The Adventures of...: Days 92-93

Day 92, 29 miles, endpoint PCT mile 1295

Josh and I slept terribly last night, all due to an unwelcome visitor to our camp. At about 9:30pm, just as I finished yesterday's blog and laid down trying to fall asleep, we heard distinct footsteps coming closer and closer to our tent. We flooded the area with our headlamps until we spotted a glowing pair of eyes floating in the darkness. After a moment, the glowing eyes turned and we could see the body of a mountain lion lurching away. Mountain lions are no joke; unlike bears, they are pretty much the one animal out there that you should actually fear. Attacks are rare, but can happen.

With mountain lions, intimidation is key; after ours walked away, we began making loud noises, trying to sound as scary as we could. The last thing we wanted was for him to come back for a repeat visit. After that we tried to sleep, but every snapped stick and rustling tree branch made me bolt upright.

When morning came and we realized we hadn't been mauled in our sleep, we quickly packed up. I mentally prepared for a day of hiking on my wobbly foot. We did an easy four miles and crossed a paved highway at Buck's Summit. From there it was a long uphill, with views of Silver Lake from the top. Then a long, long downhill for 13 miles to the resort of Belden. We stopped at the small store there and bought sodas, but we wanted to cover some more miles.

We left Belden, crossed Highway 70, and proceeded uphill for the next several miles. It took us awhile to find a flat spot to throw the tent down; by the time we camped, we had been hiking in the dark for over an hour.

My foot mostly held up, although it was painful most of the time. I'm going to have to suck it up, however; we are in a race with the post office in Burney, CA. It looks like we may arrive in Burney on Saturday, when the post office is closed. Our bounce bucket and a box from home are waiting for us there. We are going to try to pick up the mileage this week to get into town earlier on Friday. A 29 mile day today probably helped!

PCT and the California Trail are the same through this section.

Bucks Lake Wilderness

Trail views

Just a quick soda break.

Trail views

Day 93, 26 miles endpoint PCT mile 1321

Day two of our mission to Burney went relatively well and was largely uneventful. We hate having to rush while we hike, but it's necessary in this situation. If we hadn't stayed in Quincy for my foot those extra days, we would have landed in Burney Wednesday or Thursday. Now, we are pushing to get there by 4pm Friday. So the hiking today was just head down, walk, walk, walk.

This afternoon the skies grew dark, the temperature dropped just a bit, and it began to rain. It was coming down hard enough that we pulled out our water-proof pack covers, I put on my rain coat, and Josh used his umbrella (I sent my umbrella home back in Independence). It was nice to have the change in weather, and the cool air made for easy hiking.

We entered a 12 mile waterless stretch and hiked as fast as we could to made it to the junction for the next water while it was still light out. With only a couple miles to go we heard a branch break on the hill up to our left; we barely saw a bear up on the hill before he turned and ran away from us. And when I say ran, I mean it. This bear would have given Usain Bolt a run for his money. He was flying up and over a ridge at an amazingly impressive speed, his little, brown, bear rump visible for only a few more seconds before he was gone.

26 miles from when we started our day we arrived at a side trail where water could be accessed a half mile down. We found an uninteresting campsite a bit off trail before I trucked down the side trail for water. We needed water for tonight, but also enough to get us through ten miles in the morning (these waterless stretches are already getting old!).

Tomorrow we will make a (hopefully) quick stop in the town of Chester to buy food to get us to Burney. Even with the town stop, we still need 25 miles, so it will likely be a long day again.