitch pulls out some fold up cooler, fills it with a bag of ice and some beers and offers me one. That pretty much kicks the rest of the day off.

Mitch English teacher who grew up in Ventura, a child of one of the local farmers and land owners. He has long hair and probably in his late 50’s early 60’s. I think his mother’s side was Hartman whose name I’ve seen on a few buildings in the area. Charismatic character, he must run an interesting class. Well Mitch seems to have been infected with some ultra-hippy ideology which he puts to good use arguing against capitalism/greed/whatever. It is a fun debate that goes on into the evening.

Then it gets wierd. The three of us are sitting on a fence next to my tent finishing off the second 6 pack when our little debate switches to a monolog. All of the sudden Mitch and Gem are talking at the same time filling each other sentences. They are going on about returning to the ancient ways, that our modern society is a dead end, and a bunch of other stuff I could not parse. This goes on for an amazing 10 minutes. It just comes spilling out.
When they finally pause the only thing I say is “Wow, this sounds like a some kind of religion!” and crawl into my tent to lay down. I leave the door open and keep listening until…well I fell asleep. They woke me up a while later to check on me which was nice. They then cowboy camped right next to my tent on the only flat spot available and started reading poety to each other. Honestly at first I was annoyed, but I kind of liked listening to it in a semi-lucid state. Eventually I drifted off again and slept like a baby, dreaming of the ’60’s.

I suppose one of the reasons I’m out here is to get a taste of some unique points of view. Definitely found one of those.

Got a late start this morning. Packed up and walking around 7:30. I saw Gnocci and Lucas head out ahead of me where full mosquito body armor. Gnocci has a long string of curses he uses to describe how miserable the bugs are out here.

I ran into them again at Charlton Lake (1925) as they were finishing up water filtering. They took off and I spent a half hour making breakfast (Biscuits and Gravy, yum) while slapping mosquitoes.

Today is green tunnel / burned forest kind of day. There are a ton of blowdowns on this section. I was stepping, hopping, climbing over trees most of the day. I’ve heard this is only a taste of what is to come. Folks are telling me that this is the status-quo for the next 50 miles after which there is a little break in the lava fields which is probably going to suck even worse.

The grade was mostly small climbs and descents today. With my newly re-energized Spotify, I’m now listening to some righteous tunes and picking up my pace. I aimed for a place called Island lake which will give me a 25 mile day.

Reached the lake at 7 and setup with my mosquito friends. This lake is more of a bog with some high ground in the middle. I believe the Mosquito queen lives there. Had to spend an extra 5 minutes of bug slapping after I zipped up. The skeeters are now stuck outside….waiting.