Forest fires everywhere!

It was hard to leave Tahoe! But leave Justin and I did, resuming the trail at Sierra City. We were meeting Timmy C in Castella on the 11th, and it was going to be a push to get there. We did 90 miles over 3.5 brutal days. One day, we did 27 miles, including a 3500' climb. We were both hurting, with aching feet, new blisters, and some very suspicious bumps (poison oak...noooooo!!!!). On Sunday, we woke up and the first words out of my mouth were "I would like to boycott today." Spirits were not high, especially because we had to continue the 25+ mile days for another week to get to Castella. Ouch!

Then we ran into fellow hiker PigPen. PigPen let us know that Northern California had suffered 1900 lightening strikes over the last 48 hours (huh? We just had blue skies!) and wildfires were raging. One section of trail was already closed. Well, the next civilization was a spot called Belden, so we figured we'd make sense of it when we got to Belden Town. If nothing else, we actually had a bit more pep in our step heading down (and I mean down... 4500 feet down!) into Belden Town - maybe a 20 mile stretch of trail was closed!! This would decrease our mileage into Castella and allow us to ease our Death March. Woohoo!

Before I continue the tale of The Fire, allow me first a paragraph on Belden Town. We had heard from our guidebook that "Belden is creepy," and that there were weekend raves. As usual, the guidebook did not lie. We started hearing music about 6 miles out of town. Then, about 2 miles out of town, we saw two wandering free spirits, one wearing a namaste poncho and the other with feather earrings. Both had a dazed look. Welcome to Belden! As we got into town, we discovered ourselves in the midst of a music festival! People wandered around wearing tie dye shirts, fringed bathing suits, and fake tails. Dogs were dressed up. People were dancing on floats in the river. Vendors were selling marijuana accessories (medicinal, of course). We emerged from the wilderness and found ourselves ... here? So disorienting!!

Fortunately after a few minutes, we heard someone yell "hey! Hiker Trash!" We knew this affectionate name could only be for us. We turned around and there was a fellow thru hiker! We chatted for a minute and in short order learned that there are actually 3 sections of the trail that are closed, that their locations make a walk through Northern California impossible, and that most hikers were planning to hitch ahead to Ashland, OR, skipping over 400 trail miles. YIKES!

To digest this news, we needed some real food. A Sprite and a Popsicle later, we found ourselves sitting alongside about 10 other thru hikers, all asking ourselves the same question: now what? Some people were going to wait it out at the music festival and hope the news improved. Others were figuring out transport up to Ashland. Justin and I, well, we decided to go into the next town, Quincy, cross our fingers for cell reception, and go from there.

It was the hardest hitch we've had to do yet. Surprisingly, something about the thumping bass and the crazy rave scene behind us made most cars disinterested in picking up two scruffy kids. We quickly augmented our "Quincy or Chester" sign with another sign that said "we are nice PCT hikers!" Had I a third arm, the next sign would have said "we are extremely well-educated and are good conversationalists." Anything to distinguish us from the festival folk! Finally, two people who had been hanging out by the road approached us. Their dad had just dropped off a sandwich for them - did we want a ride to Quincy? Heck yes we did! That is how we met Phillip and Bo. Phillip has the sweetest car EVER (see picture below!) and Bo is his pitbull who I shared the backseat with. Bo mostly licked my face and when he got tired of that, he fell asleep in my lap. As Phillip said, it's a shame that Bo doesn't like people.

Quincy is a great town!! It's got a nice little restaurant scene (we highly endorse Pangea), a hotel with very reliable wireless (whew), and is easily walked. What Quincy lacks, however, is transit connections to the rest of the world. We had about a week to kill before we were to meet Timmy. What to do??? We had just made the decision to stay in Quincy for an extra night when we met a thru hiker who had paid an exorbitant amount for a car service to Reno Airport. We gladly shared the cost with her... At least in Reno, we would have the option to rent a car or even fly somewhere for the next few days.

And that's where we currently are. The Reno Airport. Thought we'd be in Lassen National Park right now. Sometimes, the PCT taketh away. We thought about doing the Tahoe Rim Trail or heading back into the Sierra. Forecast for both: rain every day. We thought about flying to Seattle or San Diego or anywhere really. Flights are a nightmare. Apparently trying to plan an instant vacation in August is not so easy. So we're staying put for the minute. Maybe we'll end up spending the week at a slot machine in Reno. Who knows!! Always an adventure.

**update** my oldest brother (also named Tim!) coincidentally is flying into Reno tonight from a business trip!! He's going to take us to his house in Tahoe where we'll hopefully have a better time making a plan than these plastic chairs by the American Airlines check in desk. Tim, you saved the day.

Captions:
1. Start of the hike. Everything seemed possible then.
2. We were in the land of the huge pinecones!
3. Beautiful inside of a green pinecone
4. View over a lake whose name I forget
5. A chipmunk ate the crap out of that pinecone! It's like corn on the cob for little critters!
6 and 7. The scene in Belden Town.
8. Confused thru hikers, trying to make a plan.
9 and 10. Attempting to hitchhike. Justin's beard may also have hindered our luck.
11. Phillip and his awesome ride.
12. Stuck in the Reno airport....