Day 97, The Way it Should Be

Part 3, Northern California, Day 97

The Way it Should Be

Miles: 27.42

Total Miles: 1568.70

When I woke up, all my gear was covered in orange dust from all the volcano dirt around me. I packed up, and burned the book I finished the previous night in the fire pit. I waited around to see if the singing squirrel would return, but no luck. I walked off at 6:30.

Another beautiful morning with mostly flat trails. As the day wore on, the storm clouds became bigger and bigger.

Ok, no storm clouds yet... Be patient! My feet were feeling better lately. The new insoles seem to be working, though I question his long they'll hold up. I'm taping my heel each Morning where new callouses are forming. I'm also eating ibprofen likes they're vitamins. Whatever it takes to get me hiking, right? Right!?

I found another piped spring:

Lots of epic views this morning.

I passed the Europeans and also Diogenes and Claire. I was making good miles.

I found water in this hole. There was a decent spring inside the hole.

I ate a blueberry bagel and Fritos for lunch, and I'm not sure that this is anything to be ashamed about...

In the afternoon, I crossed highway 3 and entered the Klamath National Forest.

Shortly afterwards, I entered the Trinity Alps Wilderness. I've been waiting for the Trinity Alps, even though I'll only pass through a corner of this wilderness. 

The storm clouds were just filthy at this point.

The mountains here reminded me of the Sierra Nevada, but greener.

The scenery was beautiful, even with the storm clouds!

At this point the sky started pissing rain. I'm talking Vietnam style, torrential downpour. Luckily I was prepared for rain. It was pointless to walk in this mess, so I stood under a tree for 30 minutes until the rain lightened. 

There was loud thunder and lightning too. I thought I heard shrieking coming from up trail, but I chalked it up to my growing delirium. I've been hearing things lately... Sure enough, and to my relief, I found a summer camp group of about 20 kids and counsellors, freaking out about the rain and thunder. I wasn't just hearing things!

The whole walk up this ridge, I was hearing bells...cow bells. Oh great. More delusions. Then I began to see cows. I felt bad for these cows. Can you imagine the hell of hearing bells your whole life? Either the cows enjoy the bells and are boogying down 24/7, or they were driven mad by the constant ringing long ago. Anyways...this blog needs more cow bell.

The walk was among the most beautiful scenery I've seen this whole summer.

Storms were all around me. Thunder and lightning were constant.

I set up my tent under some trees to shelter myself from the rain.

I sat and listened to the storm for about 2 hours. It was a big one.

It stopped raining at about 7 pm, and I saw a cool little rainbow. I cooked ramen and read in my tent. I was pretty dry, so a good end to an epic day.

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