We had a wet night last night, which meant that this morning we had to pack up all of our wet things into our packs. At least it wasn’t raining anymore this morning.
We had five miles uphill to start out the day and by the top of the climb, we were rewarded with nice warm sun and beautiful views. Finally we are seeing the beauty of Washington! It was especially breathtaking to see lingering clouds floating below us and beside us amongst the striking scenery.
We then descended for 10 miles or so down to the Sciuate River. The original bridge that the PCT used to cross this river got washed out years ago, so now the trail is rerouted toward a new bridge they built. The result is quite a roundabout route going far upstream to cross the river on the new bridge, only to go right back downstream after crossing. The reroute was nice however, as it was pretty flat trail amongst some of the biggest and likely oldest trees we’ve seen on this trail. It seemed like all of a sudden we rounded a bend in the trail and were greeted with towering trees whose diameters were far larger than my armspan.
I crossed the new bridge while Wolf Bird paused to have a snack. I walked another hour or so on a slightly uphill trail before stopping to have lunch by a smaller river. Soon enough, Wolf Bird and Tofu caught up and joined me. We did our best to spread out our wet gear in the limited sun on the banks of the river to dry it out from last night. As we ate lunch, we debated where to camp tonight. We wanted to camp close enough to Stehekin (our next trail town, only accessible via shuttle) to catch the 12:15PM shuttle. We decided on a campsite about 7 or 8 miles ahead, as it was already midafternoon.
Wolf Bird and I set out to hike our final miles of the day slightly ahead of Tofu. We had a long uphill after lunch that went by quickly, especially since I treated myself and listened to a few podcasts. When we finally neared the top of the climb, we were treated to some amazing views once again. The sun was getting lower in the sky and it was surprisingly chilly out! We can definitely feel fall (and winter) coming with earlier sunsets and chillier nights.
As we began the descent toward our intended camp, we hiked into a valley surrounded by mountains on all sides. The setting sun was illuminating the peaks to our left in a stunning show and it was hard to keep my eyes on the trail. I did spot a marker of sticks that read ‘T-100’… under one hundred miles until Canada!
Wolf Bird and I arrived at our campsite a little after 7 and debated if we should press on since it was still light out and it was all downhill to the next camping area. We decided we wanted to press on but waited for Tofu so she wouldn’t be confused or think we ditched her. I cooked my dinner while Wolf Bird scarfed down some cold ramen (he has been no-cook since mile 700). We ate on the side of the trail where we watched the setting sun and waited for Tofu. She arrived around 730 or so and was on board to walk another mile and a half to the next campsite. She set out ahead of us while Wolf Bird and I packed up our cooking stuff.
I had to use my headlamp for the last 15 minutes or so since it was growing quite dark out. We had to cross a river on a log using my (quite dim) headlamp, which was a fun challenge. Before we knew it, we arrived at the side trail to the campsites. We were surprised to discover that we had to walk uphill up a couple switchbacks to the camping area. There were a couple people already there in their tents so we did our best to be quiet and not shine our lights on them as we scouted a place to set up.
Wolf Bird and I had our usual argument about where to set up the tent and which ground was most level. It was pretty tough to figure out the best spot because we were in a forested area so it was especially dark and hard to see, even with my headlamp. We finally agreed on a spot and set up silently. We planned to get up a little earlier than usual to ensure we’d make it to the shuttle with time to spare tomorrow.