PCT day 150 – Those colours
I woke, as I have done for the past I can't remember how long, at 4am needing a wee. Come on body. We need to sort this out. 4am in not an acceptable time! This time I got up straight away and went for a wee. We were in a cloud, I couldn't even see Vince's tent which was about 15ft away.
I woke again at 6am, I poked my head outside and saw it was snowing. Oh joy. I went back to sleep. I heard Vince pack up and leave at around 7:30am, I ended up leaving at 8:30. It wasn't snowing when I left but there was snow everywhere and it was beautiful!!
I saw a guy coming towards me who asked if I was Puff. Yes, I am Puff. "Vince says hurry up!" Ha. Cheeky. Later on I learnt from Vince that he was a thru hiker who was turning back to Stevens pass because he had stress fractures in his foot. Ouch. I met bushwhacker, a thru hiker who thinks he has developed shin splints. Bummer to get this far and get injured.
The weather was much like yesterday. Using layers to constantly regulate my temperature. The sun came out for a bit. I tried to dry my tent a couple of times but everything else was so wet there was nowhere to put it. At least it dried out a bit.
The autumn colours are just too beautiful!
My feet didn't hurt as much as yesterday but here was a lot of up and down today. The potential for them to be very sore this evening is high.
I finally caught up to Vince at about 3pm. He was drying his stuff out. I got my tent out again and had some snacks.
It is just beautiful.
We followed the contours for a bit before descending into the valley and down into the forest. The damp, dark, mossey, slippy, mushroomy, fairy like, enchanted, magical forest.
I fell over again, slipped on a tree root and landed on my bum. Getting up was hard, walking does not give you strong leg muscles. I leant on my poles to push myself up and hurt my neck and shoulder in the process. And gave my triceps more of a work out than they've had in months. They'll probably be sore tomorrow!
I had three miles to go to camp but I couldn't wait to eat. I was so hungry! I stopped and had a snack and then got distracted by all the mushrooms on the trail (looking at them, not eating them). I didn't get to camp until nearly 7pm. Vince was already there and pretty much all set up. It getting darker much sooner now. It was pitch black by 7:40pm. And it's cold tonight. I spent a lot longer than I should have looking for my head torch to discover it was already on my head.
24 miles.