PCT Day 18: Fall-walking downhill

Tuesday, 24 July 2018

Grizzly Peak (174) – Steven’s Pass (188.4): 14.4 miles / 218.3 total miles walked

My alarm went off at 4:30 and I packed up insanely fast, just because I didn’t want to get eaten alive by the bloodthirsty insects. I started walking at 5 am and basically didn’t stop until I needed water at 7:30. And and Deerbait and a little later Fuad showed up. Like the rest of us, he was almost completely out of food, had had even less to work with for the last couple of days. What we do for following our passion, right?

Deerbait was nice enough to make coffee and that got me most of the way up the last big climb, and then trail magic happened. As they say….the trail provides. And it did in the form of Relish, another Southbounder who passed us and was generous enough to share his food with us. Thank you so much!

After the one big climb, we only had six more miles to hike and most of it downhill. Which sounds ideal, except for when you have aching feet and are really hungry.

So we kind of let gravity do its thing and sort of just tried not to stumble too much on the way down the mountain.

The bugs got better the farther away from Grizzly Peak we moved. About 2.5 miles from the Pass we took a baby break and that’s when another hiker came around the corner and says:

‘Hey, you’re that blogger aren’t you? Restlesswandering? Thanks for putting in the effort to the blog…’

So I guess I am not just shouting into the void, but some people actually read what I ramble on about and seem to enjoy it.

So thank you to Bluebell, you made my day and I felt special for a little while. 😤

The last mile seemed to take forever and when we finally made it to Steven’s Pass pretty much everything seemed to be closed. But we did manage to meet some familiar faces, like Croc, and I picked up my resupply package. Score.

Then I bought a very expensive and disgusting burrito and a pretty delicious hot dog from the little food counter inside the shop.

All the hikers hung out until Croc and TwoCents hiked out, and Deerbait, Glad, Sink and I walked back over the pedestrian bridge to try and hitch to the Dinsmores’ Hiker Haven.

After trying unsuccessfully to get a hitch for about a half hour, a very nice local piled all of us into his car and took us all directly to our destination. Thank you kind stranger! 😊

Once there we met up with Relish (food donater deluxe) and Jerry Dinsmore, greeting us with a hug.

There are loaner clothes, showers, washing machine and dryer, basically everything you crave after a week without being clean.

After a quick shower I put on a dress (weird) and we hopped in the truck with Jerry (who didn’t hop as he can’t walk very well) to go into Skykomish to find food at the diner.

I had a grilled cheese sandwich which was OK, especially since it was a lot cheaper than the nasty burrito at the Pass.

Back at the house, Sink and I shared a footbath to soak our sore feet with Epsom salts. So nice…

The evening concluded with a nice campfire and S’mores and hot dogs. And of course some great conversation….which always returns to the trail.

Taking a day off tomorrow, letting my feet heal.

Keeping you posted…