Saturday 25th June
Start: Fish Lake Resort
End: Fish Lake Resort
Miles: 0
Today at breakfast talk was dominated by snow. It could prove an issue. It just doesn’t seem to be melting fast enough. Sharing a breakfast table with Alfred and another new hiker Dan, we were shown a photo taken a week ago of a section of the trail 150 miles north. All you could see was snow!
Dan plans to road walk to Crater Lake, leaving tomorrow. I think this is nuts. We are here to hike the PCT and see all it has to offer. Road walking is a killer on the feet too – which are still delicate. Alfred is a very bravado kind of guy and shrugged it off. He left later in the day. We therefore decided that we would try to press on and just see if we can get through. Before we do this though we needed to change out some gear so we are better equipped.
Queue fate once again. Whilst still at breakfast another couple – Jan and Scott – heard how we needed to get to the town of Medford 45 minutes away. They had intended to hike up to Crater Lake but had instead decided to rent a car and drive up. Jan has some foot issues so understandably they didn’t want to risk the snow. They had already booked a cab to the car rental place in town and offered to split it with us! Hurray!
Whilst in the cab we were hatching a plan to stay in a hotel in Medford for the night (hot shower/ bed!), but this all depended on securing a ride back to the trail. We tried calling a trail angel, and asked in town but it wasn’t to be. When we arrived to a cab fee of $125 we decided to take up Jan and Scott’s kind offer of a ride back to the resort today. Shame we had already taken the tent down!
We were back to where it had all started, in the local REI branch. Boy we can’t seem to stay away from that store. Entering it is like a time-warp. Joe who works there was amazingly helpful. And in the near 2 hours we were in there we changed out our cooking system for gas and got a bunch of other stuff to carry in our packs. Most important for me were fancy Superfeet insoles – let’s hope they work!
During all this time Jan and Scott from Walla Walla (yes it’s a real place), had come to the store and waited for us! I could not believe how patient they were. We have met incredible people so far, but these two have trumped them all! We all lunched at The Mongolian BBQ – I finally ate some vegetables!!! They then drove us to Safeway and the post office…hiking HQ in Concord can expect another package of our stuff for storage soon.
Highlight of the day, actually of my week, was a trip to Cold Stone Creamery…
Back at Fish Lake I treated myself to a $2 shower today. That probably brought me an extra 30 seconds. Whilst in the rather gross shower I couldn’t help but laugh to myself – if only my mother could see me now!
Micah, Brandon, and another family they have teamed up with had now arrived in camp. They plan to stay here tomorrow and are expecting a trial update from us, so we can be the Guinea pigs!
We should now arrive at Crater Lake if all goes well on Wednesday 29th. This is because the next 4 days of hiking distance are dictated to us by the limited availability of water sources! Wish us luck!
a life to wander 