I have a new company to hate. GE and Big Agnes keep moving on down the list. Who is the latest satan incarnate? PG&E. They put the final nail in their coffin this morning before we even woke up. It wasn’t bad enough that they started the Camp Fire last year that burned 3 towns to the ground (including Paradise) and then declared bankruptcy rather than pay for the mess they made. At the very least, every member of the executive committee should serve prison time. At best, they should hang from their balls and allow all the former home owners to come by and give them a spin. The forest fires were distant and non-personal to me. Today, PG&E made it personal. There was a large group staying at the hotel with us. They got up early and took every breakfast burrito in the place. Some guys were taking 3 for themselves. The limit is one per person. They crossed the line.
Jessica (from the hotel and not to be confused with Jessica Rabbit) had already agreed to take us back to the trail at 10. Thanks to the PG&E hacks, I had to make an unscheduled trip to McDonalds for breakfast, but we were ready with time to spare. We even got to watch a little “Let’s Make a Deal.” I used Guthook to direct us as close to where we jumped off the trail the other day. Jessica was a trooper and took us almost all the way back to where we camped last. We only had 4-5 miles of easy road walking to get back on trail once she dropped us off.
There was a little bit of snow along the road as we got nearer to 4800’ elevation. Once we got back on trail, there were huge patches of snow, but it was melting fast. We probably won’t even carry water tomorrow because of all the snow melt. We crossed to the north side of the mountain and ran into continuous snow above 5000’. I was okay with the snow until the sky grew dark and then my mood grew dark. It was not even 3 and it looked like late evening. We were about to get nailed by rain.
We dropped our packs to put on the rain covers and our rain coats. I was looking at the sky and begging to not get rained on. Miraculously, the clouds split in two with one dark storm arm going to our right and the other to our left. We dodged a bullet with that one. By now, my right foot was numb from walking through all the wet snow. I could feel water squishing in my boots. The last thing we needed was to get soaked beyond our feet with over 60 miles to go to make it to Mount Shasta.
Bunny and I were noticing all the animal tracks in the snow. I told her I was feeling very relieved that there weren’t any large predator tracks around. She asked me if I thought we needed to worry about bears yet. The temperatures are still projected to be in the 30s at night and we’re walking through snow covering everything. In most places once we got above 5000’ the snow was a good 2 foot deep. I told her we didn’t have anything to worry about from bears. No sooner had I spoken the words than a bear appeared in front of us on the trail. Our talking spooked him and he took off running.
The bear also spooked a rabbit in the trail. A rabbit by the name of Bunny hiking just behind me. If it’s not the snakes that put me in the lead, it’s the bears. The encounter was so fast that we didn’t even have a chance to pull out our cameras. When we got up to where the bear had been, we could clearly see where he had come from and where he was heading. We tried to catch another glimpse of him, but he was long gone.
The snow was really beyond my comfort level. I was hoping that the melt was progressing a bit faster than what it is. Fortunately, we aren’t having to break trail. I would probably have turned back if that were the case. We did notice that at least one person ahead of us had worn snow shoes. I made up my mind that if we make it to Mount Shasta, I am not going to leave town without snow shoes because the trail will be much worse in that section. We’ll have to climb well over 7000’ and I’m uncomfortable with the snow pack down here under 6000’.
We decided to cut our planned miles down because of the slower pace in the snow. We got to an intersection of the trail and a dirt road and I was ready to stop even though it was only 4:30ish. Bunny was willing to push on a couple more miles, but I was afraid we might not find another snow-free section to set our tent on. Plus, I was afraid that our luck with the rain might not hold and I wasn’t wanting to set up camp in the rain. It had misted on us, on and off, for the last couple of miles. We just can’t afford to get completely soaked again with another 60 miles of snowy trail between us and Mount Shasta.
We were slightly spooked from the bear sighting today. It had only been a few miles back, so we decided we were going to start being more Bear cautious. No more cooking and eating in the tent. I took everything we needed to make supper to a spot across the road well away from our tent. No sooner had we started cooking than it started raining again. This time, much heavier. We quickly carted everything back across the road and into our tent where I finished cooking supper.
While we were waiting for supper to steep, we heard voices outside our tent. The rain had stopped so I was willing to get out and investigate this phenomenon of other people on the trail. I recognized them from their pictures on Facebook. This was Trash Can, Store Brand, and Birthday Girl who had flipped up to Ashland, OR and we’re heading back south. I hopefully asked about snow conditions ahead. Sadly, I didn’t get the answers I wanted. They had done a lot of road walking to make it this far. In fact, they had considered bailing just yesterday when they got caught in a snow storm on Grizzly Mountain.
They did give us good intel on the trail ahead. We know we’ve got a good 6+ mile section of snow free trail before we get to the 20 miles of snow hell. They told us about an abandoned cabin they stayed in last night and dropped a pin on our map for us so we can hopefully make it there tomorrow night. It’s about 18 miles for us with the final 12 all being in deep snow. Still, it gives us a goal for tomorrow with the reward of getting out of the snow. They decided to push on another mile or two before stopping for the night. They’re headed into a Burney tomorrow night.
As for being more bear cautious, that will have to wait another couple of days. I’ve taken the precaution of wrapping my dirty clothes around the bear bags. As an extra precaution, I let Bunny keep her pee rag on top of all her stuff. Maybe it might help, but I’m not counting on the same protection we could expect after 5 days out. We just did laundry in town.
EFG