July 3rd, 2022 by Jon
We woke up excited for town day! We got up quickly, had our new instant coffee from the trail magic (it was so good, thanks Alan!), and got hiking. Usually, Singsong and I don’t hike together all day; we hike parts of the day together and other parts at our own pace. But today we hiked pretty much all day together. We had a small hill to climb, then pretty much downhill the rest of the day to get to the highway. From there, it would be a 1.8-mile road walk or hitch into town. In total, we were 20.5 miles from the road.
There isn’t a ton to say about the hiking today because we basically did the same thing for nearly the whole day. We walked from up high at the very end of the valley, and walked all the way down and out of it to get to the mouth of the valley where the road was. Along the way we passed through forest, over a crazy amount of bridges (5 I think?!?), and down tons of loose rock. Much of the trail was a thin ledge cut into the side of the cliff, with sheer drop-offs to the sides. But the views were pretty great, lots of lakes for the first half of the day, and then beautiful creeks flowing in thin canyons in the middle of the forest, the second day.
To be honest, I was pretty distracted today because Singsong and I love to dream about the future together and what we want to do when we finish this trail. We don’t have anything set in stone, but it’s fun to talk through all the different options and feel like the whole world is our oyster.
The last section of trail we came down a long ridge, switchbacking down to the North Yuba River, crossed one last bridge, and then had a happy half mile along flat ground about 20 feet from the road, paralleling it. We came to where the trail crosses the road and found Biscuit waiting for us so that she didn’t have to hitchhike alone. We said hi, talked for a second, and then stuck out our thumb and a car pulled over after about 20 seconds of standing there. The kind couple who picked us up were actually PCT hikers who were skipping the upcoming burn section and had to pick up their package in Sierra City before going up to Burney.
We drove down into town in about 2 minutes and found a very cute little mountain town with houses and stores right along the highway. We stopped in front of the general store and went inside to grab some food and our package we sent from South Lake Tahoe before we left there. The clerk pointed to the back room and we spent about 10 minutes looking through tons of USPS boxes before we finally found ours. We returned to the clerk and ordered some food (two milkshakes, a burger for me, and a huge order of fries for Singsong) before going back outside. We were able to charge our things at the outlet on the side of the building and we organized our resupply for the next section. Our food came, and we ate, and holy smokes, the milkshakes were amazing and huge. The food was just okay, but we were hungry, and everything tastes better when you really want food.
We were just in the midst of trying to figure out how much food to leave there when Jenna showed up! We hiked together back in the desert, and we hadn’t seen her since Big Bear when she got off for an injury. We had heard from her a few days ago that she was in the area with her car, now officially off trail after making it to Kennedy Meadows South, and she was doing some trail magic and seeing friends before heading out for new adventures in Colorado. It was really great to catch up with her for a while. She offered to take us wherever we wanted to go, so we decided to go to the resort a half mile down the road, get dinner, and then camp back at the trailhead and take the long 8-mile climb out of here in the morning.
The three of us, plus a few new hiker friends from the last 2 days, all drove down to the resort in two carloads. We were with a couple, Tinydancer and Honeybuns from the Bay Area, and Dim Sun from England. The 7 of us all went to the resort, grabbed a table, and had an absolute feast. I had the spaghetti and meatballs, Singsong had the grilled trout. Both were great, and it was nice to have something besides fried food. It’s amazing I could eat it all, given I just had a huge meal 2 hours prior, but that’s what hiker hunger will do.
After eating and feeling very full, we took another two carloads back to the trailhead and found a few places to camp in the woods, just off the road. Unfortunately, it wasn’t super flat, so tonight Singsong and I are in a bit of a bowl in the ground, but that’s okay. We hung out with Jenna a little while longer before saying goodbye and good luck with the next endeavor!
It’s 73 miles to Quincy where we plan to stop next for food, we hope to do it in 3 days, or perhaps getting in the morning of the 4th day. We will see.
Your meals look awesome!