Day 75 – Flatland
Originally published on Mason Hikes the PCT 2017.
Mileage: 42
Most nights before I go to sleep, I check the potential mileage and elevation for the next day. Last night, I saw an opportunity. Today was going to be relatively flat, so I could probably so a fairly high-mileage (upper 30s) day pretty easily. Intriguing…
To jump-start my high mileage day, I decided to wake up early and was hiking by 6AM after enjoying some delicious muffins from my care package.
Almost immediately, I passed an epic campsite with spectaculars sunrise views of Shasta and completely flat ground. Drats!
As much as it would have been awesome to camp there, someone might have camped there last night. Before 7AM had rolled around, I had already seen 4 people heading north on trail, which seems insane to me. I think I’m finally catching up to the herd! Is that good or bad?
This morning’s hike was incredible, not just for the scenery, but for how surprisingly logical the trail planning had been. We need to get from point A to point B and there are a ton of mountains in the way? Let’s NOT go over and down and over and down like we always do, and instead, go AROUND the mountains while staying at the same elevation! Whaaaaaaat?
By noon, I had done 17 miles in this easy terrain. With 8 hours left in the day, I could do another 24, right? Maybe not, but I decided to walk until dark and just see where I ended up. Sounds like fun!
I ran into Sequoia at a spring along the way, and he got to laugh at me while I struggled to filter my water. We talked about how easy the mileage was getting and what was in store for Oregon, but he wasn’t in any rush to finish. I was tired of the ridiculous and arduous process, so before leaving, I filtered as much water as I could carry (about 5L) and said my farewells to Sequoia.
It was still a bit hazy as I walked around the mountains, but the combination of not having to scale any tough climbs and the lower temperatures at elevation allowed me to appreciate the scenery even more than I usually would.
As I continued walking, I heard a distant rumbling from the mountains up ahead and realized that while I wasn’t looking, a thunderstorm had rolled in!
I personally love rain and thunderstorms, but I’m not sure that my backpack and things inside would be as fond of the moisture. I ran into some southbound hikers that said it drizzled for a little as they walked, but it wasn’t anything too bad. It seemed like it was already passing over, so I decided not to get out any rain gear or put my pack cover on. Hopefully the storm would miss me!
The last few miles of the day were all uphill, which wasn’t too bad since the sun was going down, and I was treated to a beautiful sunset over the mountains since there were so many clouds in the sky.
I was having a great time hiking and still felt fine, but I was starting to run low on water. The difficulty of filtering water with my current tools makes me despise doing it, so I was hoping to make it to a spring or stream to camp. I rationed my water so that I could make it to a stream I saw on the map, but I was getting a little dehydrated. I need to get a new O-ring ASAP!
When I got to the stream, I was overjoyed to have survived hiking 42 miles, but I was far happier to chug some delicious stream water before making camp and eating. There was supposed to be a camp spot at the stream I had chosen, but of course, it was taken. Nowadays, if you show up to a camp spot after 7:30PM, chances are that someone else is already sleeping there. There are just too many people in the same place! Since I couldn’t sleep on the designated camp spot, I set off to find my own along the trail. I looked for about 15 minutes, but the best I could find was a semi-clear, not-at-all flat area that was near the stream. Where my head went was about a foot above where my feet would go, but I figured that there weren’t too many rocks and there were no bushes, so I could probably sleep fine. I was wrong, but I wouldn’t figure that out until later.
It doesn’t look THAT bad…
I set up my tent and carried all of my food and water filtration supplies to the stream and started making dinner and preparing for tomorrow. For some reason, the ants around this particular stream didn’t seem to sleep, so as I filtered and ate, I had dozens crawling all over me. At least they weren’t mosquitos! Once I was done with my food, I crawled into my slanted tent and fell asleep immediately because I was exhausted from the day. Tomorrow will be much shorter, thank goodness!