The plan for the next 3 days is to travel from Fish Lake at Hwy 140 up to Crater Lake area at Hwy 62. Should take 3 days but at the start I know I might not make it that far because of snow. About half way into this plan is “Devils Peak” which is at 7200 feet. There is a bypass for the peak itself which is really a bypass of the north face of the peak which is steep and definitely snow covered. However the bypass itself is near 7200 feet. At the starting point is a nice little tree covered turnout and when we get there there is one PCT camper and a group of people being trail angels and offering breakfast to the hikers. I had just had a great breakfast at the hotel and declined but it is so incredible that people do these things. At this point there is also a fairly fast stream passing through and I’m thinking the trail goes right through the stream. I’m looking at it and trying to find the best approach to cross and Lenora is ready to take a video of me when the angels tell me that the trail actually goes along the stream and just upstream is a bridge to cross it. So I was about ready to get lost right off the bat. So sad..
As I start out there are a lot of wildflowers and it takes me a bit of time to really get started as I am taking pictures along the way. Here are some of those
Given the fact I almost got lost on step 1, it is comforting to find some signs indicating I am in fact on the trail
The trail is very gentle at this point. Soft forest trail with very little slope. Here is a shot at 8:45 in the morning of the trail ahead.
Also about this point I enter into the Sky Lakes Wilderness. Here is some into about it.
The Sky Lakes Wilderness is a wilderness area located in the Rogue River–Siskiyou and Fremont–Winema national forests in the southern Cascade Range of Oregon in the United States. It comprises 116,300 acres (47,100 ha), of which 75,695 acres (30,633 ha) are in the Rogue River–Siskiyou National Forest and 40,605 acres (16,432 ha) are in the Fremont–Winema National Forest.[1] It was established in 1984 under the Wilderness Act of 1964.
The Sky Lakes Wilderness straddles southern Oregon’s Cascade Range from Crater Lake National Park southward to Oregon Route 140. It is approximately 6 miles (9.7 km) wide and 27 miles (43 km) long, with elevations ranging from 3,800 feet (1,200 m) in the canyon of the Middle Fork of the Rogue River to 9,495 feet (2,894 m) at the top of Mount McLoughlin, the highest peak in southern Oregon and the highest point in the Cascade Range between the Three Sisters and Mount Shasta.
The Wilderness contains more than 200 pools of water, from small ponds to lakes of 30 to 40 acres (12 to 16 ha). Fourmile Lake, near the southern end of the area, exceeds 900 acres (360 ha). Several of the lakes at Sky Lakes, including Alta and Natasha, were found to have among the most chemically pure water known of all lakes in the world.
The beautiful forest walk continues and at 10:10 I find that I am still on the right trail. I don’t think I have had any options to go the wrong way at this point but it is still nice. I will say that the trail is mostly VERY WELL DEFINED and EASY TO FOLLOW and really only directionally challenged people and those paying no attention whatsoever would have any problem following it.
At 12:30 I get to a Swan Lake which is just off the trail. I have plenty of water so I just sit there for awhile and enjoy the view hoping that a couple birds might show up. Nothing does and so eventually I move on.
The rest of the day is spent just hiking. I do come to a spring where I fill up with water for the evening and morning meals and the next day. 14 miles from the spring to the next water source and so I get all I think I will need. Meet a group of 5 hikers here who I will see from time to time throughout the day. They end up diverting just a bit to camp by Red Lake while I camp closer to the trail. From the spring to the camp site (about 4 miles) is where the mosquitoes start to make there presence known. By the time I stop for the night the mosquitoes are as fierce as I have ever experienced. Each time you stop you are swarmed with mosquitoes. Basically covered. I have a net around my head the always wear long pants and long sleeve shirts and put deet on my hands. So a huge annoyance but not much more UNTIL you do something stupid. Of course I did something stupid. I get my tent set up and get in the tent and kill the 20 or so mosquitoes that followed me in. Then I clean up a bit and get into my sleeping attire which is a short sleeve shirt and short pants and then I realize I need to pee. Ok….. how bad can it be…. I look out the tent and don’t see any swarms of mosquitoes and so out I go and get away to a good place to pee and start and WAM I am covered with mosquitoes. In a second my legs are actually covered with other mosquitoes waiting for a place to land. Trying to pee and swat mosquitoes on your legs is not something I would recommend. It would make for a very funny video however. I finished as fast as I could and raced back to tent. After I killed the 40 or so mosquitoes that followed me into the tent I just started scratching my legs from toes to just above the knee trying to relieve the intense fire on my legs. I thought of the words of my friend Phil who would tell me that is only going to make the situation worse and I tried to calm down and just ignore it. It did subside some but I actually had to take a pain pill to get to sleep that night. In the morning it was mostly ok.
Oh, and just to cement my position as the most inept PCT hiker on the planet, when I put on the netting, I put the netting over my head and then put my hat over the netting. When you do that the netting right where you hat goes over it is right on your flesh. So rather than the netting keeping the mosquitoes off, it provides a nice guided path for the mosquito. So right along my forehead was a series of bites that stretched continuously from one side to the other. Should have taken a selfie.
Had a great day. 16 miles was good I thought given I was taking my time. There was some snow along the way but nothing serious. There was a lot of debris on the trail which causes you to find ways around over, under, around and that slows you down a lot.
Lenora’s Story:
One of my favorite things about this adventure is our chance to attend new churches along the way. I loved the first church we chose in Medford, Sacred Heart Parish, and we returned there each week we were in town. Yesterday I realized it was my last chance to take pictures to remind me of this particular house of worship and so I wandered around the church and took pictures of stained glass windows. It is amazing to consider how a church community can decide to use statues, paintings and windows to teach us about our faith. I found the 12 Apostles pictured in the windows and was intrigued by the symbols for each of them. In this church there were two beautiful and original paintings that I had to photograph. The dome over the altar was stunning and the Tabernacle was beautiful. I could just imagine using what surrounded me to tell stories of our Lord to one of my own children or grandchildren. Our church has given us such a wonderful gift in the ways she presents the lessons of the Bible to our everyday imagination and reminds us of what wonders God has prepared for our future.
Need pictures here.
Now on to our adventure. Thank you Lord once again. A picture of Don contemplating wading the stream and then a picture of what we thought he needed to cross. If the trail angels had been a little late that morning he would have been up to his knees, at least, in that water. I often get a shot of him walking away on the trail.