cathieandrandy

Happy Birthday, Lester! We forgot to call you this past weekend from the satellite phone in Stehekin.

What a difference a day makes. We woke to heavy cloud cover and lots of moisture in the air, which fortunately never really developed into rain.

We got an early start and passed the Portland Trio before they left camp. They didn’t make their 25 yesterday. Later, they passed us when we were getting water, and still later we had lunch with them. We’ve probably said our good byes to them a dozen times, thinking we would not see them again. It is quite a joke now. We teased them that they’d better hustle if Joe wants to make the monument by the scheduled time for his proposal.

We were invited to attend, but figured we wouldn’t make it.  Joe said that if we plan to finish on Friday, we’d better slow down.

We made good time today because the trail construction here is outstanding, in sharp contrast to the PCT on the south side of Rainy Pass. We climbed, almost painlessly, from 4500 to 6800 feet.

Clouds swirled around us. I had the sensation we were walking around sleeping giants. Every once in a while we would get a break in the clouds and catch a spectacular view of the rugged landscape.  I would throw down my trekking poles, rip off my gloves and reach for my camera, shouting to the peaks and glaciers “stop, don’t move.”

During the afternoon we dropped down to 4500 feet and the cloud ceiling rose. We had some sun, but at 4 pm we were freezing again. Our campsite choice was to stop early, under tree cover at Glacier Pass, or to climb back up to 6600 feet where (according to the databook) there is supposed to be a “pleasant campsite with a spring.”

Pleasant perhaps a few weeks ago, but it would be freezing above treeline now. We chose the former.

But Joe was right. We have easily done two 21 mile days, with one late start and one early finish. If we do a 25 tomorrow, followed by a 23 on Thursday, we will be done.

Glacier, Samwise, Nutz and I are in favor of this plan - but Ghost isn’t convinced.