When attempting 275 miles through the state of Washington, you become very experienced very quickly. With much time in silence to think, a lot of it gets devoted to thoughts about what I would do differently if I were to do this again (which we do, believe it or not). Between the both of us, bouts of squeezing between snow and rocks and other similar terrain maneuvers had already claimed from us a few clothing items originally hung on the outside of our packs to dry - our friends from the cabin back on the fifth day promised that they would keep an eye out for the missing Croc, but believe it or not, after we headed back out on the trail with a new pair, one got lost again (and yes, it "got lost," because I wasn't the one that lost it...). I would say that the trail also took some of our dignity, because after some two weeks camping, there still never felt like there was a "proper" way to shit in the woods. The 10th time is just as unnatural feeling as the first.
Upon heading into Stehekin after our last step on the trail, we assessed the monetary damage caused and listed off all the other things claimed by the trail: a ripped shoelace, two broken backpack clips, a missing tent anchor, and two self-inflating sleeping pads ripped to shreds. I'm sure we looked a little stupid with our sleeping pads tied on the outside of our packs looking like they're ready to explode - the problem with a self-inflating anything is that when it rips, it always wants to self-inflate... and then doesn't hold the air when you need it. Case in point: that is one thing I would have done differently. No self-inflating sleeping pads. But just when we were going to curse the trail for taking these numerous things from us, we remembered that the trail had also graciously - and coincidentally - given us a pair of Crocs that someone else had dropped, so Jackie wasn't left shoeless anymore. Nearing the end, I was angry that I would not get to use my $200-worth of breathable Gore-Tex rain gear, but we'll get to that in a bit.
Let's instead start back at Baring, WA. The night's sleep was good on a (semi) real bed, and despite their pleas to stay another day and enjoy ourselves, there's only so much small town I can take. Don't get me wrong - they were amazingly hospitable and super friendly, but my ideal day of relaxation has an entirely different setup in my mind. One man in particular strangely seemed to have everything in common with us, telling us restaurants to go to in Oakland when we get back, and talking all about his involvement in their school district (how he ended up in Baring I don't know), and in the end he was nice enough to give us a ride eight miles up the road in his refinished 1931 Chevrolet for a better hitchhiking spot. Upon reading that last sentence I feel I need to clarify that it was totally a friendly offering and not creepy at all. However, this was the beginning of one of the strangest days of my life.
We were surprised to be picked up once again within five minutes of throwing up the thumb, and this time we got to sit in the backseat, bumming a ride with an older man who was apparently visiting his mother. It took thirty seconds to realize that this guy was a talker, which was fine, but the comments were taking an interesting turn. After brief introductions of what we were doing and why we needed the ride, and hearing about his mother and his cats at home (that should have been the first signal), he told us that "it's a very important time in the world right now and there are things that we should be aware of," which was strange considering I hadn't seen any major stories in the newspaper that morning. He then asked us if we knew there were other races in the world, which seemed like a very odd question, but yes, we did know that Caucasians were not the only race. He was elated to find that we agreed, and then plunged into a 20 minute speech about reptilian mind control and how there are other planets with other life forms and that people with cat eyes were really from the cat race and the government is covering everything up and how he and his sister were abducted by aliens and how he has a hole in the back of his head from the experience... I really can't do justice to it at all and wish I had had a tape recorder. But he assured us that we can learn all about "the truth" online by watching videos of some guy. Luckily, all he needed was a little "hmm" and "uh-huh" once in a while to carry the conversation all by himself, and my fear mainly came from the thoughts of what would happen if he turned around and saw my uncontrollably smiling face. This guy was f***ing crazy! I could barely contain my laughter when, in the middle of telling us about the alien spaceships going into another dimension and flying into Mt. Adams, he would stop to say "ooh look, a squirrel!" in the exact same tone of voice. I have never been that long in the presence of a crazy person before. I think he misunderstood us and thought that had found some people that knew all about this stuff. There were some awkwardly tense moments when he realized that we actually had no idea what the hell he was talking about, but he did in the end graciously drop us off at Stevens Pass and we saw him pick up another stranger some 50 yards down the road. When we were safely out of the car, I laughed harder than I have laughed in years. I knew these people existed on the internet, but in real life?!
Our laughs apparently attracted a man who I swear to you was Chris Farley reincarnated (think: "Fat man in a little [hiking outfit]"), and who somehow felt obligated to tell us his life story about what brought him to the trail and how he needs to lose the 50 pounds he gained in medical school. Upon reflection, there are two types of hikers: the ones that blaze by you without a word, and the ones that find a confidant in every other hiker they meet, sharing completely irrelevant things just for conversation. In short, hikers can be super weird. We headed towards the trailhead wondering what was attracting these people to us, but were intercepted by a construction worker having lunch, who asked us if we were hikers (duh), how the trail was, and if we had seen any wildlife. Hiking is apparently a very social activity!
Things returned to relatively normal, aside from the fact that our newly stuffed packs were making their extra five pounds (at least) known at every step. Planning for how much food to bring and how many days you'll be hiking is sort of a vicious circle because if you agree on a leisurely hiking pace to save your body, you're looking at more food, which is more weight, which will slow you down even more, which may require more days of food, and so on. Luckily we did not hit the incredibly challenging terrain until a few days in, so our bags were at least a little lighter. According to the official Wilderness Press Pacific Crest Trail guide, this 100-mile section ranks as number two in difficulty for the whole of the trail, falling short only of the John Muir Trail section in California (which is next on the list, seriously). By the pictures you may be able to tell that this part of the hike was dominated mostly by Glacier Peak; the trail does a large semicircle around it due to potential avalanche hazards if you get too close, and as a result, the trail took us on less than happy trips steeply switchbacking up one mountain only to steeply switchback down the other side, cross a creek, and head straight up the next one. Once again, thank goodness we were distracted by good weather and spectacular views.
That being said, though, I suddenly remember my vow to send the PCT Association an email and a piece of my mind. I would hesitate to even call this part of the trip a trail at all, with how unkempt it was. Every person we met hiking in the opposite direction would give us their take on what lay ahead for us; they all said something different - identifying them quickly as optimists or pessimists - but they seemed to all be variations on the theme of "swimming through overgrowth" and "climbing over a million blowdowns." What they really should have told us is that we would be bushwhacking and climbing over trees in the pouring rain. I can't complain too much since if it hadn't rained, we wouldn't have gotten the full outdoor experience and I would have replaced the expensive rain gear with a plastic poncho on my next outing. Let's just say I was glad to have more than a poncho after the skies opened. Bushwhacking is particularly frustrating when everything is soaking wet. In all, that was just not a very good day for us considering that thanks to my wanting to press on, we ended up having to camp in the middle of the trail and sleep without pads since ours were soaked through. That was the only day where I felt our friendship was at stake. I'll spare you the details.
The final days of the expedition after the thunderstorm were interesting for a number of reasons, not least of which was because our toilet paper was soaked all the way through. Don't worry though, we improvised with pages torn from a crossword puzzle magazine that I brought for boredom. Let me tell you - not the same. It's also quite an uncomfortable feeling putting on wet socks and wet boots in the morning. The sunlight was super orange all day and Jackie insisted on a number of occasions that it smelled like a campfire, but I just thought she was hallucinating about the grilled bacon cheeseburgers that we promised would be our first "real" meals when we got there. We finally made it into Stehekin to find truckloads of volunteer firefighters heading to the nearby lightning fire (to which we thought, oh, duh), and enjoyed one extra night camping in the small resort town through smoky haze and still more rain than we would have liked. Still, the first restaurant meal and real shower in over a week made everything okay. We slept 14 hours that night in food-induced comas, thanks to the Stehekin bakery's cinnamon rolls the size of my face, our celebratory beers, and our dinner of burgers and steak nachos. And suddenly I remembered what it's like to be full.
My mom was gracious enough to make the three-hour drive - north this time - to pick us up, and it was back to reality real quick. We recounted the two (and a half) black bears that we saw, along with the elk, deer, countless marmots and hummingbirds. It's funny how quickly you forget about the swarms of mosquitoes when the bites are gone; I will say though, the new worst organism in the world is the biting black fly. They do not respond to DEET and are relentless. I recalled the newest songs that made their trail debut in my head, including Sound of Music - I think you can guess which song. And then upon getting home, we checked out the list of the newest members of Teach For America, seeing who was placed at our school and where they came from, of course being super judgmental on whether or not we think they'll "make it" at our respective schools. They'll be fine at my school but at Jackie's I'm not so sure... She was the one you may recall last year who had some 60 students in one biology class, and it took about three weeks to get it fixed. Our class rosters are now accessible online, so if nothing changes, my biggest class is Precalculus with 33 students and all my other classes - freshman classes - are 25 students or less. Woohoo!
I had thought that three and a half weeks of time to think to myself would give me some epiphany about my life plan and what I want to do, but really it seemed to just make me relax in the fact that I still don't know for sure, and to take it day by day or year by year or however long it takes. It's the planning gene in me that makes me feel uneasy about uncertainty, but I've realized that I'm in no rush (yet) and it's much more satisfying doing things that I know I want to do - even if they're short term ventures. Plus, I get good pictures out of it:
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