Wouldn’t you know. As soon as I said we hadn’t seen any sobo thru-hikers and probably wouldn’t for another 2-3 weeks, a sobo thru-hiker came to our camp. In all fairness, it was quite late. It was past 7 and we had already gone to bed. Crafty yelled “hello” from the trail to let us know he was there. He had intended to meet a few other hikers at this site, but, rather than disturb us, he would hike 1/2 mile to the next site. If we could let them know the change of plans when they arrived, he’d appreciate it.
I invited them all to stay, but Crafty insisted on pushing on. They’ve been on the trail since June 26 and had started at the border. They’ve only been hiking 4 days more than we have yet they’ve covered almost 1100 miles to our 570 miles. Those must have been 4 very productive days of hiking in Washington. Or, possibly, we are slow as shit (not the artesian dumps that Bear produced in Maine). I tried to stay awake to let his companions know the change of plans, but I couldn’t do it. Luckily, they were a little loud and woke me up. It was kind of nice they moved on once I heard how loud they were. I could hear them almost all the way to their new camp.
Today is actually Bunny’s and my 11th anniversary of meeting. When we were first together, we used to keep anniversaries on a variety of events: first meeting, first date, first kiss, etc. Once we got married, we thinned the playing field down to first meeting and actual marriage date. Since we chose my mom’s birthday to get married on, I only have one extra date to keep track of.
I had a box of 8 crayons when I was little. My dad wasn’t a doctor, so no box of 64 crayons for me. I’m only mentioning this so people will understand how I’ve had to struggle to stretch my knowledge. Pink and purple don’t appear until a box of 16. My color processing is limited. Bunny wears a pink hat, a purple top, and a teal (I’m way outside my comfort zone with teal) pack. We live in a plum tent. Suffice to say, we attract a lot of hummingbirds on a daily basis on the trail. One buzzed our tent, yet again, this morning. Bunny was happy. When one buzzed her yesterday while we were getting water, Bunny screamed “bear!” She is one tightly strung rodent.
We did decide to throw caution to the wind, today, and modify our NASA flight plan. The master operating procedure we were bequeathed only had us going 10.7 miles today with a 1.4 mile water carry. Although it would be a short, easy day, it would leave us over 6 miles tomorrow to get to our pickup and town day. I don’t like to go over 5 miles on town days. It usually takes us at least 5 miles to loosen up. If we stay under 5 miles, it’s like we didn’t even hike—a virtual zero day. By just going an extra 1.7 miles, we avoid a water carry and get tomorrow’s mileage down to 4.7.
Camping on a ridge has an unexpected benefit…poop with a view. We were able to drop over the edge for total privacy, yet have an entire valley spread before us for our viewing pleasure. It wasn’t until after I was done that I noticed the trail about 200’ below me. No worries, there aren’t many people at all out. Even if there were, I know it’s a blow to my ego to say this, but at 200’ no one is seeing much.
Bunny was struggling a bit today. We didn’t have much climbing, but when we did, she was sweating up a storm. I tried to take the lead a couple of times. Each time I did, she let out a painful yell and said her hip was giving out. It’s funny that her hip never gave out when she was in the lead. It seemed to hold up so well that she could keep a tenth of a mile out front almost all day. I do like to have her out front so I can see if anything goes wrong, but there have been black bear and rattlesnake sightings on the 20 mile section of trail we are on. I guess her fear is gone.
Water was plentiful today. The longest we had between water sources was only 5 miles. Out of habit, I still carried a liter and a half of water, but with water so close, we could get by with a liter or less like we used to do on the AT. At the first water stop, Bunny found gold flakes in the sand. Since this was gold rush area in the late 19th century and we are in a wilderness area, we will not mention the stream’s exact location.
Once again, no hikers on the trail. As we neared our revised hiking spot for the day, we heard some voices in the woods above us. We were also crossing a stream, and Bear told us that your mind will interpret water sounds as voices, so we ignored them. As we were looking around the stream, we noticed a huge field of carnivorous plants—Cobra Lily, a rare pitcher plant. What if someone was out here dicing up an old foe and feeding them to the plants? I noticed all of the plants’ mouths were closed.
Yellow jackets are assholes. They don’t collect pollen and make honey. They are just bullies. I saw 3 of them attacking a bumblebee and take him down. It’s near the end of their lives (I can’t wait for a hard frost to kill the little bastards). They just want to wreck havoc in their dying days. Every time we sat down for a break, they had to swarm in and investigate. They haven’t been stinging, but I hate the sound of them. Bunny thinks I’m overreacting to them, but unlike Bunny who has an irrational fear of lightening even though she’s never been struck, I have been stung by these little bastards dozens of times; thrice on this hike alone. I think I have history and a right to my irrational fear.
It was barely 4 when we arrived at our designated spot. We could have gone all the way to the road and camped. There is a campground with pit latrines there—a major selling point for me, but it’s a dry camp and we’d have to carry water almost 5 miles. We stayed with our modified plan and set up our tent on the edge of a meadow. I didn’t walk out to see what all the verdant vegetation is in the middle of the field, but I’m hoping for berries. This could be our best shot at seeing a Bear so far.
EFG
Excellent! You activated the Alpha 1b modification to the plan. That was an on the fly mod that I was carrying as a prime alternative. In fact, it was to be a discussion point with the only question being the wind on the ridges. Well done!
I figured it was already an option in the plan. If it weren’t for weight, I’d have asked for all variations.