Start point
Tent sites at dirt road, mile 1642.8
End point
Seiad Valley, mile 1657
Miles hiked
About 10 hiked, 4.2 hitched
Wilderness area
Klamath National Forest
Marble Mountain Wilderness
People I met
Becky
The day on trail
This morning was really cool. A little group (bevy?) of deer were hanging out trying to get what they could. I tried to get a photo with them because they were so chill!
Nonny had already taken off, so I was just chilling for a bit enjoying the morning. Flamethrower and Cookie had taken off, too.
The trail took me over a really well maintained bridge.
I found a snail! These guys are so cute, at least when they’re not in my garden, not that I have one.
There were some really cool plants. This is red baneberry. Every part of it is toxic; I just thought it was pretty.
After that was log to duck under and another bridge.
The trail soon became difficult. First it washed out.
Then it became overgrown for miles.
This wasn’t even the worst of it. It was so thick in areas I had to fight my way past the plants. What should’ve been a cruisy slightly downhill hike was a grind through vegetation and blowdowns. Blowdowns haven’t really affected me much, but when it’s surrounded by dense growth, they become exponentially more difficult.
The trail did follow a little cliff side along a river. It was a delightful little feature with noise, breezes, and the reassurance that if worst came to it, there was water.
Between bends in the river, when it would flatten out there were berries.
Oh. My. Goodness. The berries.
The berries the berries the berries. The berries.
So many berries. Thimbleberries. And a new one to me: whitebark raspberry!
All the snacks!
And there was another of these beautifully maintained bridges.
Despite the struggle of the day, there was plenty of magic.
I met up with Cookie, Flamethrower, and another woman at a dirt road to get to the road that was the final approach to Seiad Valley, the last trail town in California.
As we were hiking a Tesla was approaching. I stuck out my thumb to try and get one of my bucket list items: a hitch in a Tesla. The driver pulled up to us and told us she was heading to drop off stuff for someone on trail, but she’d give us a ride if she saw us on her way back. She also gave us each a wonderfully refreshing soda. I chose an orange one because, in the absence of Dr. Pepper, that’s the only correct answer out here.
We continued on wondering how far Nonny was ahead of us.
Soon she caught back up to us and we piled in her car. We filled it to the brim. The trunk had everyone’s bags, and mine wouldn’t fit. We ended up putting mine in the “frunk” which is the worst portmanteau ever.
She also had the sweetest dog.
After connecting with the highway, we saw Nonny. Everyone wanted to try and cheer her on, but I didn’t like that vibe. Random shouts from a hitch when someone is struggling sounds less like cheers and more like jeers.
We got into Seiad and hit the cafe and post office. When trying to unload, the frunk got stuck with my bag inside. We tried finding secret catches to release it, one of the guys who ran the cafe came out to try and get it released. Nothing was working. I ended up putting a bunch of pressure on the hood, had them hit the release inside the car, and it released!
It ended up that my bag was putting too much pressure on the hood for the latch to fully release. Easy fix. Just needed some imagination.
I headed to the post office to get some repair gear from Nemo and a resupply from my dad — undies. He ended up sneaking in some camp food and the sweetest note. I really needed that note.
The cafe was closing shortly but they were happy to accommodate my order and let me hang. I got a patty melt or some sort of burger adjacent item.
Nonny rolled in shortly and we had a laugh about how much it sucked to have people cheer from a hitch. I let her know that I was not one of the shouters because I wouldn’t have wanted to be on the other end.
She ordered a vegan “chicken” sandwich with fries. When putting ketchup on her fries, the lid to the squirt bottle gave out and absolutely soaked her fries and hands with ketchup. It was a mess.
Oh man. That was it. Ketchup. Nonny got her trail name! A mishap with a ketchup bottle and then she’s always hiking late to catch up with everyone. Even the name “Ketchup” passes the shout test, where it sounds enough like a name that you can hear it if someone yells it at you.
We were originally going to stay at a campground for a hikertrash experience with others, but a trail angel pulled up to the cafe and offered us a bed, shower, laundry, and healthy dinner.
We elected for that. And it was a good move. I had a good floor to lay my stuff out to repair my tent pole and rain fly. It was easy with a clean floor and space to organize everything.
Becky, our hostess, had to run errands so we hung out, watched Eurovision, both the Will Ferrell movie and the 2023 quarter finals. It was really cool to see the song contest and gave us good fodder for our PCT playlists.
It was a great afternoon and evening, and the house was beautiful. Sadly I didn’t get photos of the backyard, but it was right on the river in the valley.
What a fantastic day. It’s funny, the struggle to hike is often just a struggle and doesn’t affect the final tone of the day. It’s just a piece of it.