The Long Walk

7/24/13

PCT mile 2174.5 (Rock Creek) - 2191(Panther Creek) 17 miles

Elev. 1487 - 1260

5:30 is our regular wake up time, it gets us on the trail while it's cool, but because we chatted with Mark we didn't leave until 7am. We had a 5 mile climb from the river but my legs were rubbery and not feeling up to the task. We stopped and drank Gatorade & snacked hoping that would help, maybe I was just low on fuel.   I checked my GPS and found we'd put in 4 miles which is a steady 2 mph (and our normal pace), so we were happy! Mark caught up and passed us at the 5 mile mark and we said goodbye, he was hiking 17 miles today and our plan was to do 11.  The trail descended as we began to near the Wind River, it was warmer and warmer the lower we went & after we stopped to have lunch, Gecko passed us.  Peg took this photo of me hiking with the light filtering through the evergreens and vine leaf maple. 

Around 3pm we could hear the delicious sound of the Wind River.  Dropping our packs we rested in the shade by the creek side but I was hot so I sat in the river to cool off as well as rinse out most of my clothes.  Both Peggy and I rested, journaled and waited for the heat to drop. Here's a photo of my laundry with my pack in the foreground. 

We rested for 1 1/2 hrs and decided we felt good enough to hike 3 miles to the next bridge and camp there. 

This bridge had a boardwalk over the forest floor for a little way, lots of moist ground, shrubs and no place to camp, Rats!  The only thing to do was hike on.  We knew that in 3 more miles there was another bridge and a campground so that's what we decided to do. By the last  mile we were both done in and body sore.  The last 6 miles has been fairly level trail but was bordered by a dirt road that had more traffic than we wanted to contend with. We both feel more safe in the woods than near road crossings. While our plan had been to hike 11 miles today we actually did 17, arriving in camp at 7:3 pm.  Dinner and tent set up was all we could do, we filtered our last water in the dark and turned in.  One good thing about hiking this far, it positions us to begin a daunting 9 mile climb in tomorrow's early morning hours while it's cool. We both know we'll feel the sore muscles tomorrow.

As a side note, there's been almost no cell service so I will post multiple journals when I can.