25 miles
It's 27 miles to the Olalie Lakes Resort from our campsite on the ridge, and I told Ninja Tank it was my plan to get there tonight. Little did I know how the terrain was going to change today.
The morning starts off well, though I don't feel quite as strong or powerful as I had the day before. The views are as stunning as always, and I try to capture them and lock them away in my memory, but it's impossible to capture the vastness of this land, even when you are there in the midst of it.
While the PCT is open, many of the side trails are closed off, official notices and tape barricading the paths, and it is a reminder how close the fires were, and how ever present the fire danger is as we move north.
Barrel is crushing miles today, and he easily pulls ahead of me, disappearing through the trees. I come to the first of the large creeks fed by the glaciers off Mount Jefferson, which we have been warned can be difficult crossings if the water is high and moving fast. Sitting on the boulders around the creek, eating my lunch, I see Barrel walking down from the trail on the other side. He yells that he had been waiting for me to make sure I was okay with the crossing. I yell back that I'm fine and he should continue on. The water is milky and moving fast. I swap my tennis shoes for my hiking sandals, and scout out a decent place to ford the creek. The water is fairly shallow, for which I'm thankful, and I make it across easily and without incident.
And then suddenly we are climbing. Straight up, steep mountains, for miles. This is not the Oregon I've enjoyed the past few hundred miles! What are these steep climbs?! The trail leads around the back of Mount Jefferson, and I try to capture the beauty in a photograph, but fail miserably.
Up and up we go. I opt to keep my hiking sandals on, since there are more rivers to cross, and a steady amount of streams to splash through. I half expect Barrel to be waiting for me at the next glacier creek crossing, but he's not--probably figuring if I was fine with one, I'll be fine with the others. Which I am. And then, at the top of the crest, suddenly my worst nemesis: snow.
And of course the trail leads right through it, across large patches, down the other side of the mountain we have been climbing up this whole time. I decide to keep my sandals on as I skid down the snow, thinking I'd rather suffer through cold feet right now, than wet shoes for miles afterward. The snow is soft and slippy, and as I'm walking down I'm practically skiing. I decide this is the perfect time to try a glissade. This time I keep my pack on, leaning back on it, and let myself slide down the mountain. I'm not going terribly fast, since the snow is rather soft, but it's enough to give me a thrill. Success!
And just as I worry about my feet, which are becoming numb during what has proved to be a longer trek through the snow than I first anticipated, the snow peters out and is replaced by a flowing stream running down the trail.
It has taken me hours longer to complete 20 miles than I thought it would, and I am behind schedule for getting to the small lake resort at Olalie Lake. I switch back to my hiking tennis, and start moving as fast as I can. It's just nearing 8pm, two more miles to the resort, when I pass by a little clearing by a lake and see Barrel's tent set up. I'm sort of on a roll, and he tells me to continue on if I want, but the option of stopping here for the night and resting is too tempting, so I pitch my tent alongside his. We bitch about the amount of unexpected climbing we had to do today, and I look up the total elevation gain and loss, and feel a bit better about my complaint when I see it was 5,300 ft up and 6,200 ft down. Still, it's nothing compared to what we've done or what's yet to come, but it was the first hard day we've had in Oregon, and I'm beat.
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