Day 122

Trail miles: 30.3

Total: 1894.8

First 30 mile day! We left all together this morning except for Raechel. Krista wanted to be together incase we got more information about the fire and needed to bail. Raechel decided she would challenge herself with a big day and hike into Shelter Cover which I think was over 40 miles. My feet were hurting pretty bad this morning. I took a short break at the spring, but didn’t get water until the water cache, where I took another break. We took one spontaneous break for phone service again, so another break for my feet. After the cache, it was a little less than a 4 mile uphill, which was alright since my feet hurt less on the uphill. We showed a southbounder how to check ArcGia for fire locations. That’s when Krista came and sat down for a bit because she was feeling dizzy. She thinks it might be the higher elevation. We sat with her until she felt better to climb. On the downhill, I tried a new strategy where I would jog the steep parts to prevent my foot from slamming the ground while walking. I think it actually helped! I was feeling tired and a little sick when we came up to Summit Lake. Oh. My. Gosh. Was it so beautiful. There were little islands with trees in the middle you could camp on and the water was so blue. We actually met two girls who were canoeing to one of the islands with a large group to celebrate someone’s anniversary and someone’s birthday. What a fun weekend! They gave us beers and took off. We went for a nice dip in the water and ate our dinners at the picnic table. Everyone wanted to do more miles to get closer to town so I followed. At least it was uphill so less pressure on my metatarsals. The first two miles were a breeze. We passed several stagnant ponds and Krista said it was the perfect place for mosquitoes to live. I said it was like New York City for mosquitoes. The last two miles of the hike were the most stressful miles of maybe the entire PCT or my life. The mosquitoes were awful. I thought I was going to have a panic attack. Krista and I switched being in the back so we could be in “leg patrol.” That’s where the back person watched the other persons legs to call out “left leg” or “right leg” when you needed to swat away a mosquito. I hope I came out of that with minimal bites. I haven’t been able to find deet in any of the stores on trail. I’m glad to be in my tent now safe from them behind my netting.