Day 80: 10 miles hiked. We woke up in our hotel room in Government Camp, and made our way downstairs for some breakfast. Beast’s friends, Sam and Firefly were there, as they had brought Beast’s Uncle Joe out to hike with us for the next few days. I ordered a very healthy breakfast of 1 donut, a piece of pie, and a side of hashbrowns. In retrospect, I should’ve just gotten the potatoes, since the side turned out to be bigger than an entire meal (see picture below). Government Camp is a ski town at the base of Mount Hood, which we were going to spend the day walking towards. After breakfast, the 6 of us left town and started our way towards Mt Hood. After a few miles, Sam and Firefly turned around to go back, as they needed to head back home to Bend, leaving Savior, Beast, Uncle Joe, and myself to continue on. The day was clear blue skies and beautiful! It was also all uphill and in exposed sand for most of the day, so it was slow going. We took our time in the forest at the base of the mountain, before we emerged with a beautiful view of Mt Hood. I looked behind and was surprised to get such an amazing view of Mt Jefferson, which I had not been able to see too much of in the weeks prior because of all of the terrible weather we’ve been getting. We hiked in and out of the valleys that surrounded Mt Hood until we got to Timberline Lodge, where we were stopping for the night. Timberline Lodge is famous amongst hikers for its all you can eat breakfast, and there was no way we were going to be ambitious in our miles and miss the buffet. It was Fourth of July weekend, so we were able to watch fireworks from our campsite. We built a fire, got pizza from the lodge, and had an all around great night.
Day 81: 15 miles hiked. I specifically ate very little for dinner in the hopes that I could eat more breakfast today. Not sure it worked, but I definitely was up for the all you could eat challenge! The breakfast was delicious and amazing! Timberline Lodge is pretty fancy, and I felt out of place in my hiker clothes. Additionally, it’s been such a wet spring/summer, that people were still skiing on Mt Hood in July! The Lodge is where they filmed the Shining, and they have a replica ax that you can check out for a bit. After stuffing ourselves, we each took our ax pictures, before heading out to walk. It was an odd start to the day, with chairlifts and skiers all around us. We were walking in areas where the snow had only just melted, so the trail was muddy, but also filled with avalanche lilies, that like to be the first flowers to come out in the snowmelt! We saw many a waterfall today (both near and far), with the streams running strong with all the melted snow. At one point we stopped by a swollen river for a break, and were surrounded by butterflies! We also had a couple of crossings over rivers from glacier run offs. The glacial streams are all milky looking from all the silt in them, and FREEZING cold. After crossing one of them, we all soaked our sore feet for a bit before continuing on. I could only stand to keep my toes in for a few seconds at a time, it was that cold! Towards the end of our day, we took a side trail to see Ramona falls. This was a beautiful waterfall, but it was completely packed with day hikers everywhere. Holiday weekends make me claustrophobic! As we were walking back to the trail, I stepped on a golfball sized rock, and my ankle snapped to the outside. It’s the same ankle that I rolled in the desert, and this time was much much worse. I felt a pop and shooting pains up and down my foot and ankle. We pulled over and took a small break, trying to decide what to do. I could still walk, so I decided we should try to make our way (albeit slowly) to a campsite a few miles away that was supposed to offer up great views of Mount Hood. As we walked towards camp, a cloud came in, obscuring any views, but we were surrounded by wildflowers, so I was okay with it! My ankle was in pain, but I was taking it slowly in the hopes of not over doing it.
Day 82: 16 miles hiked. We woke up, and Beast made us all some delicious eggs and bacon breakfast wraps. We headed out, and discovered that the cloud that had come in the day before had decided to stay put. We again didn’t get the awesome views we had hoped for, but we were still surrounded by wildflowers everywhere. My ankle really hurt at the start of the day, and I hoped that it would loosen up with time. I could walk just fine when it was flat or uphill, but anytime there was a downhill, I felt shooting pains in my ankle. After a few miles, it was throbbing, and I started to feel very unstable with each step, so I asked Beast to wrap it up in leukotape. The tape helped stabilize me, and the pain subsided a bit. The mosquitoes decided to make an entrance at some point, surrounding us whenever we tried to take a break. Much of the day was spent in clouds with little to no visibility, but they would occasionally lift, to show us the beautiful views of the valleys around us. It was a mentally challenging day overall, but we made slow and steady progress to get to our campsite for the night.
Day 83: 19 miles hiked. When I rolled my ankle 24 days into this journey, I taped it up with leukotape for a week and then wore an ankle brace for another week. A week after this, I got a rash all over it that was at first attributed to poison oak, but was later revised to an allergic reaction. I thought I was allergic to the brace (my skin doesn’t like all clothing materials), and resolved not to use the brace anymore. When I woke up today, it became abundantly clear that I was actually very much allergic to leukotape. My foot and ankle were on fire and itched like crazy. I was 19 miles from town, and I knew I would struggle to walk without my ankle taped because it was going to be on one of the steepest downhills of the whole PCT. I resolved to walk as fast as I possibly with the tape on so I could get to town and tend to it. I left at 7:30am and sprint walked my way to town, taking only breaks to get some water. Most of the day was spent walking through the burn area from the fire that engulfed the Columbia River Gorge in 2017. This fire had been devastating to the area, and while it was sad to see the destruction in such a beautiful area of the country, I was happy to see that things were starting to regrow. It’s really strange walking in a cloud through a snag forest, it’s like you’re walking through the set of a horror movie. As the day went on, the clouds began to clear, and I started to get some beautiful views of the Columbia River. The trail was heading towards its lowest point in elevation for the entire trail. This meant that it was also a lot warmer of a climate, which in turn meant that there were berries that were all actually ripe! I paused on my sprint walk into town to enjoy my first thimbleberries of the season (and a few blackberries too)! With about 8 miles to go, I noticed a few leaves of poison oak on the side of the trail. As I continued down, it only got worse, with poison oak surrounding me and the trail. At first I tried to carefully pick my way along the trail, but it was hard to do that and walk quickly and I really really REALLY wanted to get the leukotape off as soon as possible. I decided to risk it and continue my sprint walk, knowing that I’d be doing laundry and showering within a matter of hours. I got into the town of Cascade Locks, and saw Bridge of the Gods for the first time, which is where the trail crosses the Columbia River into Washington. I had hiked over 19 miles to town in 6 hours with no food breaks, but I got there just in time to have lunch in town! We had decided weeks ago to take a break and zero in Cascade Locks, as we were all exhausted. I made my way to a hiker hangout and began to take the tape off of my ankle. It took me over an hour to do so, as all of my skin had blistered up and it was exceedingly painful and difficult to take the tape off without tearing my skin off as well. I put some pictures at the very bottom of this post to show what my ankle looked like after I got all of the tape off, but I must warn you, they’re really gross. The tape left a red and inflamed rash in its place that itched like crazy. I tried to make it better with some steroid cream, but nothing would take the itch away. I ate some lunch and had a few beers while I waited for the rest of the crew to show up. We got a motel, and I picked up some packages that included some new shoes! I had hiked another 500 miles, so it was time for some new kicks. We hung out in town, got some hotdogs and ice cream for dinner, then called it an early night and went to bed.
Day 84: 0 miles hiked. I didn’t sleep well the night before, because I kept waking up to my ankle itching intensely. We spent the day doing chores and chilling out. I emailed my doctor pictures of my ankle, and they prescribed me an even stronger steroid cream that would hopefully take the itch out. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to walk unsupported, so I asked my friend Ryan to drive out from Portland with an ankle brace. He brought some Thai food too!!! He drove us to a car rental place, where Uncle Joe picked up his car for his drive back to Bend. I said my goodbyes and thanks to Ryan, and we continued on with our chores, including picking up the prescription. We got some pizza for dinner and I spent the rest of the evening planning my food resupply for the state of Washington and taking in the Columbia River scenery.
Day 85: 6 miles hiked. We said our goodbyes to Uncle Joe first thing in the morning, and then proceeded to finish up the last of our chores before heading out. In order to get across the Columbia River, we needed to walk across the Bridge of the Gods. This was a very daunting task, for me at least, as I’m afraid of heights. We had to walk along the road, with only a foot of space between us and the cars driving past us, but they were thankfully going pretty slow. My heart was racing and I was trying my best to keep calm and not look down. Meanwhile, Savior and Beast were behind me talking loudly about things falling through the grating or off of the bridge… not helpful guys! Halfway across and we were in Washington! We had hiked across (almost) the entire state of Oregon! (We had started about 25 miles from the California/Oregon border, so we still had to go back and finish up those last ones to call it complete)
Ahead of us was a 12 mile climb, and we were hoping to make it to the top of the hill by the end of the night. We were still at lower elevation, so there were berries and flowers everywhere! Also everywhere still was poison oak. We were essentially in a rainforest, with vegetation coming at us from all sides. It was surprisingly tiring and mentally draining, walking uphill and trying desperately to avoid all of it, for fear that it would be poison oak branches reaching out. Despite the brace and medication, my ankle also hurt and itched quite a bit and I needed to be precise with how I took each step. For the first time, I thought about quitting all together. I was so tired of being rained/snowed on, I was tired from all the walking, my ankle was on fire and it hurt like hell if I stepped wrong, and I wasn’t sure I should even be walking on it. I wondered if I should be spending my time traveling the world, instead of walking across the US. We decided to pull the plug early and camp at the next campsite. When we got there, we discovered some people were already there, and it turns out we knew them! Our friends from the desert, Superman and Flower, had jumped up over the Sierras to hike Washington! We hung out and caught up for awhile before it again started to rain on us. Frustrated and annoyed by the constant terrible weather, I set up camp, and started to make dinner. I had thought the whole day that I had packed lasagna for dinner and I was really looking forward to eating it. It turns out I had actually packed my least favorite thing in the world, instant mashed potatoes (I’d eaten this too many times, and I now find them absolutely revolting). As I pulled it out of my food bag, I began to cry, feeling more defeated than I ever have before on trail. I’ve never cried over mashed potatoes before, but I guess there’s a first time for everything! When I set out on the trail, I had given myself permission to quit only in the cases of injury, illness, or family emergency. I was now injured, and thoughts of putting myself out of my misery and getting off trail danced in my head all night. I just repeated to myself over and over the mantra of don’t ever quit on a bad day, only quit on good days.
Day 86: 13 miles hiked. It was complete downpour when I woke up at the agreed upon wake up time. I decided that everyone could walk out without me if they wanted, I wasn’t going outside in the rain. It turns out, everyone else felt the same, and we all slept in until 10, when the rain finally subsided. Beast made us all breakfast burritos, and we all finally left camp around 11. We continued our hike uphill in the rainforest and we were surprised to see that the trail went missing several times. The brush got so dense in areas that the trail would disappear completely and I’d have to slowly edge my way forward because there were potholes on the trail that I didn’t want to fall into. I saw lots of flowers today, including foxglove for the first time. Savior is from Washington, and he had promised us that there was no way it was going to rain on us in Washington in July because it never rains during that month. My brother confirmed this when I talked to him, as did the section hiker from Washington that we met on the trail today (who didn’t even bring a rain jacket or a shelter with him, because it never, EVER rains in Washington in July). One of the things that got me through June, was that the weather at some point HAD to turn to be better, and it would for sure stop raining on us at some point. At around 5pm, it started to pour again and we were all pretty miserable. I had been contemplating quitting all day long, fantasizing about a nice warm beach in Thailand, and the rain was really not helping me want to stay. We tried to joke our way through the misery, talking about how everyone who lives in Washington are clearly liars, since I’d been in the state for a total of 2 days, and it’s rained for 100% of those days. We trudged our way to our goal for the day, making it to mile 1100.
Day 87: 16 miles hiked. We woke up next to a beautiful river and made our 1100 mile marker out of these blue/green rocks that were everywhere. We set out with a goal of 20 miles for the day. As we walked, I was amazed by how green everything was. We were definitely in a rainforest, and the humidity and the density of the woods were imposing. It started to rain again (despite the fact that it was still July and I was still in Washington), and I wondered if I was going to have 2 more months of being rained on everyday because if that was the case, I should just go home. The first 50 miles of the PCT in Washington is quite the roller coaster. You climb and climb and climb and then you get to the top, and you just go straight back down. Then you do it all over again. There are three of these giant uphills before the trail flattens out a bit and you stay at elevation for awhile. Today we went up and over the second of the hills and camped at the base of our last climb, at panther creek. The rain eventually let up, and we were able to see off into the distance. We stopped several times at rivers so that we could get water and so I could soak my ankle in the cold water and try to reduce the swelling. In the afternoon we came upon some trail magic that was left in plastic bin on the side of the trail. In it was a bunch of stuff I couldn’t eat and some tootsie rolls, so I had a tootsie roll, imploring myself mentally to think that this was an excellent way to spend my summer. We stopped short of our original goal, as we were all tired and feeling very low. We hoped that by getting a good nights rest, we’d have more energy in the morning. Thankfully the steroids had kicked in by this point, and my ankle, while still in a lot of pain, was no longer itchy!
Day 88: 23 miles hiked. I woke up determined to have a good day and put in some longer miles. We had 10 miles of straight up to start the day, followed by 3 miles down, and then one last 8 mile push uphill, and I was motivated to get it all over with. I was excited that the trail would stop being so much of a roller coaster after today! The weather was amazing, all day! I was finally getting the July I was promised by all of the Washingtonians. As I climbed, I could see Mt. Hood off to the south of us. The top of the climb treated us to our first views of Mt. Adams, our next mountain we would climb around. I was in the trees for much of the day, but every once in awhile, I would get a window out and see Mt. Adams to the northeast or Mt. Hood to the south. Towards the end of the day, I also started to also see Mount St. Helens to the northwest, but unfortunately my phone had died at this point, so no pictures were taken. We passed by several lakes that each included their own swarm of mosquitoes, including sheep lake and green lake (aptly named… ew) before getting to our final stopping point, blue lake (beautiful). I got to the lake, took off my shoes, and put my feet in to soak out some of the pain. The water was cold and it felt amazing on my ankle that was still aching. Beast was fishing on the other side of the peninsula, and he caught two trout that he and Savior ate dinner! It was a tough day, with 18 miles of climbing, but it felt like things had maybe (*fingers crossed*) finally turned a corner and were going to get better.
Warning! Gross pictures below!
I'm happy when I'm hiking 