July 16th

Almost Chewed Off

We got a slower start than has been our norm. We left camp at 0750. When we woke up, we discovered that we had a thief in camp last night. One of my gloves were stolen along with Shannon’s knee brace. In addition, the thief chewed on my hiking pole strap and chewed on Marks socks, which is just plain disgusting. We searched around for the missing items to no avail. Something is sleeping on a cushioned bed.

Mt Shasta View

As so often happens, we started out with a climb. As we got above 6,000 feet, we began to get good views of the surrounding country and Mt Shasta. We also saw some nice flower displays along the way. We also broke out of the trees for a while with some nice open hiking. After close to 5 miles, we reached Road 38N10. There was some nice shade with a view of Shasta and so we took a break here. We met a thru hiker named Rant while we were breaking. .

No More Trees

                                                                            As we continued on, we were steadily climbing along a ridge. The area was really pretty and we were in the open with views most of the time. We took one short break and pushed on as we crossed two more jeep roads. We stopped for a late lunch by the second road. Late lunches are beginning to seem like a theme on this stretch and I may be getting some flak from the peanut gallery.

                                                                                                                                                            

Pit Stop and PS2

After lunch we started to descend as we hiked about 2 miles to Deer Creek. We lost 1,000 feet in altitude and it was pretty hot as we hiked in the afternoon sun. We were originally going to camp at the creek but decided to push on and do a few more miles. First, we filled up with water for the next 10 miles or so. We continued to descend on this stretch and found a nice camp on a small ridge. We lost another 450 feet in getting here and are camped at the lowest altitude so far in this section. There is a small breeze on the ridge which helps with the temperature and it is 6PM which also helps. We have a nice pasta dinner tonight and settle in for the evening. We were passed by over a dozen hikers today as more and more thru hikers are starting to catch up with us. It was a nice day with views most of the time and we made some good miles. Our mileage for the day was 16.77 miles and we walked at 2.6 mph. Our high point today was 6,192 feet and we are now camped well below that at 4,292 feet. Tomorrow with any luck, we will see the McCloud River which all the signs the last few days keep pointing out that it is in front of us.Wonder what is beyond the river. Good night.