I didn’t sleep very well last night so I slept in very late for me on this trail until 8:30. Wolf Bird of course had gotten up at 6 something and gone to a coffee shop. I went and joined him for a bit and then we eventually returned to our hotel to shower and pack up before check out. We were feeling a little paranoid at having to clean the room before leaving due to the crazy owners. We had to go grab the owner to have him examine our room for cleanliness in order to get our cash deposit back. It was such a weird policy and after he checked our room and gave us our money he felt the need to justify his actions and basically started another argument with us. This was the worst hotel I’ve ever stayed at and in reading the reviews after the fact I found out I am not alone in thinking as much.
After that Wolf Bird and I went to do laundry while Yote and 2.Toe worked on their town chores. The laundry machines were making a noise in a repetitive beat and Wolf Bird rapped for me with them. We then stopped by the outfitter and grabbed some Burger King before hitting the road. wolf Bird is doing a Burger King resupply where he is packing out three burgers to eat for dinner in this section. Interesting choice I must say.
We texted Tony, the trail angel who drove us into town, and he picked us up and drove us back to the trail head. He is a super nice guy and only has two more working days as a highway patrolman until retirement! Congrats Tony!
Yote and 2.Toe weren’t ready when Tony was going to pick us up so we got on trail without them. I imagine they were probably only an hour or two behind
Unfortunately upon starting up the trail I discovered that I am having the same issue I had with my old pack but with my brand new pack. I just couldn’t get it to sit right and got super frustrated at how no matter which way I adjusted the straps it still seemed to irritate my back and shoulder. Not sure what I will do about it.
We had a big climb to start of the hike out of town. It was about 230 and really warm and humid out. We chatted as we walked and it helped the miles fly by. We passed a few northbounders as we walked. One girl, Nature Monster, was asking about how close she was to other nobos. It’s funny because to us it seems like there are sooo many northbounders–we see at least 20 a day. But they all tell us that they feel the trail is very empty and some miss being around so many people as it was earlier in the trail. We have only met three other people total heading south but have been told by nobos there are a lot of people going our direction. It doesn’t feel that way but to me that is really nice. It has been hard adjusting to always having many people around both while I’m hiking and at camp or in town. One of the best parts of choosing to flip and go south for a bit has been having more solitude, which was something I enjoyed from the Appalachian trail. I think the people along the trail are what makes the trail so special, but I prefer having the option to be social or have solitude, rather than constantly having people around me.
We ended up walking until about 830pm, about 16 miles out of town. Not too bad for a nearly 3pm start. We camped a bit off trail near a parking area for a trailhead. There were a couple campers in the parking lot but we were the only PCT hikers. We went to bed a bit later than usual and in the morning I discovered I had a nighttime mouse visitor get into some of my food. We also were awakened in the night by the moon. we hadn’t put our tent fly on so the incredibly bright light from the moon was in our eyes! It was so bright in our tent. The moon was casting shadows! Luckily we admired it but were able to fall right back to sleep.