I didn't sleep very well. The ground was a little bit slanted and I kept sliding down. It was so exciting spending the night with my dad there on the trail that I didn't care that much. He was up early, so it wasn't tough for me to get up early either. We hung out in the morning a little bit and talked about the plan. He took some of my overnight gear down with him because we were going to camp the following night together at Hart's Pass. That meant that I was nearly day hiking this section. I still carried a bit more than a usual day hiker, but it was nothing compared to what I had been carrying at other portions of the trip. We both got packed up and were on the trail by 6. The rest of the world seemed pretty quiet until I heard the sound of 3 gunshots.
They were so loud down in the valley below that I became a little bit nervous. I hoped my dad was okay. It was probably hunters, but who knew from up above. I spent the morning climbing uphill. The goal was to get to Cutthroat Pass. This was a rather easy undertaking with my light load. The views were incredible. There were high mountain peaks all around me with deep forested valleys below. I ran into a few other people in this area as it seemed like most of the really pretty spots were always filled with more human beings. Everyone was very friendly and happy to be there.
After reaching Cutthroat Pass, the trail went downhill. It was really cold. The wind was sort of blowing and I was in the shade. It was definitely time for the poofy jacket to keep me warm. Once again, I was surprised at how little sweat I was putting into hiking this trail. Morning were often cool and sometimes, like this morning, downright chilly. When I would pop out into the sunlight, I would warm up rather quickly, but this trail seemed to be a series of high mountain ridges and passes. It was downhill to Granite Pass, then back uphill to Methow Pass. After Methow Pass, everything seemed to change quite rapidly. Instead of the big views of high mountains, I was descending into a valley. The valley still had the dead looking trees and this place really looked like a tinder box.
It was now beginning to warm up and I was feeling great. The trail was just slowly descending downhill and I had a light pack. I was really moving well and was easily putting up over 3 miles an hour in this section. There were still lots of people out and about. I was enjoying talking to them. I talked to an older couple who had hiked 95% of the PCT. This was one of their last sections to complete. They were worried that they were not going to finish it because they still had the really difficult section between Rainy Pass and Stevens Pass through Glacier Peak to accomplish. I encouraged them to do it because it was difficult, but nothing that much more difficult than this section. That is easy to say when the trail is in great shape and I am just cruising.
I continued going downhill quickly in the cool morning air. The sun was out, though, and it was warming rapidly. By the time I hit the footbridge across Brush Creek, it was turning into a warm day. To make it even worse, the tree cover was becoming less and less. Here I was at noon and I was at the low point of the day at 4500 feet. I would have to climb up over 7000 feet in the next few hours. I lathered up on the sunscreen and made sure I had a full water supply to charge up the hill. The going was difficult, but I was in such great shape after 24 days on the trail, that I seemed to handle the hills with ease. Here the sweat started to fall, though, and I got a good workout going up the hill, even passing a few people as I went. I made it up to Glacier Pass which was this strange flat area that did not offer me a respite from the uphill climbing. It actually had no glaciers either and was really just a dividing point for the Brush Creek and Slate Creek drainages. I continued uphill toward Grasshopper Pass. Here, the switchbacks became frequent. In fact, from down below, I could see a person hiking over 1000 feet above me. So it was switchback after switchback to climb up to Grasshopper Pass.
On one of these switchbacks, I ran into a trail runner who was on like mile 70 of a 100 mile run. I enjoyed chatting with him for the few seconds and was pretty impressed that someone would venture this far out there on a trail run. After leaving him, I continued uphill until finally making it to the top of Grasshopper Pass. This was my last big climb of the day. Once I was on top, the greenery seemed to melt away and the terrain changed to something I had not experienced on the PCT in Washington thus far. It was very dry and barren. It still had these big views of big peaks, but the terrain seemed almost eastern in its feel. I enjoyed the big views and listened to my mp3 player trying to find a local radio station to listen to.
Now came the job of finding my dad. I wondered if he would be out hiking on the trail to meet up with me. Hart's Pass is the furthest north you can go on the PCT and still have a road. The road was not great, but good enough to get a two wheel drive vehicle to the campground. It was really nice of him to meet me up here and really helped make a lot of my trip possible. I knew there were two possible camping locations he could be at. One was Hart's Pass itself, but there was another campground even closer. He was planning to find a campsite there at the Meadows Campground. I was hoping he would find a site, because there sure seemed to be a lot of people around. This place felt pretty far out there, but then again, there were big views of big mountains all around.
The trail in this section seemed to hug the slopes of the mountains around. I went around Tatie Peak and really enjoyed the section of trail. It seemed rather easy and I was just flying when I started to see the Meadows Campground. I looked for my dad's truck, but could not see it. When I got closer, though, he had put a note on a tree telling me which campsite he was in. I grabbed the note and cut off down the road. I found him at the campsite where I proceeded to find a nice spot to sleep, ate a lot of food, and lost a couple games of cribbage. We hung out for the evening, but the exciting part was that I was beginning the final stretch tomorrow. While I had enjoyed my experience on the trail, there is nothing more rewarding than completing a goal and I was oh so close.
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