Mile 1,727...Ashland, OREGON!!!

Just realized there's a laptop where we're staying here at the Ashland Hostel (which is lovely, by the way) & it'll let me post some pictures!  We've made it safe & sound to Ashland, Oregon & we are happy to be here...just in Oregon in general.  This is the first time we've ever set foot in Oregon & we have heard so many wonderful things & so far, so good.

Let me start where I last left off:  We walked out of Etna, into smoke from the nearby wildfires & it made for some rough breathing, but overall, it was lovely trail. So beautiful. Glad we didn't have to skip it (as some others did).  Unicroc spotted a bear in a tree after hearing some shuffling about from something clearly larger than a squirrel.  He saw it right before it dropped to the ground & ran in the other direction...I didn't get to see it, but I heard it... 

Before I share this story, let me say that on this trail, we have experienced SO many lovely, sunshiny, blue-sky days.  At some point, I'd stopped really thinking about weather because the sun just always seems to shine out here.  The night before we arrived in Seiad Valley, though, we hiked through a VERY powerful storm - a ton of big fat rain, hail, lightning & thunder - but thankfully we were already headed down a long descent so we were well protected in the woods.  We just continued hiking & did 4 miles as quickly as our feet would take us.  There was a rustic campground at the end of that 4 miles where we were able to seek shelter under the roof of an outhouse, which is where we found Jon, Bryce & Hannah & then Katie eventually showed up as well.  Inside the outhouse was warm & surprisingly clean & we all considered sleeping in there, but all decided eventually that that was just too weird.  Eventually we all built up the courage to brave the rain & set up our tents & by this time we were all soaked & cold.  Unicroc & I made our dinner under the roof of the outhouse & shared a Bud-Light given to us by a fellow car-camper.

60 miles after Etna, the trail then went directly through the small town of Seiad Valley, CA which had a Post Office, a hiker-friendly RV park & a cute little restaurant. We discovered on our way hiking into Seiad that we weren't actually in California anymore...we were in "The State of Jefferson," or at least that's what the locals called it.

As we were leaving Seiad Valley, one last reminder that we were not really in "California"

Seiad Valley was our last stop in California...next would be Ashland...in OREGON.

The climb out of Seiad Valley was one of the PCT's last super large climbs but to be honest, it just felt good to be climbing.  The trail has hugely mellowed out & has been physically less demanding lately & so when it gives us challenges, we get excited.  We were warned as we were leaving town that more storms were on the way, but a group of us left anyway because that's just the name of the game out here.  You can't hide from it - you just gotta make sure you're as prepared as possible.  But, no storms came - we just watched as they floated around in the distance & we had a lovely, nice & cool evening hike.

Two days later, we were 30 miles before the Oregon border & I woke up thirsty for the border - I realized I wanted to see it that night! We had told ourselves we would never hike a 30-mile day because it's just too freaking fast...but my mind was made up that morning that I wanted to see Oregon. So we did. At this point, our bodies are basically in what we call "Auto Pilot," we can walk & walk & then hours later we'll eventually remember that we're walking but we still get pretty tired after 22+ mile days. But on this day, we kicked it into gear & went for it...& we arrived at the border just before dark, where we found Hot Tub & Sweet Tooth celebrating.  My full dream was to SLEEP on the border of CA & OR...& we did that, too, even though there wasn't exactly a comfy place to sleep. We threw out our mattress pads & sleeping bags & slept with our heads in Oregon & our feet in California.  We didn't get the best night's sleep but it was well worth it & as people came to the border first thing in the morning, we got to celebrate with them, too.

Terminal Geyser in Lassen Volcanic National Park

Burney Falls at Burney Falls State Park - absolutely blew us away

I got my second pair of $140 shoes (on bottom) & Unicroc got new $2 insoles (on top) in Mt. Shasta

Mt. Shasta - the most beautiful mountain I have ever seen with my own eyes - a 14,000+ ft. volcano that we will someday come back & climb (apparently much more challenging to climb than Mt. Whitney - the highest peak in the continental U.S.)

Sunset in the wildfire smoke

Marble Mountain Marvel at the Soda Fountain in Etna

Our campsite on the border of California & Oregon

On this trail, we have become the dirtiest, stinkiest people we've ever been in our lives.  It's a lot of fun to see the dirt go down the drains as we shower.  Our last shower before this was Mt. Shasta - over 200 miles ago.  And we still love each other.  And our trail friends still hug us.  These are good people.

Today is our zero day & we'll be leaving town on Wednesday.  Unicroc has a new pack coming because his frame broke & he's been walking with it that way for almost 80 miles!  Deuter is sending him a new one for free & he's super pumped to receive it.  Hope the package makes it here by then so we can head on to Crater Lake!!!!!!

Randy & Vicky, here is a back-up place where you can send that package in case it won't make it to Crater Lake in time!  ETA for Sisters would be Monday 8/26 & they ask that you write that on the box:

c/o Sisters Inn
525 US Hwy 20 West
Sisters, OR 97759

Thank you!  Much, much love.

Mile 1606 or something...Etna, CA

Less than 100 miles until Oregon, which is pretty unbelievable. We are really excited to finally be saying hello to another state & farewell to California for a while. California is a looong state!

Sorry we weren't able to get to a computer while staying in Mt. Shasta so I wasn't able to post our next maildrop address, as promised. But our ETA for that box will be about August 17th, so there is still time if you'd like to send something our way. Make sure to put the ETA on it as well as "Hold for PCT hikers!"
Here is the address:

c/o Crater Lake Camp Store
Mazama Village
Crater Lake, OR 97604

Crater Lake National Park has long been on my list of places to visit so we are super pumped to get there & we hope to spend some time there swimming/exploring/staring in awe at the beauty. We have been walking through smoke from nearby wildfires for the past 120+ miles & apparently that will continue until we reach Crater Lake, in 200 miles. Some of the smoke traveled from as far up as Oregon. There has been rumor that parts of the trail might close but as of this morning, the trail is open & we will continue on until we hear otherwise. It's nice to have other hikers around so we can all keep each other informed & keep an eye out for each other.

The road coming down to Etna was open but going in the other direction is closed due to the wildfires. We met Zero Gravity & Marshall last night, section-hiking southbound & after a short conversation, they decided they trusted us enough to give us the key to their car to take down to Etna! They needed the car dropped off here anyway & we needed a ride so it worked out beautifully for both of us. A Subaru Outback, just like ours, but this one was a stick shift. Unicroc felt he had enough experience from driving a stick-shift dumptruck at his last job as a landscaper & luckily, he remembered how to do it, so we made it safely to town. So amazing to meet someone so trusting of strangers to do such a thing - yet another reminder of how we can all help each other out, if we are willing.

Last night, we also met the first in the pack of thru-hiking southbounders, Bobcat, who started at the Canadian border on June 24th. He plans to get to Mexico at the same time we'll hopefully be arriving in Canada. He must be going faaaast. He was enthusiastic to talk to us & surprisingly not sick of talking to passing northbounders yet!

So this town of Etna is adorable, it actually quite reminds us of parts of Virginia we've traveled to, near Shenandoah National Park. The land is really starting to change as we travel north. Unfortunately, though, they've been dealing with these crazy wildfires & as we were eating the most delicious breakfast at Bob's this morning, we learned that one of the oldest houses right downtown burnt down in the middle of the night as well & a man & his cat died in the fire. This has been quite devastating to the town & you can just feel the vibes of sadness floating around. It's a very small town, it seems everybody knows everybody. Yet they are still smiling & super friendly toward us hikers. As soon as we arrived in town, I started to fall in love but now my heart is a little broken for what they are going through. But people are resilient & it's amazing how life always continues on.

Trail Angel Lyndi very kindly took our picture (& emailed it to us so I could post it on here) after dropping us off from Mt. Shasta:  Belgian Red (from Belgium), Simon (from England) & Us

Much love to all y'all!

Mile 1415, Burney CA and it is HOT!

Soooo...we're halfway there!...Actually, more than halfway!  We hit the halfway point at mile 1331.5-ish, or somewhere around there, a few days ago & spent a day and a half in Chester, CA celebrating with K-Pax, MeHap & NoDay, Wysi & Lodgepole & Simon.  Had no internet access so I wasn't able to update the blog there, so this one'll be a longer one.

As we were approaching/crossing the halfway point, I put a lot of thought into what the heck we're doing & why we're doing it & thought of some things that I have forgotten to share with you folks through the blog. First off, I want to say thank you to those of you who have taken the time to send love our way, via mail, email, phone calls, whatever.  Every ounce of love & support truly means the world to us.  We've realized we're kind of lonely out here, we miss our family & friends & each time we hear from one of you, it makes us SO happy!  Here's a few random bits of info I had previously forgotten to share:

1.)  We had left S. Lake Tahoe the afternoon of July 4th, to avoid all the craziness that was about to happen in that town...we had heard rumor that it gets super busy for the holiday.  So we got dropped off at the spot where we'd been picked up & hiked 16 or so miles up the trail to a place called Echo Lake & climbed up to the top of a rocky ridge, found a spot big enough for our tent & watched the fireworks over Lake Tahoe from afar.  We had packed out Tofurky bratwursts & double stuff Oreos & although some locals also knew about this spot, we had a lovely celebration of our own, away from all the chaos, which was nice.

2.)  We have walked through many wildfire spots & apparently even since we've gone through, there have been at least 2 more wildfires on the PCT!  As we were walking near the north end of Lake Tahoe, we could see a the smoke from a wildfire that had started on the Nevada side, in Carson City.  Luckily, we have avoided any that have affected the PCT this year, so far.  But we have walked through so much burnt landscape & although it is beautiful in it's own way, it makes for very hot, exposed hiking.

3.)  Hummingbirds - we have seen so many out here & even back in the desert, which is something we did not expect.  We have been woken up on at least 2 occasions from a hummingbird hovering just outside our tent, checking us out & I must say, it's one of the most lovely ways to be woken up.  They are so beautiful. neither of us has ever seen so many out in the wild.

4.)  I had brought a wooden walking stick from Michigan & it is still surviving, although it's slowly shrinking...I had found another so I had two for a while but after it started cutting up my hand, I said goodbye by burning it in a campfire.  Unicroc found his walking sticks on the trail & has kept one since about 20 miles in & that's the only one he currently is using.  He's tallying every 100 miles on it, like he did on the PCT, so he now has 14 tally marks on it!  He might run out of room by the time we hit 26...

5.)  MOSQUITOES...I don't know how I'd forgotten to mention mosquitoes!  There was a stretch of trail just after Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite where the mosquitoes were SO bad...it's really impossible to explain without you seeing it firsthand.  For about a week, we didn't take barely any breaks while hiking because it was safer to just keep walking, although when you walk, they still somehow find any available skin (even through clothing) & pounce right on it, so our shoulders were so full of bites.  They follow you, if they can keep up while you're walking!  I literally tried to outrun them at times, but they're too bloodthirsty & they caught right back up!  It's not easy running with a giant backpack on either!  They were so thick that as soon as we'd open the tent to jump in as quickly as possible, 100's had followed us in!  I have to admit, it didn't take me long to become a murderer of mosquitoes!  For one, our tent was our only "safe" place from them & after 100's had followed us in, we had to have our nightly killing spree...When there are that many of them, they literally start to drive you crazy!  No Deet for us, though, no matter how bad they got...just can't justify putting chemicals on our body, no matter the reason...the natural stuff works great as long as you re-apply it often.  We bought head nets in S. Lake Tahoe, but I haven't had to use it since because the mosquitoes have tamed down quite a bit.

6.)  Fording streams/creeks/rivers made for some adventures.  We haven't had to cross any large ones lately, but there was a stretch where daily we'd be making crossings numerous times.  You either have to find rocks or a sturdy log or take off your shoes & carry them.  It always seemed as though the mosquitoes were sitting there waiting for you as you were about to cross so that they could hover over you & drive you crazy as you cross, just to add a little more adventure to the mix.

I'll probably think of more as we're hiking, I always do...there's so much time to think out here.  And to think clearly.

We just crossed through Lassen Volcanic National Park, which was really cool.  Mt. Lassen blew up in the early 1900's & there's so much beautiful volcanic rock & caves all around.  While hiking the Hat Creek Rim yesterday, we had a view of a snow-covered Mt. Lassen to the southwest of us & we saw a snow-covered Mt. Shasta for the first time off to the northwest, which is the next big volcanic mountain we will pass nearby.  There's all this smaller volcanic stuff in between; it's absolutely breathtaking.  In the National Park, the trail took us near the Terminal Gueyser, which is not technically a gueyser, but instead a "steam vent" but it was AMAZING!  To see the Earth in action like that, spewing out steam & literally making the nearby water boil was breathtaking.  We really hope to come back & do some more exploring around this area.

We had our three-month anniversary on the trail a few days ago & spent it with a few other hikers who had started on the Mexican border the same day as us, back on April 22nd.  The night before, Fuller shared a clip from NPR's "This American Life" with us, Frosty & Goldilocks (all 5 of us had started the trail together).  We sat there together, under an almost full-moon & listened to a 20 minute story of a young man who decided to hike across the U.S. from PA to CA.  I highly recommend listening to it, if you can find it.  It was beautiful; it helped remind me of why I'm out here, living this life.

Mt. Shasta will be our next stop, a town in about 90 miles & we are greatly looking forward to it!   I don't have the address on me for our next maildrop spot, I know it's our box #4, in Crater Lake, around mile 1,800 & we will post the address again when we're in the next town.  Otherwise, you can scroll back through my older posts on the blog & I had posted it when I put up the whole list of all our box drops.

Miss y'all, as usual!

Sierra City, CA - mile 1,197.5

Greetings from Sierra City, a cool old mining town tucked into the mountains.  It has a library, a general store, a few inns & taverns, a post office & a few other cool shops & stops all crammed into the same historic buildings that have been here since the gold mining boom in the 1800's.  Our favorite place here, though, is of course The Red Moose Inn, owned by Bill & Margaret, who cater almost entirely to hikers.  They have created a lovely little hiker oasis & last night was our second night here in town.  The hike out of here is basically straight uphill & quite exposed so we are spending the day here & hiking out this evening, once it cools down a bit.

Bears?  Technically, no, we have "seen" no more bears since the young guy we wrote about earlier (before Kennedy Meadows).  However, we did have a bear "encounter" in Yosemite...but it's a shameful story to tell...  So here's the thing:  before we entered into Yosemite National Park, we had come across a few bags of food (& an old pair of shoes) that some other hiker had ditched from their pack & just left out.  Apparently their pack was too heavy so they decided to just ditch the weight & figure that once it's out of their sights, it's no longer their problem?  (Unicroc is the king of picking up other people's crap...any time we come across anything left behind by others, we carry it out, if possible...even if it's truly an inconvenience.)  Anyway, so we picked up those bags of food because they were destined to be found by a bear or an animal & obviously that's a terrible, terrible thing.  Bears & wildlife should NEVER get food from humans.  So we carried that extra food (& shoes) & had plans to throw it in the hiker box about 30 miles down the trail...in Tuolumne Meadows.  As soon as we crossed into Yosemite, 2 nights later, we were required to put our food into bear canisters overnight, which we did...but with the extra food we had picked up, we didn't have enough room in our bear canisters, so we put the rest into a bag & did the next best thing (we thought) & hung the bag PCT-style, like we would do anywhere else.  But the Yosemite bears are truly a different breed.  They are skilled & talented & dexterous...& they are used to humans leading to food.  [This is why it is now actually illegal to use anything other than a bear canister in Yosemite...the bears have gotten too smart.]  So when I went to collect our canisters & food bag in the morning, I was glad at first to see that our bag was still hanging but I noticed right away that it looked a little funny & that there were empty wrappers & empty containers laying all around underneath it.  The bear had somehow managed to slit the bag from the bottom so all of the food just fell out to the ground & it had eaten every single little piece of everything that was in the bag!  It was amazing!  Amazing in such a bad way, though...we felt terrible, horrible & despicable.  We were well aware of how bad it was that this bear had gotten food from us & we decided we were going to report the incident to a ranger once we reached Tuolumne later that day.  The ranger pretty much made us feel like crap & I understand she was just doing her job (because if I were her, I would've been frustrated, too...especially in Yosemite, this is far too common of an event) but when we asked her what she would've done with the extra food we had found, she gave us no answer.  Needless to say, we have decided to keep our bear canisters for the remainder of the trip.  Now our food will be safe from bears, rodents, whatever & we won't have to worry about another similar incident while we're out here again.

One animal we have seen plenty of, but I have yet to mention on here is the yellow-bellied marmot.  This animal seems to be everywhere, especially in high elevation & they just kind of chill on or around the trail.  They don't let us get too close, but they're really not too concerned when we're coming through.  They're definitely the most frequently seen animal out here.  We've also seen some beautiful bucks, young & old as well as does.  The grouse around here seem lazier, they don't fly off when we get close, they just kind of meander on.  We've seen a couple sets of mamas with her babies.  Plenty of lizards, even still, which I thought would disappear after the desert.

We have slowed our pace down & feel like we are kind of slowly falling behind in the pack.  People are spreading out.  Some people we hiked with early on are like 8 days ahead.  Others are just a few days behind.  But most are now getting ahead of us.  The thing that I've found frustrating about this trail is the constant pressure to do high mileage, but we've recently decided that we're going to just do the mileage that's comfortable to us & keeps us happy.  If we're not enjoying ourselves, what's the point?  We keep having to remind ourselves that we have no deadline.

Life.  Is.  Good.

Miss y'all.

Mile 1,000 & beyond!!! South Lake Tahoe, mile 1,078-ish

Been falling more in love with the trail lately...not many road crossings & many days in between town stops makes it so that we are truly experiencing some remote places...places you couldn't go unless you backpacked, or spent a good amount of energy & time to get there.  It feels like you really have to earn it & when you earn it, it feels dang good.  California is such a diverse place, we never know what we're going to find over the next mountain pass.  It's truly exhilarating.

We hit mile 1,000 a while back, which was very surreal feeling.  It's now been over two months (almost 2-1/2, actually) & it's JULY!

We were planning on heading into South Lake Tahoe via Echo Lake at mile 1,094 but when we reached a road crossing at Hwy 88, mile 1,078-ish, we threw out our thumbs in hopes to beat some of the holiday traffic through town.  A woman in a Subaru (of course) picked us up & she had her young daughter in the back seat, which at first, surprised me.  Turns out, she just completed the John Muir Trail (which was also the PCT for 100+ miles) & so she was very familiar with PCT'ers.  We instantly hit it off & after talking about how expensive our town stay was going to be since it's so near to the 4th, she invited us to stay at their home.  She pulled up to her house & basically said to her husband, "Look what I brought home!" & he immediately was friendly & welcoming to us & invited us right in.  He took us on a bike ride through town as he skateboarded (on a longboard, which is pretty sweet...& he's dang good at it) & rode us up to a pier on Lake Tahoe last night for a quick dip before the sun went down.  She has fed us fruit & goodies & shuttled us around town, making sure we're getting our town needs met, because she knows just what hikers need!  It's been lovely.  And their daughter is adorable, reminds us of Gabby, Keith's neice.  We're staying one more night & then heading back out to where we left off tomorrow sometime & will celebrate the 4th hiker-style (pack out veggie brats & few other treats), on the trail.


Running low on library computer time again, so I'll have to cut this short, but thanks for all the love to all you who we heard from!!

Oh & I just got new glasses because in California they have "opticians," (rather than just optometrists) who can look at your glasses, read your prescription & then make you new ones...Amazing!!!

Next stop - Sierra City!!!

Maildrop #3

Here's the address for our next maildrop:

Box #3 - mile 1,197.6:
Keith & DeAnna Romstad
c/o Sierra Country Store
213 Main Street
Sierra City, CA 96125

If you'd like to send us something, you can send it out within the next week so it'll make it there on time...& write "ETA July 8th" on it because we hope to make it there sometime around there.

We are well rested & our bellies are full & it's time to continue on to the next part of our journey.  We've had a lovely, relaxing time here.  Next stop:  Tuolumne Meadows in Yosemite National Park to grab a bite to eat/supplement our food in 35 miles, then we're heading straight to South Lake Tahoe.  We'll be arriving there around the 4th of July so we're hoping to get in & out as quick as possible to avoid all the chaos.  We'll see how that goes.

Keith was able to epoxy the heck out of my glasses so they're actually quite sturdy, just look a little goofy.  They should last just fine until I'm able to get new ones.  It's all part of the adventure...

Happy Summer Solstice from our Vacation in Mammoth Lakes, CA, mile 906.7 (& I posted pictures!!!)

Thanks to Cuddles & his wife, Emma, we are finally able to upload some pictures!!  This is all we have time/energy to share, but hope it makes up for all the times we weren't able to post previously.  But first, here's what we're up to.  We agreed to share a condo with Cuddles & Emma, The Blur, Goodall, Fun Size, Hermes & Lotus, & Cookie - sharing it, it costs about the same as a crappy motel but is MUCH better!  We have a kitchen so we get to cook whatever our hearts desire & there has been an abundance of food since we first got here, yesterday morning.  We had the most amazing almost never-ending breakfast this morning with vegan pancakes, potatoes & veggies, french toast, fruit, soysage, & orange juice & it was amazing. We are staying here until Sunday so this is our "summer vacation" although we've felt like we've been on vacation since we left our other life behind in Michigan.

We have had a lovely 8 days since we left Independence, with a few minor bumps along the way...I broke my glasses by sleeping on them...so they are now super-glued together & we are hoping they last until I can find a optometrist who will see me!  Keith burnt his $30 underwear while attempting to dry them next to our campfire after a swim...but at least he didn't burn his socks this time!  For the first time, the people along the trail are spreading out a bit, so we've had more seclusion, which has been nice, although we have fallen in love with many people we are hiking around.  Since we summitted Mt. Whitney, the PCT has been conjoined with the JMT (John Muir Trail) so we have been running into quite a few JMT'ers heading the opposite direction as us.  By the time we separate from the JMT, we will have hiked a majority of it...with only like 60-something miles left, so perhaps we will return someday to complete those 60-something miles?  Especially since it has been SO non-stop beautiful ever since we met up with the JMT.  Who knows...

We have passed through Sequoia & King's Canyon National Parks, which we've been to once before, but it was cool to see a different part of them, all on foot.

We don't have many pictures of us & I'm not sure we have any of us without our hats on, so you can't exactly get a good look at our hair...

Mexican border

Unicroc walking along the Los Angeles aquaduct

Moonrise over some Joshua Trees

Taking a break next to the Kern River, looking ahead to the GREEN mountains

Climbing up Mt. Whitney in the evening, trying to catch sunset

Sun cups on Mt. Whitney

Up bright & early for sunrise atop Mt. Whitney

Jen's box arrived with Primal Strips inside - yummm!!

Rae Lakes, one of the many beautiful lakes atop the Sierra's

Life is good...we just keep taking it one step at a time & soaking up all the beauty all around us.  Thank you for all of the love, support & well wishes.  Much love.