Day 133 : Timberline Lodge

30th August 2013 Mile 2107.5 to mile 2120 : Timberline Lodge to Sandy River Mileage : 12.5 Average Mileage since day 101 :

All of us were up early today with one thought one our minds: buffet breakfast. I remember growing up in Dubai one of my favourite treats was to go to the buffet brunch at the Jebel Ali Hotel and it still sets the bar for any buffet experiences subsequent to my childhood, massively infrequent as they are even on the trail. The Timberline Lodge has reset the bar. It has become the breakfast buffet against which all others will be measured, and in all probability they will be found wanting. Waffles and pancakes with fresh cream and berries and actual maple syrup. A huge leg of Spanish ham that took me instantly back to tapas bars in Barcelona when i tried it. Mountains of fresh fruit that actually had flavour, a full range of cooked breakfast options and much, much more. Breakfast was served from 7:30 to 10:30 and i pretty much sat and ate continuously for the duration of the breakfast service. I had intended to eat with my fellow roommates, but as i sat down at the table a minute or two before the rest of them two middleaged gents asked if they could join me. I smelled an opportunity to yogi breakfast off them and of course welcomed them to my table. I tried my hardest to yogi a meal of them.discreetly, but to no available, but i wasn't bothered as they turned out to be very good company. A couple hours later I was about ready to leave and get back on the trail when I ended up bumping into Funsize and Cuddles, who gave me the Pinata to take to Oregon border Funsize, Goldie and Frosty, and Shedder and Roo, all of whom, with the exception of Cuddles whom I'm saw briefly in Shasta City, I hadn't seen in more than a thousand miles. Meeting up with all of them put paid to my plan to get some major miles today, and decided to stay for lunch. The lunch buffet was almost as good as breakfast, and after several more hours of eating I finally got back on the trail and struggled down the trail. Some days on the trail are easy, and some are difficult, today's hiking was difficult due to the enormous amounts of very good food i'd consumed that day. Nevertheless I managed almost 13 miles that afternoon before I lost the light and stopped. I wished I could have stopped earlier, but I wanted to make it to Cascade Locks the next day and so needed to bring the distance down as much as possible. So I camped just before the last big climb in Oregon, and went to bed early as I had need nor desire to eat again that day.

Day 132 : A change in the weather

29th August 2013 Mile 2073.5 to mile 2107.5: Warm Springs to Timberline Lodge Mileage : 34 Average mileage since day 101 : The whole of today was centered around getting to Timberline Lodge that evening, so I was up and moving early in order to get some easy early morning miles under my belt before the weather changed for the worse. Although the weather is not supposed to change just yet, I have been having an ominous feeling over the last few days that autumn in the Cascades has started. As if confirming my suspicions, the weather decided my kit wasn't quite wet enough after another humid night smaping right by a river and so attempted to rectify the situation all afternoon. Apart from the rain, the day passed uneventfully apart from bumping into Fireball, with whom I had crossed the half-way marker, and whom I hadn't seen since leaving Burney Falls. Fireball had reached Crater Lake, was having a rough time and decided to get off trail for a couple days and then head south for a while to mix things up. To me this seems a bit weird and it's not something I would have done, but I'm better at not judging others now and am glad that he's still on trail. The has been an almost palpable mentality change among the hikers still on trail as we realise that although we're close to the end now, we still have hundreds of miles to go with ever worsening weather conditions, and every hiker has to prepare him/her-self for that. Hikers are still dropping off like flys, and it seems to me that from here on out the trail is a mental challenge as oppposed to a physical one. That is not to say the physical challenge is non inconsiderable, far from it. Infact, the the trail will get tougher in Washington, and the physicality of the trail is compounded by the slow but constant deterioration of our bodies. Any hiker that started out from Mexico is by now experiencing a fatigue and weariness that doesn't really go away regardless of how much you eat or sleep. It would be great to be able to slow down and take more zeros and hike fewer miles everyday, but the thought of being stopped by the weather one or two days from the Canadian border not something any of us will entertain for even a moment, and we all know that if we want to get there, we must keep pushing as hard and as fast as possible. So it all comes down to mind over matter. In my view those hikers that will make are those strong enough mentally to endure the weather and physical pain long enough to get to the border. I thought a lot about that today while hiking, and realised the make or break issue for me will be my ability to stay dry when sleeping. I can deal with the cold, and the rain when i'm hiking as I can just eat more, and hike harder to stay warm and dry. But when I'm done for the day, i need to be able to put on dry clothes and keep them dry, and me warm when I sleep. To that end I know my Tarptent is going to have to go. I spent a fair amount of money on it, and am disappointed by its performace, but hiking experience is hard won through a process of trail and error so I tried not to get too annoyed by it. I am fortunate that this is my only hiking kit issue thus far (apart from run of the mill things like socks and hiking poles of course). What works for one hiker, doesn't necessarily work for another so now i need to find a replacement. A couple other hikers I've been hiking with over the last couple days, namely Horny Toad, and Senor Verde are also users of the Contrail Tarptent but are nevertheless thinking about switching to the Big Agnes, whatever that is. I personally can't justify spending several hundred dollars on a shiny new and all powerful expensive tent fitted with an en-suite bathroom that I will use for 10ish days, so I've decided I'll go the other way, i.e. low tech and low cost. I am going to get myself a piece of tarpaulin big enough to stretch across me when I sleep and that i can put up high enough over me that hopefully it will keep enough of the weather out to keep me ish-dry while in northern Washington while allowing me to get my morning and evening routines done with minimum hassle. The pros of this option of course that it costs very little, and is very light, but the cons are that the protection it can provide is minimal at best, and that in a real storm, might be totally inadequate. I'm also aware it will mean that I have to camp in the trees at night in order to string it up, which shouldn't be a problem given the forested nature of the Washington Cascades, but it will mean i have to think a bit more about my camping choices as i get farther north. All these tent toughts helped me pass the time as I sped towards the final climb of the day up the southern flank of Mt Hood towards the Timberline Lodge. I usually plan my days to avoid long climbs at the end of the day, but today I decided the prospect of Timberline Lodge was worth it. Timberline Lodge though, as the name suggests, is at or above the timberline of Mt Hood and was a long climb almost , but thankfully not quite, into the cloud layer obscuring the higher portions of Mt Hood. The only way to tackle such a climb at the end of a long day is through the intake of massive amounts of sugar, which is why i carry a skittle reserve at all times. As I've said previously I don't often use sugar on the trail as a form of energy but it does have its uses, and this is a good example of when it comes in handy. I could literally feel my energy levels surge from the sugar entered my blood stream as I started the climb. High on sugar I was able to pretty much run the 5 miles up to the the lodge which I reached just as I began to crash. The lodge was swirling in ever darkening mist and fog as I raced up to it and into the warmth of the luxury lodge. My plan for the night only took me as far as the lodge, and not what i'd actually do when i actually got there. Although massively hiker friendly, the lodge is still a very expensive place to stay and I had no intention of shelling out a lot of money, and so had actually scouted out a bit of shelter around the back of the lodge where i could retreat to if i didn't find anything better. As often happens though on the PCT 'The Trail Provides' and the time from me entering the main entrance of the lodge uncertain of where i'd stay, if i'd be able to get clean and if i'd be able to get something to having all that sorted under a minute, as Cartwheel, a fellow PCTer was walking through the lobby and instantly helped me out. He gave me his room key and told me to go upstairs, have a shower, and claim a sleeping place on the floor of his room. I love the PCT. In his room were hikers , Scout, an Alaskan girl, The Messenger, and Israeli, and The Chosen One, a self styled Rastafarian. This bunch were equally hospitable and before long I was warm and clean and looking for something to eat. The Timberline Lodge is revered by all PCT hikers for its legendary buffets, but I was too late for the evening one so contented myself with a meal and beer at one of the other restaurants. The extremes between the rough and ready nature of the trial, and 5 star luxury of the lodge were difficult to process. I sat that in the restaurant listening to the pianoed lounge music emanating from somewhere nearby, watching all the other people staying there interspersed with other PCT hikers in a similar sort of trance. Pleased with the day's accomplishments, I headed back to the room and got went passed out almost instantly upon getting into my sleeping bag.

Day 131 : Blueberries

28th August 2013
Mile 2042 to mile 2073.5 : Breitenbush trail junction to Warm Springs
Mileage : 31.5

Average mileage since day 101 :

My plan to use my tent as a cover instead of as tent did not go well. I had again assumed that most of the wetness came from the humid night air, and not from myself, and that by covering myself with my relatively impermeable tent I would escape the worst excesses of the condensation. This turned out to be a mjor error on my part and I woke up in the early hours of the morning wet both inside and outside my sleeping bag. I was less than happy with myself, but at that stage decided it would be better to keep the cover on rather than let the wet sleeping bag start to freeze in the near freezing temperatures. In the morning, it took a lot of energy and willpower to get up and moving, but was finally on the road just before 8am, a very late start in the world of thru-hiking. Minutes after starting, I ran across both of the only two Scots on the trail, I think there are about 10 Brits still on trail at this stage, and 5 of us are hiking within 24 hours of each at the moment it would seem. One of the Scots, a young guy of 21ish told me a harrowing story of some trail magic gone wrong in Bend, the other town to which I could have hitched instead of Sisters. He said he had had the best day so far on trail, and possibly the worst night of life. The best day involved being driven around on a mobile bike-bar in Bend having all his drinks paid for by fellow drinkers, so far so good. Towards the end of the day he was doing exactly what I had been doing looking for a place to stay for the night. Before long he had found somewhere and was probably feeling pretty pleased with himself. After arriving at this gent's house however he realised he was in the house of white sumpremacist, and he said Edward Norton's character from the film American History X about summed this guy up. Poor Lighthouse was at this stage stuck, he had had a few beers and so was not at his most sober, it was dark, and he knew aboslutely no-one in Bend to call who might have been able to help him out. In the end had to endure this guy ranting and raving all night long before he finally passed out drunk. With the guy passed out and the day finally dawning Lighthouse made his exit and found his way back the trail and the world of normal thru-hikers. As he recounted this tale I was thinking to myself how easily that could have been me in Sisters instead of him in Bend. Thru-hiking on the PCT is a very safe activity in just about every respect. The nature element can throw things like lightning bolts at you from time to time, but mostly is benign if you know what you are doing out there. The human element however is a bit more unpredictable. Although I am sure there have been a few other harrowing encounters on the trail, this is the only one i have heard of in 131 days of being out here and it is not the norm. The norm, is much more like my experience in Sisters where the overwhelming experience is positive, but it just goes to show that every once in a while as a thru-hiker you are going to encounter odd people, and as a thru-hiker in many respects we are fairly vulnerable. But also we are very tough knowing that these encounters are few and far between and that a bad expereience like this just makes all the positive ones just that bit more positive. Lighthouse was packing up as I bumped into him aand I didn't hang around as the morning was cold and I was behind schedule, but a few minutes after that I bumped into the other Scot, a woman called Ingrid, and her 2 american hiking partners Tracy and someone else who's name i don't remember. These three were munching blueberries that they were picking from the bushes lining the sides of the trail. I joined in with gusto for a few minutes before reluctantly continuing up the trail. I have seen berries appearing on the trail for a couple weeks now, but have been unwilling to eat any of them for hear of eating some that i shouldn't and getting really sick in consequence. With confirmation from Ingrid and co though I enjoyed picking a few berries before realising that time was aticking, and that i hadn't done more than a mile. For a long time now the trail has been a green tunnel so havne't had many scenic views, and with the inclement weather any mountains i have seen have had their heads chopped off by the clouds that have dogged my progress since Crater Lake. But in climbing up to a ridgeline on the north side of Mt Jefferson I was treated to views south as far as 3 Fingered Jack, and north up to the massive hulk of Mt Hood. Tomorrow evening I'll be there! After more delays Ollalie Lake, and then some frantic speed hiking I the miles i needed to cover in order to make it less than 35 to Timberline Lodge the next day.

Day 130 : 3 Fingered Jack and Mt Jefferson

27th August 2013
Mile 2011 to mile 2042 : Yet another burn zone to Breitenbush trail junction
Mileage : 31

Average mileage since day 101

So my cunning and fox-like plan to keep the foot of my sleeping bag warm as I slept didn't quite work out as anticipated. I think in all fairness, I did prevent the bag from water ingress from the outside of the tent. What I was less sucessful in preventing however, was the evaporation of water egress from my feet inside my sleeping bag, so my sleeping bag ended up wet anyway. I was disappointed to say the least. It seems there is no winning when it comes to keeping my sleeping bag dry with my tent poncho combo, so i'd have to go back to the drawing board if i were to find a solution that I could work for me in northern Washington, where rain and the wet would be the normal state of affairs. Packing away my wet sleeping bag I started off up the trail skirting around 3 Fingered Jack before heading toward Mt Jefferson. Dan, my impromptu Sisters trail angel, had told me to expect the trail to be in poor condition in this section with lots of of rocky sections that would be difficult on the ankles, and he wasn't wrong. It wasn't too bad in most places, but it did mean that my average speed for the day made it dificult to get up to the 34ish miles I had planned for the day. I ended up sleeping on the north face of Mt Jefferson in a meadow trying a new tactic for my sleeping bag. Tonight I would try upzipping my sleeping bag along most of its length in order to let it breathe, and instead of erecting my tent, use it as a cover directly over it. This proved to be an evern worse idea than the previous night's.

Day 129 : 2000 miles

26th August 2013
Mile 1988.5 to mile 2011 : Lava Lake Trailhead to yet another burn zone
Mileage : 22.5

Average mileage since day 101 :

This morning I woke up to the wonderful smell of frying bacon. This, along with fresh bread and coffee, is one of the real luxuries in life, and I was lucky enough to wake up to Dan making breakfast. Rather than take on calories, as I usually do in the morning, I enjoyed breakfast, and after breakfast Dan drove me back to the trail via the coffee shop where I had a cup of really good coffee. The fry up and coffee put me in good stead for the day ahead, which, although was better weather wise than the day before, still entailed several miles of hiking gingerly across seemingly endless lava. To make matters wortse, I didn't have maps for this section up to the Big Lake Youth Camp. This lack of maps was not an issue in terms of safety or anything like that, more that I like knowing about the trail in front of me so's I can prepare myself mentally for any tough climbs, or tricky miles, case in point, the lava. The mapless 13 miles between McKensie Pass and the Big Lake Youth Camp was an error on my part, as I would be picking up all the maps I'd need to Cascade Locks at the BGLC so it more of an inconvenience rather than anything else. About a mile out from the youth camp I came across a very important sign in the dirt, the 2000 mile marker. To be honest it was rather anticlimatic. I have come along way, 2000 miles infact, but the miles seem less important now than the places I'll be getting to. Also, given that I was on my own there was no-one with whom to celebrate, but nontheless I did have a quiet smile to myself thinking about the fact that for all intents and purposes, I have now hiked 4/5ths of the way to Canada from Mexico, an impressive achievement if i do say so myself. At the Big Lake Youth Camp I found my box and packed it up into my rucksack along sime KaZu, one of the Japanese contingent on the trail. The last time I saw her I think was over 1300 miles ago at Kennedy Meadows South just prior to entering the Sierra and so we chatted a while before she headed off to find a ride to take her into Bend for a day off. I on the otherhand made my way to the mess hall of this youth camp where i'd been told the day before from Nora, the girl i'd met at the coffee shop in Sisters who'd offered me a place to stay up here, that I'd be able to find a meal here. Sure enough I managed to find some cheapy reheated pizza from the kitchen and sat eating it while a group of early 20-something years sat nearby. I am used to most people taking some sort of interest in my hike, and have a standard schpeel that all hikers have on stand-by ready to dole out at a moments notice, but oddly the 'kidss' running the youth camp couldn't care less about me. I thought it odd at first, given that they probably had all chosen to come out to work at this camp, but then realised that as college kids they were all much more interested in each other and the trials and tribulations of college life rather than what some bearded english guy was doing hiking through the West Coast wilderness. After my late lunch of cheap pizza, I was back on trail heading north towards 3 Fingered Jack, the next volcano on the road north toward Canada. There are 105 miles betweeen the Big Lake Youth Camp and Timberline Lodge, my next goal, and I intend to get there in 3 days and the afternoon I left from the youth camp. This meant that my dayly average would come considerably the more miles I could do today, so I took off from the youth camp intending to get some serious miles in before nightfall. Unfortunately, my ankles had taken a real battering on the lava flows, and consequently let me know I needed to stop just after 7pm. It is extremely rare that I stop before 8pm, so for me it was a real luxury to have that extra hour of daylight in which to do my evening routine. I also took the opportunity to try out my new, improvised sleeping bag dry system, which consisted of a polyethene poncho wrapped around the foot of my sleeping bag in an attempt to shield it from the worst of the exterior condensation and perhaps, rain. Although I didn't know it at the time it turned out to be a bad idea.

Day 128 : The Three Sisters

25th August 2013
Mile 1969.5 to 1988.5 : Mesa creek to Lava Lake Trailhead
Mileage : 19

Average mileage since day 101 :

As predicted I woke up with wet everything thanks to the rain and the inadequcy of my tent to keep me dry. Luckily there was a pause in the rain long enough for me to break camp, and so I managed to stay relatively dry while I got ready to hike. Today hike saw me skirting left around the day's set of volcanos, the Three Sisters, and they were not happy to see me. By mid morning I was trudging up wet and slippery trails trying to avoid stepping on the sharpest shards of obsidian that littered the trail in some sections. All three sisters, Southern, Middle and Northern, were hiding in thick cloud and clearly I was hiking through the oregraphic influence zone caused by them as I hiked either in rain, or clouds all day. The wet conditions makes stopping and resting unpleasant, as all that happens is that I get more cold, more wet, and more miserable, so I didn't really stop except to get food out of my rucksack to munch on the hoof. By the middle of the afternoon though my morale had sunk pretty low, and I had little desire to hike more miles, especially given the long exposed lava section which my map told me I was getting pretty close to, and the amount of lightning i was witnessing. A couple days before coming into Shelter Cove there had been a lot of lightning and corresponding thunder, and after each flash I would crudely work out how far away I was from it in order to judge the danger levels. Today I tried to do something similar, but found I couldn't do it due to the shear amount of lightning flashes all around the mountins. Hiking down to the pass the rain, thunder and lightning were continuous. It wasn't really dark enough to see the individual flashes, especially given that I was walking under a forest canopy, but the thunder just became one long rumble that would vary from a low volume and frequency rumble to huge bangs almost right overhead. Originally the day's objective had been the Big Lake Youth Camp, where I had a resupply box waiting for me, but coming up to McKensie Pass I decided I had had enough of the weather for the day and would attempt to hitch into either Bend or Sisters some miles east from the pass. The trail has an uncanny ability to throw highs and lows at you in quick succession, and today was the perfect example of this. My morale was at a real low coming into the pass, and I didn't fancy my chances hitching in the storm, but as I emerged at a carpark I bumped into weekend hikers Shay and Beth with their teenage daughter Lu just getting into their car. They were only too happy to help out a fellow hiker, and soon enough I was on my way to the small town of Sisters. As I had not planned on stopping there, I had not bothered to find anything out obout Sisters or Bend, so had no idea what lay in either of them. In the end I got dropped off at the local bustling coffee shop, and thought about my next move. I decided the best course of action was to start talking to anybody and everbody who would listen to me, and talk loudly enough that everyone would know I was a PCT hiker and had a British accent. The combination of the two has served me well numerous times on the trail and I had faith in them here. Within minutes an elderly couple had suggested I go up to the local firestation where, they assured me, I would find information on trail angels and if the worst came to the worst, I'd be able to stay. After that a girl about my age piped up to say she was working for the summer at the Big Lake Youth Camp that I had been due to get to that day, and that I'd be more than welcome get a ride with her back there for the night as they had ample room given the camp as there were no children there at the moment. Minutes after that another guy, Dan, chimed in. Dan is a Forest Service employee just back from spending two weeks on the PCT managing a trail maintenace crew and that I could stay with him. Jackpot. So within 20 minutes of arriving in Sisters I had a place to stay with a shower, laundry, kitchen and even a ride back to the trail courtesy of Dan. "The trail provides", there is little else to say. 15 minutes after that I was being given the tour of his Forest Service house which was his home whenever he wasn't out on the trail himself. In theory Dan lived with other Forest Service employees, but given the outdoor nature of the work that they do the house is more often than not empty. Dan proved excellent company as we cooked dinner together, had a couple beers and swapped trail stories until I was struggling to keep my eyes open. The most interesting and blood curdling story he told me was about the time he had been struck by lighting. He told me that most people don't actually get hit directly, but rather indirectly as the current dissipates through the ground, and this is what happened to him. He says during one trip out in the wilderness he had gone to bed one night and then woke up, or regained consiousness i suppose, to find that he had suffered fairly significant burns all over his body. It was a sobering story given my recent encounters with lightning, but not sobering enough to keep me from nodding off after a couple beers, so I took myself off to bed and slept in a bed for the first time in a long, long time.

Day 127 : Equipment failure

24th August 2013
Mile 1934 to mile 1969.5 : Another Burn Zone to Mesa Table Creek
Mileage : 35.5

Average mileage since day 101 : ?

Today for some reason lots of bits of my kit seemed to be failing me. I got through socks at a rate of knots, and am used to them falling appart on me. Other bits of kits though should not be failing me though. I noticed today that all the other bits of my clothing, i.e. my shirt, underwear and hiking shorts are also failing me. In truth i am surprised my shirt has lasted this long without getting holes in it, but in contrast I am surprised that my hiking shorts are wearing out, as are is my underwear. In order to provide my lowever back and hips with extra padding i usually where both the aforementioned pieces of clothing up high, and clearly they are taking the brunt of the abuse from my rucksack, which is a good thing i suppose, but I am annoyed that I will soon have to replace both. My Dirty Girl gaiters have also seen better days, and are developing holes on the sides where they catch on vegetation. I can ascribe all these kit failures to general wear and tear on the trail, and am mostly proud that it has all held together this long. What I am less than happy about however, it my tent. I have the Contrail Tarptent, and I do not like it. The Contrail Tarpent should not be thought of as a tent, but more as a basic shelter which will keep the worst excesses of the weather off you while you do a weekend hike or something of this nature. The reason I say this is that it does not keep me dry, at all. The Contrail Tarptent when erect resembles an irregular pyramid, and in profile looks like a right angled triangle on it's side, with the hypotenuse on the floor, and the right angle at the apex supported by one of my hiking poles. The opposite side functions as the head of the tent, with the adjecent side sloping down to the floor where my feet rest when I'm sleeping in it. The problem is that my feet, when in my sleeping bag, touch the sloping roof, and as the tent does not have an outer rain sheet the water comes through and soaks my sleeping bag. This effect is compounded further by the fact that almost from day one, I have been sleeping with my feet elevated on my rucksack which I do because a) my feet usually hurt too much in the evening for me to be able to just leave them flat on the floor when I sleep, and b) I don't have a full length sleeping bag so need to keep my legs of the floor in order to keep them warm. This means that my sleeping bag from the knees down is touching the top of the tent and is thus soaked every time I use the tent. This wouldn't be a problem if I were only out for a day, but given I have now been on trail for over 4 months, and that I have another month to go in the northern cascades in the autumn, I am going to have to figure out a way to deal with it. Last night, with more rain clouds on the horizon I again put up my tent, and although it did not rain, my sleeping bag was nevertheless wet when I woke up. Today this wasn't a problem as I stopped for about an hour at lunch to dry it out. I think though, that both the sun, and hour long breaks, are going to be frequent my days less and less as I get closer to the Canadian border. As I was looking for somewhere to stop at the end of today's hike though, the spitting started, and I resigned myself to another wet night, and following day.