Day 96

Campsite to Chester - 33.7 miles

Total - 1332.8 miles

Woke up to a beautiful sunrise where we camped last night. I was woken up by the urge to lay a massive shit so I had to handle that quickly. The landscape was no ideal with shale rock so I technically did not follow the reccommended 6 inch rule cat hole but I worked around it as much as I could. I headed out before Caleb as he woke up late but still got out of camp in a record time of 24 minutes according to him. I immediately hit the sign stating we were entering the cascade range along with hitting 1300 miles. We had a 3 mile climb before it all leveled out for 15 before one last climb. Belden was so bad that we were feining to get into a good town so we decided to do our biggest day yet. Caleb passed me early on but then we stopped at one of the best water sources we have had in awhile. A spigot gushing ice cold spring water surrounded by a burn zone. Immediately filled up and then stuck both our heads under it to cool down. Then we booked it. I pounded back 3 ibeprofen to counteract any bit of pain, sucked down 200 mg of caffeine, and started playing the 2008 playlist shared by Caleb. I was fucking flying. Zoomed through and reached 12.0 by 10 in 4 hours, and then 18 by before 12. The climbs slowed me down a bit. Caleb grabbed us water from 0.3 off trail while I ate. Peanut butter and jelly isn’t hitting as much as it used to so it was strictly snacks. I pounded back 120mg of more caffeine and my legs were moving faster than I could think. At one point I thought I was dying bc I felt like I had no control. Fully cracked out. I had to slow it down so I knew I was alive. We didnt plan the water sources very well as immediately we had a long climb in the middle of the day which caused me to get to the top with a lil over a half liter with about 6 miles left before the next water source. I’ve never had this issue even in the desert. I never felt pressed for water so we booked it all downhill. During this time, we passed the midpoint of the PCT!!!!!! Omg. What a milestone. Now we are officially closer to finishing than starting which is insane. We also have no constraints but to just try to outrun/skip the fires which are blazing up ahead of us. A whole bunch of people were sitting at the midpoint which kind you is still in a burn zone. The entire day of hiking was in a burn zone. We spent maybe 3 minutes taking a picture and then immediately heading out. I tried calling people as we had service but EVERYONE was in work. Pathetic. For a Wednesday?????? Finally, I kicked it into third gear and tripped over a million rocks just to make it to the cold refreshing stream with no water left on my back. I filtered and downed one liter before packing out 2 liters for the last 3ish miles. My only goal was to make it to the road by 5:30pm as then we would have done 44.7 miles in 24 hours. Which we fucking did like the badasses we are. I felt good too. My feet hurt obviously but it wasn’t too bad. It’s what you expect when you hike that much. We pulled up to the road and a couple who supplies cool drinks for pct hikers immediately said we could drive into Chester with them. Sweet couple and super nice to give us a ride. They gave us a lil tour before dropping us off at bings restaurant. I ordered a large king pao chicken with a large wonton soup. The chicken was great but way too many peanuts and the wonton soup was perfect except they used so much pepper in the broth which is all I could taste. So it wasn’t perfect basically is what I’m trying to say. I did down most of it though. We then walked over to the park as apparently the locals don’t care if we sleep there as long as it’s just in the back behind the baseball fields. True hobos for the day really. It does have bathrooms and a spigot so I’m very happy. It’s also by a river with easy access. We set up and basically immediately went to bed. I took 4 ibeprofen just to counteract any inflammation caused by the big day. I was feeling good but didn’t want to feel worse. We also heard a rumor that a hiker the day before camped in the area and a bear came and messed with him a lil. This can’t be the first time I see a bear in trail especially in Chester not even South Lake Tahoe.

Today overall was fueled by ibeprofen, caffeine, and 2008 music. I would like to thank all of those who contributed to one of my longest hikes on trail. Hopefully I will produce longer days to assert my dominance amongst the muggles aka people with jobs and responsibilities.