The camping at Shelter Cove is $10 a person. Unfortunately, we didn’t camp until after their store closed. Also, we left in the morning before their store opened. Who could we pay?
The trail today passed dozens of lakes. Some were tiny and stagnant, others were large and beautiful. Water was plentiful, but so were the mosquitoes. They could have been a lot worse. The stories we’ve heard about Oregon mosquitoes sound more like nightmares.
A few hours into the day, a southbound hiker told us there was some trail magic about 7 miles up the trail. We would get there around noon, just in time for lunch. We neglected to ask what the trail magic was though and we weren’t sure if it would be some pop in a cooler or a full blown meal.
At the road we met Sparkles. She hiked about 1500 miles of the PCT last year before a stress fracture took her off trail. She was cooking hot dogs and burgers. There was also just about everything else a hiker could need. After 2 hot dogs, a burger, lots of cookies and chips, a few drinks, and a Dr Pepper for the road, we hiked on.
The plan was about 16 more miles. It’s still weird that doing 16 miles after lunch is a normal thing now. We stopped halfway and talked to some southbounders about Washington. I ate more.
We passed more lakes, finally stopping at Mac Lake. The bugs weren’t bad, but someone camped here with horses and let them shit everywhere. Not sure why people get so worked up about dog poop on trails but not horse poop.
I have a confession to make. We accidentally skipped a mile of the PCT today. We were walking the mile and a half back to the trail from Shelter Cove when a lady offered us a ride. She drove us to the trailhead on the highway, not to where spur trail we took met up with the road. We didn’t even realize it was happening. None of us are too concerned with that missing mile.
This brings up an interesting discussion about the “purity” of a hike. Some people are hardcore purists. They have to walk every inch of trail. If they take a side trail to water, they have to go back exactly to where they left the trail. I don’t know what they did in the Sierra where you couldn’t even see the trail.
The next level are the “continuous footpath” people. If you drew a line everywhere they walked, it would connect all the way from the Mexican Border to Canada. These people will go miles out of their way to make sure they walked to Canada. I think this group is a little silly, since they take hitches into town and that feels like a break in the footpath to me.
My goal is to hike as much of the PCT as reasonably possible. I’ll walk alternate routes if they’re reasonable. The road walk around the crater lake entrance only added 5 miles and didn’t go too far off trail. I did that. Back in Idyllwild, there was a road walk around a fire closure that added about 20 miles. I didn’t do that. I hiked up to where the PCT was closed and hitchhiked into town, where I could pick up the trail again near where it reopened.
In the next few days I will take an alternate route around the Three Sisters Wilderness before hitchhiking past a larger fire in the Mt Jefferson Wilderness. I don’t feel like I’m cheating, this is just how the trail is this year.
This is a topic of constant debate and discussion out here. It doesn’t sound as bad as what happens on the Appalachian Trail, where shortcuts are common. HYOH. Hike Your Own Hike.