Day 18

Mile 286 to 308 (‘cold’ part of Hot Springs)

PCT - 22 miles

Hot hiking day! 300 mile marker.

Beautiful morning hike. Stopped along Deep River to soak our feet and met up with Viking and Astro. While sitting with toes in the cold water a snake swam up to us! Did the rounds along the shore as all hikers pulled their feet out of the water. He/she acted as though this was its pool and we were not welcome. No trespassing. Snakes are everywhere around here!

Another hiker (Vagabond) we met along the trail was heading south because he lost his headlamp and was hiking back several miles looking for it. Tried to give him one of ours, but he wouldn’t take it. Hiking back several miles in the heat?!? Only the young could manage that. Saw him later and, sadly, he had not found headlamp. Still wouldn’t accept one of ours. Stubborn. It must have been some special headlamp.

Later in the day Rick found sunglasses on the trail. This is how the brain functions after a long day with no outside input: Rick saw them, picked them up and said ‘oh, my sunglasses’, then ‘wait - I haven’t been here before’ then ‘wait - I’m wearing my sun glasses!?’ In his defense they were very similar (yellow must be thing) to his new Unabomber sunglasses, just a bit less Unabomber. Tried to find owner over next two days, but no luck. Chris is hoping Rick makes the switch to the found glasses and leaves others in hiker barrel.

Afternoon hike took on the now-expected ‘these miles are sooo slow!’ feeling. We had hoped to make it to the Rainbow Bridge, but were too beat and hot and made it to the Hot Springs. The last thing either of us wanted to do was get in hot water, so we found a lovely cove with deep pool a few hundred yards upstream of the hot springs. Soothing cold water soothed our hot and tired legs and feet. What a sweet little hidden oasis we found. Nice evening and end to a hard hiking day.