300 Mile Hike Day 8

View to the east

Thursday, July 20 2017

I've hiked various places on the Pacific Crest Trail since I was about 13 years old.  At the end of this hike I will have laid footprints down nearly half of California. I've hiked some of the more enjoyable sections multiple times, like the 220 miles of trail between Yosemite and Truckee. But I have never felt more clearly like I was walking on the very crest of the pacific coast mountain range than I did this morning. Within a mile or so of leaving our campsite, we were looking east toward Nevada and Southern Oregon and every mountain was lower than the one we were walking on. There was an obvious inversion layer and we could see smoke in the valleys. A few miles later,  we crossed over to the west side of the ridge we were on. Looking west we could see every mountain was lower than us again and then we realized we could see the marine layer on the coast.  I was not expecting to see that on this trip.  

View to the west






We came to an area where we had to negotiate across snow.  It's nothing new for us.  We had to negotiate miles of snow last year.  But this snow field was a little different.  It appeared that an avalanche had occurred during the winter. It must have deposited a huge amount of snow where it stopped. Much of the snow that was probably there had melted away leaving large trees jumbled all about for us to climb over as we negotiated the steeply angled snow field.  It wasn't like the trees were knocked over.  Their stumps where no where to be seen.  They were snapped off and pushed far from their original place.

Beyond the snow fields,  we walked again through miles and miles of burned forests.  Incinerated forest. As we walked,  helicopters buzzed overhead carrying water dumps to another nearby forest fire. I wondered what kind of jackass can't come to the forest without starting a fire. 

Paul takes a nap

In the afternoon, it was hot.  The miles were long.  As we descended from a ridge,  the trail passed near a lake. Paul was way ahead of CJ and I so he didn't get to share in the fun but CJ and I weren't about to walk on by. We dropped our packs on the trail, scrambled down the slope and dove  straight in with all our clothes and shoes on.  Then we scrambled back up to the trail,  put our packs on and kept walking like nothing happened.  Except we were way happier than we were a couple minutes before.  This is the view of the lake from the trail This notch is right where we climbed down and dove in.

The lake where CJ and I jumped in with all our clothes on!

First view of the northern California town of Etna from the trail.

We walked from 7am to 6:45pm and camped at meadow that was shown as a lake in the map.  It must have filed in with sediment and become overgrown in the years since the map was made.  Elevation 6239'

I didn't wonder long about what kind if jackass can't come to the forest without having a fire because later in the evening some people who camped by us - in the middle of nowhere - built a large campfire. Paul told them it didn't seem like a good idea.  I didn't know if it was legal or not to have a fire right there right then, so I took their picture as they built their fire to ensure the case is prosecutable if they burn the rest of the forest down. There really isn't much of the Klamath National Forest left that hasn't burned. How could they not notice that? 

Total miles: 18.6
Total up: 4082'
Total down: -3987

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

300 Mile Hike Day 6

300 Mile Hike Day 9

300 Mile Hike Day 2