Day 66 – Belden
Originally published on Mason Hikes the PCT 2017.
Mileage: 25 through Belden (mile 1284)
I woke up around 6AM this morning and sat in my tent for a while before starting the day. I heard either Taylor or Jann deflate their sleeping pad, which meant that it was time for the other to wake up. I ignored this signal and continued to lay in my tent without a care in the world.
I eventually decided to get up, at which point the other two were walking out of the campsite, so I bid them adieu and started my own morning ritual. Retrieve food bag, search food bag for goodies, eat goodies, eat more goodies, drink some water, eat more goodies, pack up my backpack until the tent layer, throw everything out of the tent, shake the dirt out of the tent, fold up tent, pack rest of backpack, streeeeeetch, and we’re off!
Today I would be heading down to Belden, an eclectic small “town” at the very bottom of a large valley. As such, we would be descending from 7000′ down to around 2000′. Obviously though, since this is the PCT, we needed to climb first.
The 2000′ climb was unexpected since the dominating feature of the day was the massive downhill (and subsequent uphill) we would be doing to get to Belden, but it wasn’t too bad and we had soon made it to the top of the descent. Oh boy, it was a looooong way down! And a looooong way back up on the other side. Fun! My legs felt like they could use a good workout!
All the way down and then all the way back up…
Jann, Taylor, and I had our own paces for the downhill so we split up, but we all suffered through the same endless switchbacks and monotonous pounding of our trail runners against the rocks. It was boring and tedious hiking since there were no views to be had and everything was downhill, but at least we didn’t have to work too hard going down. After almost two hours of climbing down, we finally crossed the railroad tracks and made it to the tiny town of Belden!
Yes, that’s the whole town
Belden was an interesting place, with porta-pottys everywhere from the festival this weekend, a ton of trash and other festival byproducts, and a large man in a tiny speedo and bikini top passed out in the front yard of one of the cabins. As they say with Belden, “you never know what you’re going to get!”
We immediately went towards the restaurant having talked about burgers and shakes all day, so we sat down and were joined by the rest of their group, Glacier and Radio Disney. Glacier, Radio Disney, and Jann are all from Zurich, so this group is collectively known as “Taylor and the Swiss”.
We all ordered the Belden Burger, a double bacon cheeseburger that I unfortunately ate too quickly to take a picture. So much better than my burger in Sierra City! It was so good that I considered ordering another, but Glacier gave me a chicken strip to hold me over until ice cream. When the checks came out, Jann, Taylor, and I discovered that our checks had been paid for by a mysterious benefactor! This benefactor was almost certainly the couple that we talked to for a while when we sat down, but the world may never know. I’m just thankful for the kind deed. 😊
At some point during lunch, we started talking about the climb to get out of Belden. Obviously it was going to be bad, but we wondered just HOW bad it would be. I pulled out Guthooks to look at the elevation profile and saw that we had a fair amount of climbing to do, but when I scrolled to the section after Chester, I was caught off guard. It was so… flat! In one 50-mile section I looked at, it only had 1500 feet of elevation gain. That’s unheard of on the PCT! I mentioned the possibility of a high-mile day after Chester and I was met with some “Yeah, that DOES look flat” and some “We’ll figure it out when we get there,” but an idea had been born inside my head, and it wasn’t going to just give up and die.
Once we had finished our food, it was time for more, so we headed over to the store to see what kind of options they had. As Taylor described it, “it was like a hikerbox with prices,” because the assortment was so seemingly random and they only had one or two of certain items. Even stranger was how the owner seemed to arbitrarily decide how much your food would cost as you brought it up. He did the same thing when I picked up my packages, saying “hmmm… $10 for the small one, $20 for the big one.” I wasn’t really in a position to argue arbitrary prices that were preventing me from retrieving my food and free shoes, so I paid the man and got out of there (with my ice cream, obviously).
I packed up my new food and then my backpack, which drew incredulous looks from the ultralight hiking crew I had come in with because of all my extra things. I still had an ice axe, I had an extra pair of shoes since I couldn’t mail my old ones back, I had some extra clothes that were accidentally sent to me by my resupply guy, I had a few extra smaller odds and ends, and I had a ton of extra food. My pack was FULL. Definitely not bigger than my pack in the Sierras, but bigger than it needed to be. Let’s see if I can change that at the next post office…
When I had packed everything up and was ready to leave, I ran into Jim, my old pal from Big Bear! I had seen him a few times since, but last I had heard he was leaving the trail because the Sierras were too dangerous. How did he get here!? It turns out that he went through the three river crossings leading up to Forrester Pass and was scared to go through any more alone, so he went over Forrester and left through Kearsarge Pass to hitch up to Kennedy Meadows North. And now he’s here! Super small hiker world, yet again!
After hanging out talking to Jim, Taylor and the Swiss were ready to hit the road, so I left with them to head up the monstrous climb out of Belden for a few miles before calling it a night. It wasn’t too bad to begin, but we soon hit the uphill portion, which was a brutal grind where we had to work for every step. Jann was leading and was absolutely cruising up, until he startled a rattlesnake and it, in turn, startled Taylor and I, who immediately jumped back a few feet.
Playing a fun game of “Where’s the snake?”
Besides the minor mishap with the snake (the second rattler seen by the Swiss today), it was smooth, sweaty sailing all the way up to William’s Cabin Site, which would be much cooler and a more appropriate name if there were actually a cabin there. Instead, it was just mosquitos and deer that wanted to hang out, which I guess is cool too.
The five of us set up camp and were later joined by Jim, so it was a cozy campground all around. I started eating dinner, but two of the guys were too full from the burger to eat dinner so they skipped. I feel like I have a bottomless pit for a stomach right now, which is both useful for gorging myself on terrible foods and awful because I’m never full and I’m always hungry. Hopefully this goes away quickly once I get back to Seattle, otherwise I’m going to get HUGE!