The First Leg of the Journey Continues

July 3, 2013 (transcribed)

From the Journal:  June 19, 2013
Today is ending better than it started.  We were exhausted this morning and ended up deciding to sleep in and make it a half day.  I woke up on and off listening to rain fall on the tent, which was peacful and also made me want to stay in the tent indefinitely.  When we did crawl outside, we discovered it was snowing and we were in a whiteout.  There was about a mile of terrain to cover before reaching the road that parallels the trail between Slate Peak and Hart's Pass.  After waiting for an hour for visibililty to improve (it didn't) we got on our way.  We made it to Hart's Pass and 6 miles beyond for a total of 9 miles today.  Not bad considering we didn't start hiking until 1 pm.  We had two sections with steep snow traversess that are mentally and physically exhausting.  Normally the trail would be nicely carved into the hillside, but, when it's covered in snow you walk very carefully over a 45-55 degree slope at times.  Ben says we did "thru-mountaineering".  On the bright side, my feet are magically feeling better.

 

 These are the tiny ones - didn't get a photo of the heel - ouch!

 

June 20, 2013
Day 6 - 18 miles.  Another epic.  We woke up with six inches of new snow on the tent and more coming down.  We were on the move by 7:30.  Right off the get go we had to descend more steep snow.  We ran into two SoBo (South Bound) hikers - Kate and Lisa who started yesterday from Hart's Pass.  Finally we got down to low ground (4000-5000 ') where the trail was clear of snow for 10 glorious miles.  Mind you it was still pouring down rain, we are in our rain gear, soaked through and freezing any time we stop moving.  It was too miserable to take breaks, we just huddled under some trees and had bites of PB and cheese.  Eventually, we had to climb back up to Methow Pass.  Luckily, the descent was south facing and relatively snow free except for two short crossings.  We did this section with our new hiker buddies.  Safety in numbers.  We are now camped at Granite Pass, about 6 miles from Rainey Pass, where we will go into town and hopefully have my shoes brought out.  I had some really miserable moments today where I wanted to go home, but somehow the trail has turned itself back around for me.

(I'm taking the liberty of adding this quote:  "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."  Lao Tzu)