Day 103 (31 July) - Mile 1195.42 - 1206.18

 Portola, CA to Campsite at mile 1206.18

I slept really well in the Airstream and woke around 7:30 AM. The plan for the day is to get our food and bags ready for 4.5 days of hiking to Belden, CA and then go into town to do laundry and eat breakfast.

By 10:00 AM we were on our way into town. We found the laundromat and a cafe just down the street...perfect!

With laundry done and our bellies fed, we headed back to the trail. Oh, I forgot to mention earlier that Brad is getting back on trail today. He is feeling totally better and is ready to get back to hiking after missing the last 2 weeks. Woohoo!

We were all ready to hike at 1:19 PM...including Tim who is going to hike in with us a couple of miles.

Ready to hike

Oh...Tim is going to meet us at the 9.5 mile point today, so we are able to slack pack again today which is so cool since the first 10 miles or so of today is a climb. It is 3,177 feet of climbing in the first 10 miles...crazy.

Tim climbed with us for about 2 miles then headed back to the 4Runner to then drive to where the trail intercepts another road 9 miles ahead. Meanwhile, Share Bear, Brad, and I kept climbing. We met 2 guys from South Korea hiking the trail, Jay and Chen. We continued to see them throughout the rest of the day.

The trail is climbing up there.

4.5 miles later we came to the 1,200 mile point on the PCT.

Proof I'm standing at 1,200 PCT mile.

1,200 mile pose.

Even though we have come this far, I still love the milestone miles we come to.

We spent at least 2 hours walking up this ridge. It was tiring, but beautiful.

Self-portrait "Ridge hiking"

Share Bear catching up.

We were finally off the ridge and hiking on more of a roller coaster type trail when we saw Tim just ahead with 1.5 miles to go to get to the 4Runner.

While hiking toward us he walked over this shadow and couldn't wait for me to take a photo with him and the shadow:

Tilty Tim

We came to a trailhead and saw this awesome tree with a PCT and trailhead sign:

PCT sign of the day with Sierr Buttes Trailhead sign.

We arrived at the 4Runner around 5:45 PM and somehow managed to hang out there until 7:20 PM.  I guess we are not getting the 15 miles in that we planned. We saw that there was a campsite just over 1 mile up the trail, so we said goodbye to Tim (we may see him at a road crossing in 2 days) and hiked up the hill to our campsite. Wow...my bag felt really heavy after being able to slack pack the last 30 miles of trail.

We made it to camp just before 8:00 PM and quickly set up our tents. Mine and Share Bear's were up, but Brad was still working on his.  I think he is a bit rusty after his 16 day break.

Brad still working on his tent

Finally, Brad was setup and we all ate dinner. While finishing up, Painter from Tasmania walked by and we invited him to join us for the night. He gladly agreed since the sun has set and he was pretty much ready to stop for the night.

It's another warmer night so I didn't put on the wind flap. It should be a perfect for a good nights sleep.

My home for the night.