Ashland to Crater Lake

PCT MILES COMPLETE: 1022.2

PCT mile 1727.4 to PCT mile 1829.3
Section mileage: 101.9
Days: 7/31 - 8/3

It was hard to leave the hotel's free continental breakfast and air-conditioning for the triple digit heat. The news commentators on TV didn't make it easier, "this makes 12 days this summer over 100 degrees. We are well on our way to a record hot summer!" I reluctantly left the room and Craig late morning, bound for the bus terminal alone for the first time in ten weeks. I sat at the terminal making a PCT HIKER TO TRAIL sign while I waited with the real homeless people - the ones that don't have a social safety net to rely on when they get shin splints.

I got off in downtown Ashland, and asked a man on a bench, "Do you know where I can find some donuts?" I had decided on the bus ride that the one thing that would make hiking much, much better was a stack of gooey, chocolate topped, creme stuffed donuts. He directed me to Puck's around the corner where I bought 5 donuts, ate 2, and strapped the greasy paper bag to the top of my pack. With my donuts and hitching sign, I started walking in the general direction of the trail. Immediately, a man in a pinstripe vest with dreads hopped out of his car and came towards me, arms outstretched, for a hug. I flinched. He was taken back, saying, "Hey, it's okay! Do you need anything?" I said, "nope, just heading back to trail!" gave him a hug, and marched on. Definitely back in hippie-ville!

Five minutes later, a woman pulled over and offered a ride back to the trail. At the trailhead, she asked, "Do you want me to call your parents for you?" I chuckled and said, "thanks, but I talked to them yesterday!" and jumped on the trail in what I hoped was the right direction. It was hot, and hiking felt hard again after 8 days off. The trail was dry and meadows brown. Most of the plants had gone to seed already, and all of the views were hazy from wildfires that had erupted across southern Oregon and northern California in the last week.

I ran into a couple of girls in carhartts at a trail junction. "You guys aren't hiking, are you?" I asked. They were, however, building trails! If you've never done trail building, it is seriously hard, gruelling work. And one them, this girl named Solstice, hiked the PCT to Kearsarge Pass this year. I sat with them in the shade, forcing myself to drink water, and ate another donut. It made me feel sick, so I gave the last two donuts away. A few miles later, I reached the spring where a few thruhikers had gathered for the night. I made dinner and talked to them for a while, feeling like the new kid at school. I know no one in this section of trail; we'd left all our friends in Sierra City.

Onwards I hiked, into the plume of smoke on the horizon and red glowing sun. As the sun sunk, so did the oppressive heat. When it got dark, I turned on my headlamp at night hike. At the highway, 16 miles from where I started, I ran into a woman standing by her car, staring at the hill behind me. "How are you?" I asked. "Okay," she said, "waiting to see if we have to evacuate our home," indicating the hill. I turned around. In the dark, I could see the red glow of the forest fire consuming the hill where she lived. I wished her luck, and hiked on a little farther to a clearing in a field, where I laid out my Tyveck and camped under the stars.

The next morning, I awoke to a friendly golden retriever whose tail wagged so enthusiastically that its whole hind end swayed with it. I miss waking to dogs. His owners, an older couple, called him off and continued on their walk, wishing me a cautious "good morning." I leap frogged with the couple for the first few miles, exchanging pleasantries and telling them about my trip. By mid morning, I had seen no one else, when I came upon a tent next to the trail. I hiked past, and saw a head pop up and call out, "Hey!" as I passed. I said hello to the faceless voice, then hiked on to a nearby road. I had decided to take a 1.4 mile alternate off the PCT to visit the Hyatt Lake Resort where there was surely coffee, breakfast, and news of any new fires.

I walked swiftly to music on my newly-shipped iPod, until the road became overgrown with grass, and finally abruptly ended in the middle of the woods. I looked around. No sign of a lake, or resort, or any milkshakes. I looked on my map. First road, turn left. Walk 1.4 miles. Arrive at resort. I flipped to Yogi's guidebook pages and read through the directions again, trying to find out where I'd gone wrong. "Turn left," it said, "on the first paved road." This was definitely not a paved road. I hate backtracking (as do all thruhikers), so I took off in a northeastern direction hoping that I would hit the real road soon. Instead, I hit a sewage treatment plant in the woods, which was just a retention pond with a thick layer of algae and a barbed wire fence around it. I found the plant on my map, and used it to navigate a hundred yards farther to the (paved) road.

Heading in the correct direction, I almost immediately flushed a large creature from the roadside. Looking back, I realized that it was a big hawk, grasping a rabbit of about the same size in its talons. I wished that Craig had been there too to see it; he loves megafauna, especially predators. The road was otherwise quiet and I was the only one at the restaurant when I arrived. The news was on the TV and the cheerful commentators were talking about the fires. A fire in southeastern Oregon had grown from 100 to 7500 acres overnight. Luckily (for me) it was traveling south into California and not north towards the PCT. When I left the restaurant an hour later, smoke had settled into the lake, obscuring a view of the opposite shore. All afternoon, the light was an eerie red glow, like it was five hours of dusk.

I hiked into real dusk, to a wooden shelter. Someone had left a cooler with sodas, so I sat on the picnic table drinking Sprite alone, contemplating dinner. The shelter gave me the creeps. There was a squeaky pump that I had to use all of my (admittedly weak) strength to move the handle up and down to get brown water to flow. I pay close attention to my unease when I am traveling alone, so once I got water I moved on down the trail to camp in the anonymous woods where I felt safer. Giant black ants were everywhere, so I set up the tent and pulled all of my food inside for safety.

In the morning, I started out by 7:15 to try for a forty mile day. I've never done a forty mile day, and as silly as it sounds, I want to hike one. The trail was quiet, and I started moving fast. "Lava" said my maps, and sure enough! The trail wound past lava fields full of big black jagged boulders. I ran into a trio of women hiking up the mountain and sat down to eat a snack and field the usual questions. "The trail fairies left some soda by the road," one said. "Fairies?" I teased, "don't you mean trail angels?"

Sure enough, at the highway there was a glorious cooler of cold root beer and strawberry soda. I chose a strawberry one and sat in a pile of ants to drink it and wait for my Aquamira to do its purification magic. It tasted like something familiar. Pop rocks? Yes, definitely. Liquid pop rocks. From the road, I started a slow climb towards Mt McLoughlin. The trail actually skirts around the base, and there is a spur trail that takes intrepid hikers an additional 3000 feet to its summit. I was not feeling intrepid, and besides, I had 40 miles to hike. In the distance, I saw a dust cloud getting closer on the trail, and out of cloud emerged two horses with two women walking next to them. One of them asked, "You out for a day hike?"

I turned to the side, showing off my pack, and said, "Nope, going all the way to Canada!"

She looked surprised, "But your pack is so small!"

Now it was my turn to be surprised. On the Appalachian Trail, I would get this a lot. But that was 8 years ago, and I had not updated much of my gear since then. I have a bulky, synthetic sleeping bag, and carry extra food and clothes, so my pack seems to be bigger (if not much heavier) than other thruhikers. "Doesn't feel that small..." I retorted.

The trail in the afternoon was flattish, and I was hiking fast. I was well on my way to my 40 mile goal when I stopped at a spring to refill my water and the mosquitoes found me. There are many species of mosquitoes, and this was a different, more aggressive species than we'd seen in the Sierras. I realized that I hadn't brought any bug spray (even the natural kind) or pants. I'd have to fight this battle the old fashioned way. I walked as fast as I could, trying to outrun them. It wasn't working; they were too fast. I started slapping at my legs and arms as I walked. Then I reached a poorly maintained section of trail, and logs were strewn across the trail at regular intervals. My slapping, speed walking routine was punctuated by occasional hurdles over logs. It looked like I was trying to do some angry, hokey dance from the 50s like the jive or the chicken dance. After an hour of this, I gave up and set up my tent in the middle of the trail. I made dinner and waited a couple hours for the buzz of the little assholes to subside.

I hiked into dark again, past the 1800 mark and along volcanic cliffs. I was tired and it started to smell like smoke. For all the haze in the air in the last couple days, I had never smelled like the forest was burning nearby... until now. But what was I to do? I laid down on my tarp, too tired to set up my tent, and fell asleep. 32 miles. Far from 40, but still my longest day on this trip.

I woke in the middle of the night, covered in big black ants. One was wedged in my eyelid, and chomped down when I opened my eye. I hastily, groggily set up my tent, shook out my sleeping bag and went back to sleep.  I woke up again at dawn, drank the rest of my water, scarfed down some trail mix, and hit the trail my 7 am. I was getting better at this. I had 28 miles to Crater Lake, where I would meet Craig and eat ice cream. It was still smoky, and between Devil's Peak and Lucifer, I could see the advancing plume of smoke getting closer to the trail.

At the first stream, I ran into a slender blonde hiker from Michigan named Kristen. She had just started her Oregon PCT hike a few days prior. Lucky for me, she was there to lend me her water filter, because my Aquamira drops were gone. I hiked ahead, trying to keep a good pace, stopping to eat skittles and ginger candy every five miles. My feet were sore, but less sore than the day before. I could hear the buzzing of helicopters and little fire planes all day, swooping to dump water on the countless little fires. By 6, I had reached the general store. Oregon was on fire, but I was safe for now.