Trail Day 74: Highway 50 crossing (mile 1090.7) to tentsite near Susie Lakes (mile 1101.9)

11.2 PCT miles

I was really anxious to get back on the trail this morning. My original plan was to get up fairly early and get to the trail in the morning. However, none of the trail angels I had texted last night had gotten back to me.

I saw Spice Merchant in the courtyard of the hostel and he invited me to go to breakfast with the crew. So, I went to Driftwood Cafe with Spice Merchant, Dragonfly, Pullout, Twisted, Dodger,  and Holly where we all loaded up on calories for the next stretch.

Holly also wanted to get back on the trail ASAP, so we took the bus to “The Y” intersection and tried to hitchhike on the Highway 50 part of the intersection. We were in an area with a high volume of traffic, but nobody was stopping. Luckily, Holly had taken a picture of the list of trail angels posted at the hostel and systematically started calling them. One of them actually called back.

We were picked up by an awesome trail angel named Warren, who used to be a white water rafting guide in the 80s and 90s. He was nice enough to take us to two separate locations. Holly was dropped off at the Echo Summit trailhead and I was dropped off at the Highway 50 crossing.

Highway 50 crossing.

I walked through the forest, as well as by some nice little homes tucked into the woods, before the trail dumped me out at Echo Lakes.

Echo Lakes was jumping. There were people circling the full parking lot waiting for someone to leave.  There were throngs of tourists,  day hikers, and backpackers hanging around the little store or waiting for the ferry to take them across the lake.

The store at Echo Lakes.

Tourists running to catch the ferry at Echo Lakes.

I headed down the trail that goes around the lake and there were so many people that it was hard to give a friendly greeting to everyone. I took the trail past Echo Lake and around Upper Echo Lake, gaining in elevation. One of the fun things that happened in this section was, on two separate occasions, I had a dog decide that walking with me was more fun than walking with its owner. It was nice to have a furry little hiking buddy keeping pace for a while.

The trail around Echo Lake.

Upper Echo Lake.

As I approached the top of the elevation gain, I started to see fellow hikers from the hostel. Holly had already passed me and Hatchapi and Flame caught up and chatted for a while. It turns out they had also tried to hitch from “The Y,” but they only had to wait 5 minutes for a car to pull over. Jerks.

After that I continued in the direction of Aloha Lakes, passing trail junctions and day hikers, some dressed like they were going to the beach. At one point, a PCT hiker (named Vortex) asked me if we were still on the PCT. It turned out that we weren't.  There was a little spur that headed down closer to the lake, then rejoined the PCT.

We followed this around and found her friend, Second Wind, sitting by the lake not far from the junction. I was in desperate need of a snack break, so I sat down and joined them. Flame and Hatchapi, who had stopped to chat with some other hikers, came in and joined us as well.

It turned out that all four of them had bumped into a hiking group that had given them free cans of beer, which they chilled in a little snow patch by the lake. I lamented about not getting the trail magic, and Flame then pulled out a Budweiser he had packed out of town, so that I could join in.

After our beers had sufficiently cooled,  we drank them and snacked some more by the lake. Hatchapi and Flame went swimming afterwards. I got a later start than I wanted to today, so I packed up to start moving again with Vortex and Second Wind not far behind me.

Vortex retrieving the beers from the snow patch.

The Budweiser that Flame had dug out for me.

I told Vortex and Second Wind that I take pictures at all the 100 mile markers, so they agreed to look for the 1100 marker and take a picture for me. We couldn't find the marker (it may have been covered with snow), so we made our own out of pine cones.

Snow and a small lake near Lake Aloha.

Lake Aloha.

1,100 miles!

In the next mile or so stretch, I saw more of my fellow thru hikers as they passed me including Hatchapi and Flame  (again), Dragonfly, and Twisted. I got to a section of snow where Dragonfly and Twisted were talking to Vortex and Second Wind on the other side.

The first part of the snow was flat, but to get down the other side, it was steep and slippery. I had made it almost to the bottom,  but then I slid a little out of control at the bottom, twisting sideways, then slamming my knee into a rock.

Dragonfly asked if I was OK. I told him “Yes” and he again asked, “Are you sure? Let me see your knee.” I looked down at my knee and there was a tear in my pants. I peeked in the tear and saw ragged flesh. A lot of it. I pulled my pants up to see that my knee had been split open about a quarter inch deep, almost all the way across the knee cap. Crap.

I held the skin together as people got out their first aid kits. It turns out that Vortex was a EMT and Twisted had some kind of medical training from his time in the German army. Vortex used some tape (steri-strips) to keep each side of the gash closed and then put antibiotic on and covered the wound.

After first aid was administered and the little nausea I had was gone, I thought I would have to start hiking back towards Lake Aloha. However,  Twisted had more detailed topo maps on his phone and found a side trail that lead to a resort that would only be 4-5 miles away as opposed to the 8-10 miles of hiking back the way I came.

Everyone (including Spice Merchant who had arrived during the first aid) decided to stick with me and camp near Susie Lakes, before the trail junction that would take me out. Twisted offered to hike with me out the side trail. He also carried my pack to our campsite, while Dragonfly carried both his own pack and Twisted’s pack.

When we got to the campsite, I felt liquid running down my leg. One of my clots had broken while walking and blood was dripping down my leg again. Vortex helped redo the dressing right as Pullout showed up to join the party. Second Wind had an inReach, so I was able to text my Trail Angel,  who will be driving up tonight and meeting me at the trailhead tomorrow morning so that I could see a doctor. I will probably need stitches.

Tomorrow will be interesting. I clearly have to come off the trail for a little while, but hopefully it won't be too long. Right now the injury doesn't even feel that bad. If I hadn't seen the gash, I would have thought it is only a scraped knee.