Our day started with a fantastic breakfast of fresh fruit, pastries, bacon, and egg burritos, courtesy of Unload and Eric. Thanks, guys! We really appreciated it! We finally made our way out of camp around 8:30 after leaving Mellow, Action Pack, and Smiles a note telling them to catch up and proceeded to knock out 27 hard miles. We spent most of the day in the Trinity Alps Wilderness which was beautiful. It was more rugged than most of the terrain we've seen recently, and it felt like we spent the entire day going up. Not bad though.
We'd planned to camp at a spot where the PCT crosses a 4-wheeler road but there were a ton of cows in the area and we didn't want to spend the entire night listening to their bells. We decided to hike a little farther up to a ride in hopes of finding better camping but got totally skunked. The ridge was super rocky and had steep sides. We wound up following the ridge and were fortunate to find a saddle with enough space to crash, but I think we were all starting to worry we were on for a 30+ mile day. Nips and Wildflower didn't make it here, but I'm sure they'll catch us in town tomorrow....I'm actually thinking they may have backtracked to the road. Things were looking a bit bleak for a while.
I think we're about 13 miles out of Etna. I'm considering taking a semi-unplanned zero in order to hit the brewery on Tuesday (it's closed tomorrow) and watch some Olympics. There are a lot of peeps who seem to be on board with the plan, and it'll also give Mellow, Smiles, and Action Pack a chance to catch up. Should be a good time. Etna is the last California stop!
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