Day 100 : The halfway headache

29th July 2013
Mile 1332 to mile 1335 : Soldier Creek to Highway 36
Mileage : 3

Today was not about hiking, it was about celebrating the achievement of hiking halfway to Canada from Mexico, and about some hard truths about the miles to come. I had made it to the raod by 8am, and thanks to Ned, my ride for the day, into Chester by 9am where I met up with Dr Slosh, Smiles, Rocky and T-Rex for some celebratory breakfast calories.At first conversation was centered on congratulating ourselves for how far we had come literally and figuratively, but soon we started thinking about half far we still had to go. 1330 miles is a long way to have come, but 1330 miles is a long way to go, especially when the time element is considered. It has taken me 99 days to cover the first 1330 miles, averaging just 13.4 miles per day when zeros are included. Given that my goal is to finish at the end of September, including a 10-12 day break, it means my average daily mileage for the 52 days i reckon i have left on the trail has be 25. That is a big number. I'm not sure just how achievable that is, but starting tomorrow when i leave Chester I'm going to give it a go. The only things that will stop as I've previously said are a family emergency, or an injury, and my personal belief is that an injury can best be avoided by keeping the weight on. In VVR several weeks ago, and in Sierra City several days ago I weighed myself, and doubted the result both times, but have managed to do it third time and now believe the previous scales report on my weight. I started the trail weighing 86 kilos and in the last 100 days have lost only an implausible 4 kilos to take me to 82kgs. The reason I say this is implausible is that every other thru-hiker I have met, male or female, has lost considerably more than that. Shady Acres for example, who is roughly equal to me in height, build and hiking ability, has lost over 16 kilos since the start. I know that muscle is more dense than fat, and that I have no doubt that a have transferred a good deal of muscle from my upper to lower body, but a loss of only 4 kilos is improbably small. I think this is accomplishment about which i most pleased given how far i have come physically and mentally in the last 100 days, and i intend to try and keep this weight up if I can. There is a current myth going around the hiker that the second half of the trail is easier than the first, and that consequently we cover the miles quicker. I am skeptical about such assertions. Perhaps the conditions on the trail are marginally easier, but this is offset by the fact that the average mileage has to almost double for most hikers, and I definitely fall into this category. There is often talk about the fact that as we can cover ground more quickly we can carry substantially less food between trail towns, i personally think this is a big mistake. Up til now my calorie intake has been largely based around taking on 1000 calories 3 times a day and then at least 1000 calories worth of snacks between these meals. As I have been losing fat, I must be consuming more than I'm eating, even with trail town splurges, but given my relative lack of weight loss I can't be too far from correctly assessing my daily calorific requirements. The danger for the future is, in my view, to continue this strategy as i massively increase my average daily mileage. To counter this I have decided to change my calorie intake strategy to one based round miles and not days. A healthy average male is supposed to consume about 2500 calories per day, so this is my base. On top of this, I am going to attempt to eat 100 calories per mile while on the trail. As my 25 miles per day estimation includes any zeros i might take from here on, my aim for a daily mileage is going to be 30, resulting in an average daily calorie requirement of 5500. All in all, this means that, where other hikers are finding they are carrying less, I might actually end up carrying more, but I feel this is the right way to go. There is a well known hiker crash point at the end of Oregon, where hikers realize they pushed too hard through Northern California and Oregon and no longer have the strength to continue through Washington. I personally feel that a crash at this point is self inflected due to an insufficient calorie intake regime, and I am determined for that not to be me. On that note, it is time for resupply.

Day 99 : Halfway!

28th July 2013
Mile 1309 to mile 1332 : Cold Springs to Soldier Creek
Mileage : 23

As of today I have hiked halfway from Mexico to Canada, a total of 1330 miles!

I was the last out of camp this morning, which i like as i prefer hiking at the back of groups where i don't keep looking round every time I want to stop to take a picture or whatever. I filled up my water to capacity and started off in the early morning cool to get as many of the 23 waterless miles done as possible before it got too hot. Although it doesn't happen very often, the halfmile maps on this occasion were wrong and didn't list 2 springs along this section cutting the waterless length down to 12 miles, which i would do later that afternoon. I decided to lunch earlier than usual and so stopped at the last spring before the actual 12 mile waterless stretch. As yesterday, my current hiking group were following the same plan and we all stopped in some shade at the top of the day to rehydrate before tackling the days climb in the hot, hot sun. Again most of hikers left in front of me and i spent the rest of the afternoon catching them up so we could all celebrate at the halfway marker together. At about 4pm i reached the PCT halfway marker at mile 1326.5. I had hiked halfway from Mexico to Canada! It was actually a little anticlimactic, i don't know why, but it did. I think mostly because the two main groups of people with whom I have made friends, PRT and the Wolfpack, weren't there, and it felt a bit strange celebrating with people i didn't really know. I don't have anything negative to say about the present group with whom i am hiking, but they just weren't my group. Nevertheless, 2 of the group, Fireball and Busted, had each brought with them a bottle of sparkling wine, which we all used to good effect in front of the the monument. Interestingly, the PCT halfway marker isn't halfway along the PCT. The length of the PCT changes over time as detours are added and then removed, for a whole host of reasons, and this year the trail is 2660 miles long meaning the mid point was at mile 1330, and not 1326.6 where the monument is located, but who's counting? After a long time collectively patting ourselves on our backs we all carried on down the trail towards water and that night's camping spot. I was in two minds as to whether to stop at the water, or continue to the road and try to hitch to Chester, 7 miles eat from where the trail crosses the nearest highway at mile 2335. In the end i decided it was getting late and my chances of hitching in the dark were close to zero, so i decided to cover the last miles to the road early in the morning and get to bed early that night, so along with most people, except Dr Slosh and Smiles, who had turned up out of the blue at the monument and then had disappeared back into the blue immediately after on their way to Chester that night, i camped at Soldier Springs. My main reward to myself for getting this far has been the low mileage of the last couple days, I know that this is going to change in a big way from here on out, but that night i drifted off to sleep content that i was well on my way to fulfilling a long desired goal of hiking from Mexico to Canada along the PCT.

Halfway through!

Clockwise from the champagne : Fireball, Lady X, Solstice, Golden Boy and Busted

Day 98 : The 2nd hardest climb of the PCT to date

26th July 2013
Mile 1290 to mile 1309 : Belden to Cold Springs
Mileage 19

By now I am a hiking machine and am not generally phased by anything the trail throws at me. But the climb out of Belden was definitely the 2nd worst climb of the entire PCT to date. 1st place in the horrible climbs awards goes to the climb out of Ziggy and the Bear's into the San Gorgornio mountains over 1100 miles ago, but the Belden climb came close to pipping it. The gain over the 14 mile cllimb was about 5000ft, but Dr Slosh worked out later that the total change, with all the little ups and downs, was more like 7000ft. It was less than pleasant. 14 miles should take less than 5 hiking hours (not including breaks), this took over 8. Thankfully there was shade and water for the majority of the ascent, but even so i was hot and dehydrated when i got to the summit. My original goal was to do about 25 today as i slowly ramp up the miles, and although i could have gone farther, i decided to call it a day after only 19. Once i had recovered a bit, i discovered i wasn't actually that tired, but knew that i would still be dehydrated for some hours to come, and so shouldn't start off dehydrated into the 23 mile dry stretch which lay ahead, especially now that i only carry 3 litres water capacity. Where I stopped at Cold Springs, I discovered i wasn't alone in my plan for the dry stretch, and in the were a large group at the campsite that night : Shay Acres and his two friends, Fireball, Busted, Solstice, Golden Boy and Lady X.The mood was pretty excited that evening, for one big reason, tomorrow we would be halfway to Canada!

Day 97 : Belden

25th July 2013
No Miles
Mileage : 0

The climb out of Belden is 5000+ft, and i had no intention of doing that today. Realistically the only time to tackle a climb like that in the middle of summer is in the cool of the morning, and given i had gotten up late today following Pan's birthday celebrations, i planned to tackle the climb the following morning. Belden is too small to do any real resupply, and too small to have anywhere with wifi or internet connection, so oddly i didn't have any chores to do. The high point of the day was getting in touch with Sophie, with whom i hadn't spoken since Yosemite Valley a couple weeks ago, and after that i spent most of the day by the river with Shady Acres and two of his friends who had come up to hike with him for a couple days. Towards the end of the day Chick-Chack and Starfox turned up, and the three of us headed across to the Braatens', some local trail angels who put up hikers in their cabins. The three of us spent a couple hours chatting about our experiences on the trail thus far, and talking about the fact that in the the last couple hundred miles or so there had been a substantial number of people dropping of the trail, and we wondered if any of the people we have been hiking with would end up leaving. Sourcream, the young canadian guy who started on the same day as myself, Chick-Chack, T-Rex, Rocky, Mr Green and Hoopdreams, with whom i have mostly stuck with up til now, is the only person we know personally that has left. He decided he had accomplished enough for his needs, and decided there was no need to carry on. A few hundred miles ago (i have taken to expressing time in miles hiked) I would have taken a dim view of this, but now I am much more laid back about it. Each hiker should hike his or her own hike, and not judge others for deciding to take a different path. Although the only 2 things that pull me off the trail are an injury or family emergency, it did make me wonder about continuing. More accurately, it made me wonder about stopping. The Mexican and Candian borders are just arbitrary lines drawn on a map, and don't really represent a physical barrier, e.g the sea, to a hiker so why place so much importance on it? Why stop there? Why not continue up into Canada and beyond? I find it difficult explaining even to myself why i'm out doing this trail  in the first place, so I understand that if Sourcream feels he has gone as far as he needs, he doesn't need to explain himself to anyone. After reaching the conclusion that all of us are out here with different aims and objectives, and that it is unfair to judge other people for making decisions that aren't inline with one's own, i went to bed contemplating the enormity of my own objective for the following morning : A 5000ft climb in the hot summer sun.

Brenda Braaten

Belden bar and restaurant

Day 96 : An unexpected reunion

24th July 2013
Mile 1266 to mile 1290 : The Williams' to Belden
Mileage : 24

As if the previous day's hospitality hadn't been enough, the 5 of us hikers staying at the Williams' last night were woken to the wonder smell of coffee and frying bacon. I had the best of intentions to hike out early and make the most of the cool of the morning, but the breakfast laid on by the Williams' put paid to that. It was without a doubt the best breakfast i have had on the trail thus far, and i don't imagine it being beaten any time soon. By 9am i was on the move once again and after a 5mile road walk around Bucks Lake had regained the PCT. With the hundreds, if not thousands, of calories i had taken on a breakfast i had covered 15 miles before i needed to stop an eat again, and did so just before starting the 5000ft knee jarring descent down to Belden, a small hamlet built on the North Fork of the Feather River as it cuts east to west through this most northern section of the Sierra Nevadas. The trail spat me out almost directly in the middle of the centre of the 'town', a grandiose title for population centre of 22, according to wiki. Upon arrival at the local watering hole, i spotted the packs of PRT. I discovered Peter Pan, Mr Greem, Dishcloth and HoopDreams soaking in the river celebrating Pan's birthday and awaiting my arrival. They had been expecting me earlier in the day, but my trail angel stop had delayed me by about 9 hiking hours and so they whiled away the time doing what PRT does best, resting. In truth i was not expecting them, to be here so soon, as was intrigued to know how they'd gotten here so fast. It turns out they had found it too tough to leave Sierra City given the steep climb out of there, and so had obtained a ride to Bucks Lake, from where they had hiked into Belden. In order not to cut any corners, they now intended to get a ride back to Sierra City tomorrow, from where they would hike back to Bucks Lake, whereupon they would get a ride back to Belden before returning as normal to the trail. The logic of their plan escapes me, but it does leave me with a bit of a dilemma as to whether or not to wait for them in Belden, or whether to continue up the trail and hope they catch me up. For the moment I put all that from my mind and joined them cooling off in the river with a hard earned beer. Planning could wait til tomorrow.

From left to right, by Starfox : Rocks, Yours Truly, HoopDreams, Dishcloth, Mr Green, Peter Pan, Shady Acres, Nurse Betty & Nurse Betty's fella whose name i don't remember

Day 95 : A pleasant surprise

23rd July 2013
Mile 1251 to mile 1266 : The Middle Fork of the Feather River to The Williams'
Mileage : 15 + 2.5

The Feather River has 3 forks, Lower, Middle, and Upper, and they cut through the terrain forming deep forested canyons. Most of the trail follows the tops of of a plateau like landscape at about 7000ft except for where it crosses rivers, which mostly flow west to east. Whenever this happens, the trail dives straight to the bottom of these canyons and climbs straight up the other sides. This is the situation at Sierra City, the Middle Fork of the Feather, and at Belden. The rivers are often over 3000ft, and at Belden almost 5000ft, below the plateaus and the temperatures are substantially higher, difficult to believe due to the intense heat of the plateaus, as a result. For this reason I was actually looking forward to the 6000+ft of climbing the trail had planned for me that day. The first 4000ft were completed at relative speed as it was up, up, up from the go that morning, and by midday i was at Lookout Rock admiring the view. At Lookout Rock, I saw a sign for a local trail angel at Buck's Lake, took a picture in case i needed it later, but otherwise didn't think much of it as i wasn't planning on on stopping there. Most of the angels are well known to hikers in advance, so we can plan to stop in or not, but this was a total surprise and so i hadn't planned on a stop there. By the time i reached Big Creek Rd however, I had changed my mind. PRT were still behind me, and i was trying to ease up on the pace to let them catch me, so decided i would go and investigate the local trail angels Terry and Nancy Williams. It turned out to be a very good idea, and they turned out to be the best Trail Angel experience i've had so far. There was no traffic going my direction on Big Creek Rd, so after 15 minutes i started walking down the road in the direction mentioned on the sign, and before long had found the Williams' cabin 2 miles down the road. The Williams are from the Bay Area, and keep a small cabin up by Bucks Lake to escape the worst of the summer heat. It was wonderful. I was the only hiker there that afternoon, but was soon joined by Chops, Rocks, Hercules and Daniela who turned up just in time for dinner. It turns out the Williams had had a large family reunion a few days before and were doing there best to offload all the excess food onto us hikers before it all went bad. The 5 of us did our best to help Nancy and Terry out and put our hiker appetites to work. Many calories later we were all snoring soundly in the cool evening air all congratulating ourselves for the making the decision to stop here. As i said it was the best Trail Angel experience thus far.

Clockwise from far left : Chops, Terry, Hercules, Rocks, Nancy and Daniela

Day 94 :The Feather River

22nd July 2013
Mile 1221 to mile 1251 : A-tree Spring to the Middle Fork of the Feather River
Mileage : 30

I made good time today getting all the way to the feather river before dark fell. Most of the day was spent trying to hide from the sun that beat down on me all day as it continues to be the hardest part of the hike at this stage. There were several unpleasant exposed sections on the tops of ridges, that i had to tackle in the midday sun, but thankfully these were short in length and i was able to hike in the shade for the majority of the day, although at the hottest part of the day even this wasn't possible. Exacerbating the intense heat is the stillness of the forest. On the exposed ridges there is sometimes a breeze, but mostly the forest blogs out the wind, every once in a while i can see the tops of trees waving slightly, but down on the forest floor there is no relief, the oppressive heat and silence weigh down on me everyday and is difficult to ignore. Towards the end of the day the forest is at it's hottest, and today was no exception. At the end of the day I had a 3000ft descent down to the Middle Fork of the Feather River, and as i descended i could feel the temperature and humidity increase with every step, even as the forest was starting to darken with the oncoming evening. The river was a welcome sight at the end of the day, and i was able to cool off, but even so i looked forward to the climb back up from the river as the forest is fractionally, but noticeably cooler with the increase in altitude.