Day 111 - Monday, August 16

Tenting with an amazing view of Mt. Thielsen (mile 1856.1). Walked 8.3 miles today.

We woke up at 5:30 this morning, tired because of the long day yesterday and late bedtime. We did a quick load of laundry and replaced the tips of Frank's trekking poles, something she had been wanting to do since Tahoe since they were so worn down. We rushed a bit to pack up and left the apartment at 6:45 am to catch the 7:00 bus from Union Station. Luckily, it's only a short walk to the station and we made it with plenty of time to spare. We boarded the bus to Eugene where we got the safety lecture from the driver before heading off. After a couple of hours in which we slept a bit (bit not as much as we needed to), we arrived in Eugene 10 minutes early.

We hung around outside the station for a few minutes until Dana and Marta pulled up. They had graciously agreed to drive us back to the trail. They were taking advantage of the drive to visit Crater Lake while they were in the area. After the 2ish hour drive, we arrived back at the trail we had come to know for the past few months; however, in checking the trail register, the names were all unfamiliar save for two people that we hadn't seen since the first 200 miles.

We hiked less than a mile up to a water cache and ate some lunch here before hiking on. It was fairly warm today and my foot had been hurting since we left the trailhead. We got to a great view of Mt. Thielsen and then another a bit later.

We got to an ice cold stream and decided to stop here for the night to rest up, even though we had hoped to do 15-20 miles today.

We went uphill from the stream to a large but hidden campsite and pitched our tents with a fantastic view of the north side of Thielsen.

I stretched and rolled my foot out and we relaxed (as though we haven't done enough of that lately), and it felt better. We witnessed a rockelide from the mountain and admired how cool it was to see something like this here. The breeze picked up and the evening grew cold as we retreated to our tents for the evening.