miles: 30
Slept around mile 1,522 on a saddle overlooking Castle Crags and Shasta (although our view was admittedly obscured by the trees). Last night I had woken up numerous times and was witness to several silent lightning displays. I'm sure I have mentioned this in previous posts, but I am no fan of lightning. I am terrified when the clouds look slightly thunderstorm-esque and get a giant pump of adrenaline when I hear or see any signs of thunder or lightning. Sleep last night did not come easy as I lay in my sleeping bag wondering why the lightning was so close, yet so silent. And whether or not it was starting fires nearby. The flashes were not so far in the distance, as I could tell they were close enough to light up the entire tent. The weird thing was: no thunder claps and no moisture with these strikes. This worried me because it is forest fire season and everything has been so dry that a wildfire could be bound to happen during a lightning storm like this.
In the morning the clouds and sky were unbelievable. The thunderstorm was still lingering around, shrouding the crags, Shasta, and nearby mountains in a thick layer of haze, only exaggerated by the smoke from distant fires. All of this created quite the dramatic landscape for this mornings hiking...
The following photos are sunrise photos:
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| The red poking through is the sun coming up. |
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| Notice Shasta on the left in the distance and the fiery red sunrise to the right. |
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| Goodbye Shasta (see her in the distance?) as we move WEST instead of north on the PCT. |
We accomplished 10 miles before 10am this morning and by that time the clouds had cleared and it began to look more like this:
Except towards the East... Shasta was still covered in a haze of weather mixed with smoke.
Morning time is a great time to bust out some miles, and we continue to be diligent in waking up early and hitting the ground running... literally. The morning offered fantastic views, cool mountain air, and plenty of relatively easy terrain.
We are, however, moving westward, rather than north, which is a bit frustrating. This portion of trail skirts around the Shasta area in a large "C" shape... so essentially we are going west all day today, which feels like we are making no forward progress.
The three of us stopped for lunch after doing 18 miles by 1:00pm. This is a record for us! We were delighted with our accomplishment and took a long break to celebrate. We had 12 more to go if we wanted to get in 30 miles that day and we were determined to make it.
It would be me and Ben's first 30 miler.
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| A spring piped by a copper fixture... very cold, delicious water. |
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| Ben waiting for me on top of the climb. |
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| The beginning of the Trinity Alps. |
We did it! Thirty miles was not so hard after all! We found quite a nice camp spot down in a valley (sort of marshy area) and it was only 7:30. I was proud of our pace today. We celebrated with stretching. My feet weren't in as much pain as usual, which was a good sign. Maybe it's going away?
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