Progress Report and Pictures

New photos are up on Photobucket (a sampling of which are below). And Vince is meeting up with his brother and his buddy around Willamette Pass to hike ~80 miles! He's pretty excited about this - for good reason. :)
Well, without further ado:
Progress report:

Fire detour leads to this:
Still saw fires though:


Pitcher Plants?

Mt Shasta?

Donovan attempts the pancake challenge in Seiad Valley, CA (I believe there are 5 - 1lb pancakes)


If you could read the sign, it would say Vince made it to Oregon. :)

Oregon Trail... well, PCT in Oregon...

Made it to Oregon!!! After 1700 miles (minus that which I had to skip because of the fires), I've made it through California and am about 2/3 of the way done. Very exciting! I've never been to OR before, so I'm stoked to see some new scenery. I'm in Ashland, OR now, getting my fill of ethnic food. From here, I have to send myself food for the rest of OR, as there aren't any resupply options along the trail. The next few hundred miles are supposed to be relatively flat and low in elevation, though really hot (it will be over 100 degrees this week . . .). I do hear it's very beautiful though, and includes a section along Crater Lake.

New Photos are Up on Photobucket

Vince is back on trail as of Friday afternoon and will hopefully get to Oregon around next weekend (14-17 August).

I've posted some new pictures (Truckee to Chester- the half-way point) on photobucket and will post more as I receive them - probably in a week and a half-ish. Enjoy!

(here are a few) :

Smokey Bear Says Only YOU Can Prevent Forest Fires

From Gravitron:

Fires on the trail! Trail closed! Just as I was getting ready to hitch hike back to the trail from Chester, a few other hikers stopped me and told me the trail was closed due to numerous forest fires, started by recent lightning strikes. Even if I was able to make it through, the roads leading into my next resupply town were closed, thus making hitching impossible. Apparently the Forest Service doesn't expect some of the fires to be contained anytime soon. Sadly, I had no other option than to skip ahead past the fires (losing about 150 miles of trail). Definitely not an easy thing to do . . .

At 2 pm, I was able to hitchhike from Chester to Red Bluff, an hour away. There, I tried to hitchhike farther, but to no avail. After hanging out at a convenience store for over 8 hours (trying to hitchhike most of the time), I took a greyhound bus to Redding, and arrived there around 11 pm. Then, I had to take a two hour train ride to get to a town near the trail, Dunsmuir. Of course, the train only runs between the two towns once a day, from 3 to 5 am. The waiting room at the Amtrak station was locked, so I had to wait outside all night, in a very shady area of town. Lots of homeless people nearby, though luckily no problems at all. Dunsmuir is super tiny, and only had a few places to stay, which were very pricey. I went to the park, and tried to sleep for a little while under the children's playground (the sprinklers on the lawn had just come on) - the diner and coffee shops didn't open until 8 am (seems very late for a coffee shop to open to me). I finally caught the first bus to the town of Mt. Shasta at 7:30. I was hoping to find a hotel that would let me check in early, but to no avail, so after a night of no sleep, I had to walk around town for a tortuous 6 hours, then finally made it to a bed a little while after lunch.

Best yet, the maps that I need for the upcoming section were sitting in a post office that I would have stopped at had the trail been open. Plus, there were more maps at home that I needed, and as I skipped ahead, they hadn't been sent out yet. So, I've been hanging out for a few days waiting for things to be shipped to me here in town, and should (hopefully!) be ready to go tomorrow (friday) morning. Can't wait to get back to the trail! And while this has all been a pain, and I REALLY hate to skip a section of the trail (I consider myself a "purist" at heart), it'll make for a good story to tell, and give me a good reason to come back sometime. Gotta look for the positives! AND, I've gotten to eat a lot of chinese food and ice cream . . .

Whoooaaa Ooohh Half Way There! Chester, CA!

From Gravitron:

HALFWAY POINT!!! Passed mile 1325 early this morning! Very exciting. I'm in Chester now and plan on treating myself to an expenisive dinner (and drinks!).

I had an excellent time with Monica, Toby, and my parents in Tahoe, and the time off was nice. Monica wrote all about it below. Thanks for all the food Mom and Dad!

I hiked ~170 miles over the last week through some gorgeous terrain. I'm officially out of the Sierras, which I hiked through for about 700 miles. I just entered the southern end of the Cascades, and the "Northern CA" section of the hike, and am just outside of Lassen Volcanic National Park. I'm now on a fast-paced schedule to reach Canada before the snow falls. It took me 93 days to get to the halfway point (including time off in Tahoe), and I now have approximately 60 days to reach Canada by the 2nd week of October. Most say you should be there by the 1st, and the 15th should be the very last day you should expect to get through the Cascades before the snow becomes too deep - though it could be later). My necessary plan: alternate between 25 and 30 mile days 6 days each week, which allows for 1 shorter day each week to resupply. And no more, or very few, zero's (entire day off without hiking - requires 2 nights spent in a town). Luckily, there are very few towns near the trail with cheap enough lodging for the rest of the trail, so I won't be tempted by pizza and beer. But I'm loving every minute of being on the trail, and am certainly up for the challenge! Well, maybe not every minute . . . ah mosquitos. AND I'm unfortunately back in rattle snake country - came within 2 feet of a snake b/f it rattled twice the other day.

Until the next town with internet . . .