Start point
Kosk Spring, mile 1441.5
End point
Dirt Road intersection at mile 1453.7
Miles hiked
12.2
Wilderness area
Shasta National Forest
People I met
Queasy Rider
Mixtape
The day on trail
Today was epic. It was such a fun romp and hike with these people I’m so fond of.
It’s really cool how you can meet people, get a vibe with them, gel, and then enjoy spending so much time with them. There’s something really unique about going off on parallel adventures alone, then meeting up and talking about the day at camp. Though today wasn’t exactly like that.
True to form, I was the last out of the campsite. First it was Eva and Swiss Cheese, then Nonny, then me. I knew I’d catch them all. There were reports of snow fields ahead, and we planned to meet up at the snowy sections. Because I had the most snow experience of the group, I’d be leading the way through when we got there.
It was a really nice morning. I saw a cute mushroom and some sort of rabbit.
I caught up to the others when we reached a view of Mt. Shasta next to a miniature Pride Rock. Who doesn’t love a random Lion King moment?
Shortly after that is when we hit the snow. There ended up being three snowfields of varying length and difficulty.
The first snowfield was along the side of a fairly exposed mountain. We ended up finding out was up the snowfield and along a ridgeline. We had lunch under some trees on a dry patch of ground. The area was really overgrown with manzanita bushes, and we had to bushwhack our way forward.
After lunch we ran into a couple Queasy Rider and Mixtape. We all ended up going along a dirt road that followed the ridgeline parallel to the trail. There was maybe 200’ of good, yet overgrown, road until we hit more snow. They took one route and I found a slightly different one. The couple ended up coming back to take my route. Theirs took them to a rocky outcropping that wasn’t really traversable. We all ended up staring up a big snowy hill. They sped up it while we took our time.
The others I was hiking with needed a little encouragement, and I fully got it. I’d been there myself. I remember feeling wholly out of my element north of Truckee and having Pat leading and not really offering much — just kind of going with Claire and leaving me to catch up. It was miserable and I’d never do that to someone. In fairness, Pat and I didn’t officially pair up.
We made it up the hill and the next area started. It was along the side of the mountain. This area followed the trail more closely at times, though also had to divert away from it often.
My preferred method of tackling snowy areas with any sort of steepness more than about 20° is to try and get higher to look down and make decisions based on what I can see. The trail also tried to hug the higher side of the mountain, so it made sense. What we ended up doing was hiking among the trees when we could and following up higher when needed. We all were able to find a few different ideal routes to take in turn. It was a really nice collaboration.
We caught up to Queasy Rider and Mixtape at the last ascent. They were having trouble finding a route. I got them headed the right direction. I’m happy to run up some snowy hills and routefind. There were a few bad options and a few less bad options, and they quickly got onto one of the better paths.
We finally took a little hidden turn off the snow and were able to take off our microspikes. We took a break and got absolutely mobbed by some carpenter bees.
Eva was unlucky enough to have one land behind her knee as she was trying to move. These bees don’t sting unless you squeeze them, like when ones behind your knee and you want to crouch down. She said it hurt a lot less bad than a honeybee, so that was going for her.
We continued on and soon hit our last snowfield. It was exhausting! At least it was a little flatter and shorter.
After that it was a quick trip to camp. There was a mound of snow. I packed my dirty water bladder with as much as I could and hung it up so I’d have water to filter in the morning. I also melted a good amount in my pot that night to filter.
I don’t know what’s been in snow, what’s rolled in it, or what other dirt is in it, so I filter snowmelt. Some people think it’s pristine if it’s white, but the data doesn’t support that.
We had dinner and a beautiful sunset over Shasta.
And then it was the sleep of the exhausted. We were officially done with the major section of snow between Burney and Shasta!