Day 58 July 22, 2017

Daily mileage 31
Total mileage 1012
Hiked from 5:15 am to 4:30 pm plus an hour of dusk hiking

I have now hiked 1000 miles on the PCT!

That was a day of great highs and fixable lows. Last night I decided to play by the Park rules and put my food on the bear box. When I went to grab a snack this morning, I found that the bear box had indeed kept out the bears but had let in some rodents. Not a bit of trail mix left. And one of my two remaining chocolate bars had been nibbled on. Buggars.

The other discovery I made was that I left my ballcap on the table of the Drakesbad dining table. Oh well I was not attached to that cap, but it did mean a long day of hiking with no lid on to protect me from the rather strong sun.

I got the only two climbs of less than 1000 feet each done early. Then the trail became mellow. Like really mellow. I had 21 miles done before 2 in the afternoon. The trail went through miles and miles of burned forest. It must have been a huge fire. There was a section of about two miles in which the bugs were insane.  Then, poof, they were gone. Weird.

First log crossing I have had since the Sierra

Lower Twin Lake

Miles and miles of burned forest

Goodbye My Lassen

There was a horseback endurance event on part of the PCT later in the afternoon. I likely had 40 riders go past me. They were all super friendly.

When I got down to where the event was being staged from, I went over to one of the communication tents to ask about the event. He happened to mention that they were searching for a missing rider. He mentioned in passing that she had a nosebleed. Well it just so happened that I recalled seeing a female rider with tissue obviously stemming a nosebleed. I sort of became part of the search logistics at that point. I hope they found her ok.

The biggest and best news today is that I passed 1000 miles on my hike. Woohoo! Of lesser note is that I did my first 30 mile day.

I made it down to Old Station (pop 83) and had a pretty good burger and a few very welcome cold beers. I checked in with my wife and found out that the Burney Post Office had rejected my replacement backpack by sending it back to Osprey. Then I found out that my credit card has been compromised and had to be shut down. All of this is fixable, but it is far more difficult to do so from the trail.

As I was sitting on the deck of JJ's Restaurant digesting my burger and beers, I began pondering a desert of some sort.  There was a group of four young folks (not hikers) sitting at the table across from me who, when they learned I was thru hiking the PCT, gave me the ice cream sandwiches that they had ordered.  I mean, really, this trail magic is just nothing short of amazing.  And I am here to say, those tasty ice cream filled cookie sandwiches were good. Damn good.

I made a late decision to get started on the Hat Creek Rim this evening. This section of the trail is renowned to be hot and dry. It is over 20 miles between reliable water sources. Anyway, I got about 3 miles in and got rattled at by 2 rattlers in that stretch. So now I am going to set up at a viewpoint when the last of the tourists leave. I figure rattlesnakes will not make their way all the way across the cement.

Home for the night