Day 124 - Sunday, August 29

Tenting at a dirt road and trailhead (mile 2198.8). Walked 25.4 miles today.

We got on trail this morning just after 7 am and did the four mile descent down to Trout Creek and the impressive concrete bridge over it.

Over the next 5.5 miles, we crossed 3 paved roads and several other dirt ones as the trail stayed relatively flat through this section.

I had heard Washington is fairly remote and had expected fewer roads, but I think we'll reach that part later on. We crossed the beautiful Wind River and got water at Panther Creek.

Here, we talked with a hiker who had camped near us last night, whose name was Rally. Frank and I then began the highlight(?) of the day, a 3,600 foot climb over 9.5 miles. It started out super steep but mellowed out after a few tenths of a mile. Frank's hamstring is still a little sore, but it's much better than the previous days.

We got 5 miles into the climb and then stopped for lunch. Rally caught up to us and ate with us. After we finished, we did the second (and easier) part of the climb. At the top, we had a fantastic view of Adams.

We hiked down and then got water a few miles later before skirting the edge of a lava field and then entering it briefly. Luckily it was much better trail than we had in Oregon's lava fields and we had no issues walking through it. I don't know why we thought there wouldn't be lava in Washington - it's still the volcanic Cascade Range.

We reached camp just before 7pm and ate dinner with Rally before setting up our tents. We have the luxury of picnic tables and put toilets here and we've tried to take advantage of these things as much as possible. Today wasn't super exciting, it was a lot of walking through a green tunnel, but we know we'll get some exciting scenery soon enough.

Frank proposed a finish date for us today.  It's an ambitious goal with some decent miles.  We'll see if we can pull it off.