To Have and To Hike: Hello Oregon! Seiad Valley to Ashland

Hello hello! Man, the last two resupply stops couldn't have been any more different. Seiad Valley was a tiny, one-building town (Post Office, Store, Diner all interconnected). Now we're in Ashland, OR - which I can only describe as a more free-spirited Princeton, NJ. We are in heaven.

Hipster Mexican cocktails = hell yes

But first, more about Seiad Valley. While we were there, we paid the "day use" fee at the neighboring RV park - $20 got us two showers, one load of laundry, and the opportunity to sit in a dusty room and wait out the heat. #worthit. Side note: not #worthit? The toothpaste we found in a hiker box and used for a night before discovering it had expired in March of 2001. Back when I was in high school.

I patched the holes in my short pockets all by myself. I hope you're proud, mom!

The size of one pancake from the Seiad Valley pancake challenge. No wonder it's been 8 years since a hiker won.

Annnyway, we kept waiting for it to cool down. It never did. Finally, close to 6 pm, we finally acknowledged that we had to get moving regardless of the fact that it was still north of 95 degrees. We then began one of the most infamous climbs of the trail - the 4,500' trudge out of hot Seiad Valley and back up to the (mercifully cooler) ridge.

Yup, that looks horrible.

We'd planned to camp maybe 4-5 miles in, where we'd read there was a good site. When we got there, the sun was just setting and our legs felt great. Why not keep going a little bit, we thought? That was a mistake. Turns out there weren't any more campsites for miles. The sun fully set and the moon was just a tiny sliver. Ultimately, we had to get out headlamps out to light up the trail, and even then it was sketchy, as we were on a narrow ridge with a steep drop-off. When we finally came to a semi-flat spot, we decided to commit to camping (especially as it was well past "hiker midnight," aka 9 pm). This is when things got really honeymoon-y. The two flattest spots (as in, only a minor incline, not a steep drop) were both far too narrow for our tent. We ended up splitting up, unrolling our sleeping pads in two spots about 50 feet apart, and sleeping separately for the first time in months. Also we ate donuts for dinner and slept in our clothes. And ants kept finding their way into our sleeping bags. The next day at lunch, I had to take a two hour nap just to recover. This night now holds the coveted award for "worst night of sleep on the trail." Only time will tell if someplace in the PNW can take the title.

Pretty view of the valley as we climbed

Last sunset in California!

This is what camp looked like when we arrived. Great view, huh?

We spent a chunk of the next day leapfrogging with our friends from 2014, who got on trail coincidentally right where we were. Some wonderful dejavu moments to see Gourmet and One-Track napping under a tree as we strolled by.

In the early afternoon, we saw something we've seen only twice before during this journey....storm clouds. We kept an eye on them and kept hiking. Pretty soon, we heard thunder rumbling in the distance. At this point, we only had ~10 miles left in California, and we were both under the strange and wholly untrue impression that if we could just make it to the Oregon border, we'd avoid the storm. So we ran/hiked to the border, stopping only once to refill water and shove sour skittles in our mouths. The California/Oregon border, while of massive importance to thru hikers, is not much of a landmark. Indeed, it's really just a sign nailed to a tree and a trail register where everyone says some variant on "California, I love you, but damn it feels good to be in Oregon." The storm clearly would not have respected this boundary had it meant business. But lucky for us, it stayed hovering over the next ridge and we stayed dry.

Storm running!

And then, well, shoot....! We made it to Oregon! Woweee! Our first state line crossed! On the AT, apparently hikers cross their first state line in something like 1-2 weeks. Not so on the PCT. They make you earn it. You gotta go through 1,689 miles of desert, mountain passes, heat, creek fords, mosquitos, and snow before you get the glory of moving into a new state. And I do mean glory. We feel really great about it. Our bodies feel great. We're having fun. It's been hard but we wake up everything morning excited to keep moving north. It's also incredibly bittersweet. This journey is clearly once-in-a-lifetime, and we don't want it to end! We are so grateful to McKinsey for allowing us this time, to our families for ever-supporting this journey (I can't tell you how many random packages and duffel bags are currently stored at Matthew's small cottage), and to our friends for cheering us on. We can't wait to get to Canada, but we also want to savor every damn moment. In a few months, we'll be back on airplanes and staring at laptops. For now, waking up in a tent as the sun rises, spending the day talking, thinking, and listening (while simultaneously cranking out 30 miles), and falling asleep under the stars is insanely special. Which is all to say, we were both thrilled and sad to make it to Oregon.

We had a lot of feelings about finding ourselves in Oregon, but we handled them by doing what we do best: walking north. We slept about a half mile from the border that night, and the next morning started to crank out the 27 miles to Callahan's - a resort in the woods where you can then hitch into Ashland. We blasted through the miles (Justin listening to Top 40, Me listening to the NPR Politics Podcast), stopping only because we ran into Copper Tone and his tricked out root beer float RV. We said we wanted to keep pushing into Ashland, but the allure of a root beer float was far, far too great. I actually said "I'm not strong enough to walk by and not have one." Fortunately, Justin was on the same page. We inhaled the floats and kept going.

Can't possibly pass this up.

We are super lucky in that Kris, the sister of my sister-in-law Heather, lives in Ashland and agreed to be our personal trail angel for the weekend. She picked us up at Callahan's, set us up in her adult daughter Taylor's bedroom (Taylor is off on an epic journey of her own, driving the Pan American Highway down to Patagonia), showed us the best spots in town for a spicy margarita, and was super polite as we dragged our extremely stinky backpacking stuff into her lovely home. It has been so nice to see family as we transition into this next phase of the trail. Thank you, Kris!

And, as mentioned, Ashland has been incredible. We've had craft beers, brussel sprouts, massages (!!!), and more craft beers. I walked a labyrinth outside the Episcopal church. Justin bought an energy bar made from cricket flour at the co-op. It's been everything we've needed to rejuvenate and we don't want to leave. But in the words of our homeboy John Muir, "the mountains are calling and [we] must go!"