Tune Up

Sierra City is not part of the modern world. It does not have cell phone service. It has television and WiFi but only through satellite links. I love it for this. You feel like you have stepped back in time 50 years.

The town sits nakedly under the Sierra Buttes. In 1952 an avalanche from the slopes above destroyed much of the town.

The Plan

I will hike two days to get near Interstate 80. On the the third day I will hitch into Truckee for resupply and then hitch back up to the Donner Ski Ranch where I will spend the night and hike out the next day for a four-day hike to South Lake Tahoe.

I am on the road walking to the trail at 6:10am. A car pulls off the road in front of me. Would I like a ride the passenger asks? We are going the same way so I say yes. Their names are Whisper and Lewis and they are heading up the Buttes to camp for a few days.

They drop me off where they park – on Wild Plum Road which intersects with the PCT.

Town Fog

Town visits produce a mental fog that carries over to the trail. I have described it as a membrane you need to push through, like the one in my water filter. I don’t think about anything except what I saw on TV and what I ate in town. I am not slow, but I am also not fully engaged.

It’s basically all up from an altitude of 4200 feet to 7200 feet. In the morning the trail follows Milton creek which has two nice bridges over it.

The trail is just a jumble of rocks, trees, bushes and logs. Nothing seems interesting. Then I hear this sound like a giant waterfall in the distance. As I get closer I see it’s a reservoir. The sound is water spewing from the spillway. This is the best picture I could get from the south.

It’s an earthen dam. The top is wide enough for a two-lane road.

Some of the land here is privately owned and occasionally logged. Here is how they tell the loggers where to stop logging. The forest managers spray paint the word STOP on the trees. You can see several trees marked like this. Since trees don’t read, I wonder what they thought about this.

Midway

It’s warm today, but not as bad as it has been. The sky is deepest blue. The trail goes next to this crumbly rock formation. Rocks the size of automobiles have tumbled down from above. I keep my ears open for the tell-tale signs of cracking.

All my food tasted salty today. I did grab a tiny nap. Here is what I saw just before I fell asleep.

I enter zombie mode again. It’s Harry Potter for hours as I mull over The Deathly Hallows, which was on TV the night before. Then I’m stressing about getting a ride into Truckee. The local trail angels are telling me the best place to hitch. I don’t want to hitch from there. It’s too far away. Should I hike more miles today? Tomorrow? Ugh. Here are two halfway decent photos from the afternoon

Ending

I am camped near Mule Ear Creek. I stopped here to avoid a big ascent at the end of the day. I am beat. Time to get some sleep. I want to hit it hard tomorrow to see if I can get closer to my hitching point on the day after tomorrow.

I know this was a crappy post, maybe tomorrow I will have more energy.

Miles hiked today: 16. (Maybe I should have done more!)