Day 28 – Mount McGloughlin

The day started per usual: I don’t hear my alarm and wake up 9 minutes late. To prevent this, I have started sleeping with my watch next to my head. Unfortunately, the alarm frequency is blocked by my earplugs. Argh. If only I could train myself to wake up at 4am, remove my earplugs and go back to sleep for 15 minutes until the alarm goes off. I need an alarm that pinches me.

Despite waking up nine minutes late, I am out of camp at 5:15! It is just barely light enough to see without tripping. I know mountain lions hunt until 6, but if I don’t get going the heat is going to kill me later, so pick your poison.

The morning is beautiful as usual. But there is a subtle warning in this sunrise. Notice the hazy streak in the sky? It’s smoke. I can smell it too. A few days ago I learned about a fire that started near a section of trail I have already walked through. That fire must still be burning, and the smoke has come north. How far will it spread?

Crankin’

I am super stoked. I have a plan that is completely doable. And I have a “stretch goal” in case everything goes right. The trail could not be smoother. I check my pacing after I have hiked for two hours. I have gone 5 miles. And this includes a rather involved bathroom break, if you know what I mean. I eat some snacks. When my 15 minute break is up, I am off again. I am on the clock. I am going to beat that heat today!

Oregon has a very different feel from NorCal. The forests are…quieter. They have a muted feel to them. They also do not have the riot of flowers I found in California. Here are the only two of note a saw all day. Note, these flowers are super tiny. The dangling ones are barely bigger than a pencil lead.

And I see my first real rabbit. Those other things I think were some kind of joke. When I think of rabbits, I think of this:

Brown Mountain

At 8:45 I reach my first destination, the South Brown Mountain Shelter. The shelter has a hand pump where I will fill my water bottles and reservoir. The shelter looks like this.

The hand pump outside brings up cold clear water. I sit for a few minutes enjoying the coolness. I may have said this before, but the one thing I crave more than any other is an ice cold soda. Ice cold water is the closest thing to that on the trail.

Just to keep things in perspective

The trail feels bad for not having more flowers, so it offers me these:

The trail then makes a 10-mile waterless circuit of Brown Mountain. The trail alternates between direct sun exposure and forest cover. The exposed sections are enormous boulder fields. Boulder fields seem so intimidating. Are they happy with their place in life, or are they waiting for the chance to tumble down? I keep one eye on the trail. and one eye above me. Some wonderful people did a huge amount of work to build the trail across these boulder fields using crushed granite topped with cinder-sized crushed volcanic rock. I crunch across these aerial ribbons – so grateful!

I must admit though, the exposed boulder sections are scorching hot. My feet start burning bad. If I don’t stop soon, I am heading for a blister, for sure. I pull over in the shade and take off my shoes and socks to let my feet cool down. The mountain is a good sport though. It gives me a glimpse of what is coming up next: the majestic Mount McGloughlin. It is over 8000 ft high and I am going to spend the rest of today and part of tomorrow morning climbing the shoulder of it.

A mile from the end of Brown Mountain, I run into these two gentlemen. They are hiking the PCT in sections. By the end of this year the will have completed all sections except Washington. They are done with this section today, so they give me some food. A bunch of it is dried fruit which I love. I think I have enough now to get to Crater Lake on Friday. As they say on the trail, “The trail provides.”

They insist on taking my picture, too.

Up Mount McGloughlin

As I rest by the creek at the end of my 18-mile day, I decide to implement my stretch goal – I am going another 4 miles up Mount McGloughlin.

I am done by 5:30 and I feel great about it. I managed the heat and still did 22 miles!

To make things better, I have a camping buddy – Terminator. He has been doing 30 to 40 miles a day since he left his trail family at the start of the Sierra Nevadas. I asked him about some of the mountain ranges he has passed through. He did not know the names of a single one. Trinity Alps, Russian Wilderness, Marble Mountains… none of them. I am not judging him. He is solely focused on speed. The only thing he cares about is the trail in front of him and the logistical requirements to keep moving at maximum speed. That is one way to hike the trail. I wish him the best.

Terminator and I will rise in the morning at the same time. After that it will be “Hasta la vista, baby!” Oh, I almost forgot. I passed another milestone today:

• June 29
• Starting mile: 1755
• Ending mile: 1777
• Daily PCT miles: 22
• Total PCT miles: 405
• Animals: a weal wabbit