Frogs Everywhere

11:36 AM

It froze overnight; everything is covered in a layer of ice. Unfortunately, I forgot to secure my water filter, so the only way to find out if it’s broken is by filtering dirty water and drinking it. If I get sick, I’ll know the filter froze and broke.

First I walk to the campground restaurant to warm up and have breakfast. And yes, eventually you still have to go back outside. The weather is nice, and walking in the sunshine feels good.

12:26 PM

So many fallen trees 😮‍💨. After an hour of detouring, climbing, and crawling, I run into a large group of trail maintenance workers. They tell me it’ll be another two tough kilometers, but after that everything has been cleared.

And sure enough, there was an even bigger group busy sawing, hauling, dragging, and rolling trees and rocks. Thank you so much for the maintenance 🙏. After that, the trail was neatly cleared and free of fallen trees.

2:53 PM

And with a trail like that, you can really rack up the miles.

4:50 PM

Frogs—frogs everywhere, jumping all over the place. You really have to watch where you step, because there are thousands of them.

7:15 PM

Last campspot before the pass. I’ve had enough for today. This is my view, and the weather is beautiful. No flat screen showing nature—I’m sitting right in the middle of it, live.

A Korean hiker comes to stand with me; his name is LightPull. He started on July 14 and has only had two closures due to wildfires. So we’re moving at roughly the same pace, since I started at the border on July 17.

Total: 37.54 km in 11 hours · 930 m up · 723 m down