Friday Jun. 30, 2023
- Start: Grizzly Creek (PCT mile 1752.1)
- End: Stealth Spot (PCT 1768.2)
- Distance: 16.1 miles
The narrow campsite we picked on the trail above Grizzly Creek last night wasn’t ideal. But neither Poledork nor I slid down the slope in the middle of the night. There weren’t any hikers unexpectedly using the old trail. Plus, we had plenty of access to water.
Our plan this morning was to get up early to beat the oppressive heat of southern Oregon. The day would begin with a 6-mile-long ascent up Old Baldy. If we could get that climb done before the summer heat descended, we’d be in good shape. Beyond that, the elevation profile for the remainder of the day was nice and easy.
That left us with only one other challenge: managing our water. There weren’t many water sources up ahead of us. There was a piped spring in about 4.5 miles, and then Brown Mountain shelter, at 12 miles into our day. Beyond that, we’d enter a dry stretch lasting 10+ miles. The next available water isn’t until we reach Fish Lake sometime tomorrow.
Horses
Our ascent up Old Baldy was gentler than I expected. Perhaps it was the fact that we were on fresh legs. But the fact is, the PCT was nicely graded overall, making it a huge benefit over the Appalachian Trail. The AT’s climbs always felt relentless to me. I spent four months hiking the East Coast and mentally asking myself, “When is this trail going to get easier?” The answer was never.
Out here on the West Coast, our trails are in a different league. I don’t mean to imply they are easy. They aren’t. There are plenty of steep slopes and sketchy descents, and the mountains are so much higher in the Western US. But these trails were also seemingly built to take advantage of the ridgelines and river paths. We didn’t always build them to get from point A to point B using the most direct or difficult route possible (like the East Coast).
The biggest challenge in the PNW seems to be the blowdowns. There are sections of the PCT that are lousy with them. And even though it is the last day of June, there’s still so much trail that needs to be cleared yet. Whether it’s a high-snow year (like this one) or a low-snow year, the trail crews can’t work year-round.
Four and a half miles into our climb, we reached a short side trail that led to a piped spring. This was our sole water source until Brown Mountain Shelter, another 8.1 miles ahead, so naturally we needed to make the detour.
As we made the turn, we were met with several horses tied up to some trees on the edge of a meadow. This is another big difference between the PCT and the AT. I’m not sure I saw any horses on the trail during my 2,200 miles from Georgia to Maine. But the PCT was built to accommodate horseback riders.
Yesterday, we’d stopped for lunch at the developed horse camp near Hyatt Reservoir. And now we were hiking past a makeshift horse camp in the woods. One of the riders was just saddling up his horse for the morning as we walked by, and Poledork and I stopped on the trail to say hello.
The Euro-Bros
After saying goodbye to our new cowboy friends, we made our way along a wooden boardwalk leading out to the spring. And upon reaching the end of the raised walkway, we were surprised to find a crowd of hikers already there.
Four backpackers in their early 20s were filling bottles and sitting in the shade. All of them were speaking English to each other, but they each had a noticeable foreign accent. Poledork and I plopped down our packs nearby and introduced ourselves (in our very American-accented English), and the guys reciprocated one by one.
We’d stumbled upon a crew of PCT thru-hikers who’d reached the high snow in the Sierra and jumped ahead. The first was a fellow from New Zealand named Botox. Then a German hiker named Machine introduced himself, followed by two Belgian hikers named U-Turn and Totally Fucked.
They were bursting with gregarious “bro energy” in the way young men on the trail often seem to be with one another. It’s been my experience that young guys like these usually fall into two general categories: (1) the introspective hikers who are out here looking for something (a physical challenge, time to figure out what to do next in life, etc), and (2) the social hikers who are out here to have an adventure and as much fun as possible.
These four guys were definitely in the second category. Their exuberance and loud joking made it clear they were having a ball. As they departed the spring ahead of us, I was almost certain we wouldn’t see them again. The Euro-bros (as we came to call them) were that category of hikers who wanted to crush 30-mile days through Oregon followed by double zeros in every town.
Missing Hiker
After the spring, we still had another mile and a half to finish the rest of this morning’s climb, followed by a three-mile descent. This was also where we passed a wooden USFS sign announcing that we were entering the Rogue River National Forest. This prompted Poledork to launch into several entertaining stories about the Rogue River.
Poledork and her ex-husband had both worked as river guides in their younger years, and she entertained me with stories about the river. She’d also taken a recent hike with several gal pals on the Rogue River Trail — a 40-mile National Scenic Trail that runs through southwest Oregon in the Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest.
Listening to her stories helped the miles melt away, and I felt like I was getting to know so much more about her backstory and love of the outdoor through these vignettes and memories.
As we began the descent on the back side of Old Baldy, I checked Far Out to see how much farther we had before we hit the South Brown Mountain Shelter. That’s when the app showed me one of its more interesting features. There was a missing-hiker alert posted on several icons, beginning with the shelter and continuing north toward Fish Lake.
The messages informed us that a 17-year-old hiker had gone missing earlier this week somewhere between Brown Mountain Shelter and Fish Lake. Once he’d been missing for 48 hours, FarOut began publishing messages in the app asking PCT hikers to be on the lookout for him.
The young man and his dad had been hiking north from the shelter on Monday, but they weren’t hiking in tandem the entire way. They separated briefly and planned to meet 10 miles up the trail at Highway 140 near the side trail leading to Fish Lake. However, the kid never arrived. Two search-and-rescue teams were even activated to find him.
Luckily, there was also an update in FarOut, saying the lost hiker had been found by one of the SAR crews. Thank goodness for that! This is a pretty dry stretch of trail, and it was far too warm to be out here without water.
A little while later, Poledork and I crossed the paved road leading to Peterson Sno-Pak, where we ran into Skeeter again. He was out here doing more trail magic and making sure the PCT hikers had a little supplemental hydration on this warm summer day. We gave him a quick wave, but didn’t stop. We had some miles to make and would leave his generosity for other hikers who were on a longer journey.
Brown Mountain Shelter
Poledork and I rolled up to the Brown Mountain Shelter around 12:30 pm and were pleasantly surprised by how far we’d come. Hiking 12 miles by 12:30 was pretty good for the two of us. We weren’t in any sort of rush today, but the last 6 miles since Old Baldy had been mostly downhill or flat.
The shelter was another pleasant surprise. It looked like a log cabin in the woods and had the added benefit of a nearby picnic table and a hand pump for water.
Given our pace, Poledork and I decided we should take an extended 1.5-hour lunch break here at the Brown Mountain. This was our last water source of the day, and we only really needed to hike another 4 or 5 miles to reach our projected campsite. There was no reason to race up the trail to wherever we were going to end up dry camping. We should take advantage of the water here and camel up over our extended break.
After more than an hour lounging in the shade cast by some of the taller trees, we heard a series of loud male voices coming our way through the forest. And they had accents. It was the Euro-bros again! What the heck?! I was certain they were miles ahead of us by now. These young guys were moving fast when we last saw them at the spring this morning. But perhaps they’d been sucked into Skeeter’s trail magic back at the road, and we just didn’t see (or hear) them.
Their arrival at the shelter was our sign to wrap up lunch and begin using the hand pump to fill our bottles to capacity. This was our last chance at water. We’d need to carry enough for the rest of the afternoon miles, dinner this evening, breakfast in the morning, and the remaining miles to Fish Lake tomorrow.
After some quick discussion, Poledork and I decided to fill everything we could with fresh water. I could gather 4.5 liters between my two 1-liter water bottles, my 2-liter water bladder, and my 16.9-ounce drink-mixing bottle. And Poledork had the capacity to grab 2 more liters of water. (Unfortunately, the loss of one of her water bottles somewhere on the trail earlier on this trip meant she was down to a single 1-liter water bottle and a 1-liter bladder.)
With 6.5 liters between the two of us, I gave Poledork one of my water bottles to put in her pack. I’d carry 3.5 liters in my pack, and she could carry the remaining 3 liters in hers.
Lava & Fire
We had only 2 more hours to hike before making camp, so we set off at a relaxed pace. With that much water, we each had the dreaded additional 6.5 to 7.5 pounds on our backs as we trudged into another warm summer afternoon. Slow and steady was the name of the game.
As the PCT wound its way north, it took us into more lava rock fields. These rocks are one of the many things PCT thru-hikers talk about long after they are done with the state. But Oregon’s rocks are nothing like the rocky sections of other major trails.
Appalachian Trail thru-hikers love to talk trash about northern Pennsylvania’s rocks, which earned it the nickname Rocksylvania. But those hikers are primarily complaining about the jagged, uneven path that’s difficult to walk on and ridiculously slick in the summer rain.
Arizona Trail thru-hikers (including me) will also complain about the two different rock hazards in the Grand Canyon State. These include the citrus-sized round rocks that threaten to make you roll your ankle at any moment, and the menacing loose dirt and scree that could cause you to unexpectedly slip when you’re heading downhill.
Yet Oregon’s rocks are altogether different. Their claim to fame is their ability to destroy your shoes. The volcanic lava rock is light and sharp, and the soft rubber soles of your favorite trail runners will undoubtedly pay the price if you walk enough miles in Oregon.
During a brief stretch of shaded forest between these volcanic fields, we began to hear the whir of helicopter rotor blades overhead. Then we passed some pink tape marking the PCT with the words “Brown Fire” written in black ink. Was there a fire nearby? We didn’t see or smell any smoke in the area. But all the signs were here.
As Poledork and I debated whether there was any fire risk in our vicinity, a group of yellow-shirted guys suddenly came into view. A USFS fire crew was coming our way.
We stopped them to ask about the conditions up ahead and whether we needed to detour off the PCT, but the team quickly put our concerns to rest. There was a fire near Brown Mountain, but it was out already. There was nothing to worry about in our immediate vicinity. We were free to keep hiking the rest of the way up to Fish Lake.
Our water baby
With this good news, Poledork and I continued hiking north, alternating between exposed lava fields and shady forests. The extra water weight on our backs and the afternoon sun were zapping our energy. Eventually, we agreed to stop at a giant fallen tree to take one final break in the shade.
We had a minor accident, though, once we wrapped up the break and grabbed our packs to resume the trail. The Sawyer bladder that Poledork strapped to her pack slid off and landed right on some lava rocks. This impact with the sharp rock punctured the bladder, and our precious water came pouring out.
I immediately grabbed the bladder off the ground, and we were able to stop the flow by covering the puncture hole with a piece of duct tape I had wrapped around my trekking pole. But the tape wouldn’t remain in place unless we held the bladder flat, with the puncture hole/tape facing upward.
The instant we raised the bladder upright, the water came leaking out again. We couldn’t afford to let that happen, so Poledork had no choice. She had to cradle the busted bladder on her forearm like a fussy baby for the remaining 1.3 miles to our campsite.
We eventually reached our camp in a lovely shaded spot that had clearly been used by many prior PCT hikers before us. It was nice and flat, and only had one problem. There must have been a bee nest nearby because there were tons of bees buzzing around by the time we were done setting up our tents.
We debated whether to break down and relocate to another spot, but neither of us felt the energy. We just stayed in our tents until dinner time, then set up our camp kitchen 200 yards away to avoid getting stung while we cooked and ate..
We were just finishing up dinner when two new hikers arrived to set up camp nearby. We waved hello and warned them about the bees, before returning to our discussions about the remaining logistics of the hike.
We still had a solid 4 liters of water left over after eating dinner. That was more than enough to get the two of us through the night, breakfast, and the remaining 8 miles up to Highway 140. Our newest plan was to meet Keith at Fish Lake tomorrow around lunchtime and catch a ride back home.
Going back to Eugene is a major change from our original PCT plan. We’d come out here expecting to fill Poledork’s entire 135-mile gap from the California border up to Crater Lake. Our goal was to hike the first 82-mile section to Fish Lake, then pick up our resupply packages from Keith tomorrow before continuing north for the remainder of the hike.
However, after reading all the recent comments in FarOut about the trail conditions ahead, we were now reconsidering our options. It appears that the 50 miles north of Fish Lake are still covered by a ton of snow. Other PCT hikers are leaving comments that most water sources in the Sky Lakes Wilderness are frozen, and much of the trail is covered in snow and ice. Plus, there’s a sketchy descent down the north side of Devil’s Peak that is still under 10+ feet of snow, with no existing trail visible.
Neither Poledork nor I brought microspikes out here. And there is no reason for us to enter the next stretch of the PCT under unfavorable conditions. Sure, it would be nice ot get those miles under our belts. But we live here in Oregon. We don’t have to race up the trail like the Euro-bros who have to finish the PCT before their tourist visas expire.
We agreed over dinner to give the snow in the Sky Lakes Wilderness a few weeks to thaw out before returning to pick up the trail again. When we meet Keith tomorrow, we’ll just head home instead of resupplying. A few weeks off trail will also give the blisters on my toes (from my recent Mt. Rainier climb) a real chance to heal, too. And so, tomorrow we’ll hit pause on this PCT adventure.
