Southern Oregon is notoriously cruisy. It’s fairly flat, the trails are level, and the weather is mild. For most people, it’s where they hit their first 30 mile day. For a crazyperson like me, that milestone happened on day 4 so my goals are a little different. I didn’t come here to go especially fast or break any records though. I came here to see the country.

We passed by Crater Lake, more forests, lakes, and quite a bit of wildfire smoke.

When we arrived, I was excited but honestly Crater Lake National Park was just okay to me. Beautiful, sure, but not awe-inspiring.

It didn’t really wow me. It was cool for about 5 minutes before the crowds started to stress me out. The lack of variety in terms of things to see (it’s literally just a lake that you can’t even go down to) left me a little unimpressed. Still I’m glad I saw it, and enjoyed the ease of the roadwalk.

Mt. Thielsen, on the other hand, a volcanic peak just to the north of Crater Lake, was much more striking. I wanted to climb it, but held off since we were trying for our first 40 mile day on trail and I didn’t want to sabotage the effort. The smoke in the air was also starting to mount, obscuring long-range views. Thielsen also has a lot of class 3 and 4 scrambling and though I probably would have been fine, I wasn’t 100% confident in going alone.

We hit our first 40 mile day without much difficulty. Biscoff and Eddie wisely vetoed my attempt continue and try for 50 miles, as they are concerned above all about staying healthy and avoiding stress injuries. I knew it would pay to hike with people older and wiser than me.

We have walked through a few burn zones here, and there is a little smoke, but overall it’s been fine. The burn zones are much better maintained than anything in California. We may still be climbing over some downed logs, but at least there is almost no overgrowth.

Next week we’ll hit the Three Sisters, Mt. Hood, more moss, more volcanic rock. It’s started to rain again, which will hopefully help with the fires. Or maybe it will just bring more red flag warnings. We’ll see.

Mac

Milk&cigarettes

I finally got my patches, now my hat is complete