This last section was 148 miles, from White Pass, WA to Cascade Locks, OR. It starts with the Goat Rocks Wilderness, touted as one of the highlights of the trail. And it ends with a walk over the Bridge of the Gods, a historic bridge over the Columbia River gorge. Note: historic bridges don't include many amenities, like, for example, a sidewalk.
The weather forecast was mixed for this section - cloudy, two days of rain, then sun. The goat rocks includes a ~5 mile section of trail known as "The Knife's Edge," known as such because you walk on top of a ridge with steep drop-offs on both sides. We were pretty eager to do the Knife's Edge when it was sunny, or at least just not-rainy. I was also pretty eager for my mom to not know about the knife's edge until after we'd survived it. It's like when my brother Tim backpacked around Pakistan but told mom he was going camping on Vermont. Sometimes you just have to help her not worry. We hustled out of White Pass and got to the base of the Knife's Edge around 5 pm. We started steeply climbing and met two girls who had just come down it. They recommended we wait until morning, since the wind was starting to pick up and we definitely didn't want to be battling darkness. That made great sense, so wait we did. We found an awesome campsite, took a pre-dinner nap, had a multi course meal, and then finally sent out the Spot message to mom. Changes in routine worry her, and arriving at camp 3 hours early qualifies as a change. As I said, sometimes you have to help her not worry.
The next morning, we lucked out weather-wise. It was cloudy, but no rain! To the knife's edge!! It was a little sketchy at points, but not as bad as some hikers had made it seem. It helped that, because we're heading south, a lot of the scariest parts were uphill for us, which is inherently less scary than downhill, where you're worried your momentum will have a negative reaction with gravity and you'll be careening off the side of a cliff before you know it. The views of Mt Rainier and Mt Adams were awesome, we got to walk across a glacier (first real snow of the trip), and we saw old friend 'Merica! This was especially great because we'd been debating exactly what his tattoo says since we last saw him on Kearsarge Pass in July. He was able to clear that up for us. 'Merica is a former Marine who has done the whole trail in a red, white, and blue tank top and short shorts, which make him a bit of a trail heartthrob. We were glad to find him unchanged.
On our way down from the knife's edge, we met a DC park ranger, who works at the Lincoln Memorial and is out in WA on vacation. He's a former AT thru hiker who was excited to meet some fellow long-distance backpackers. He told us that he cried when he finished the AT, and told us that going forward, we'd really hold this experience in our hearts. Some people just have the best energy.
The next day rained and included a slightly hairy river crossing. We camped that night next to a professional windsurfer who has done the PCT three times. I would like his life, please. Fortunately the sun came out the next day, so Justin and I had a leisurely morning in camp, drying out our gear and enjoying a hot chocolate. When we finally left at 10:30, the windsurfer (who was just starting to take down his tent) commented that "it was great to finally meet some chill thru hikers who don't leave at the crack of dawn." While this compliment seemed a little backhanded, we seized the opportunity to explain the finer points of difference between a thru-hiker and a thru-hanger.
While we weren't epic thru hikers that day, all that changed on Saturday. We woke up at 5:45 am, broke camp in the dark, and banged out 30 miles by sundown. This included the illustrious "10by10," or ten miles completed by ten a.m. (10:03 in our case). Why did we do this, you ask? Simply because we hadn't yet. Lots of hikers post huge mileage in Oregon, where the trail is relatively flat and the tread is gentle. Having skipped OR, we didn't have any big mileage days to boast about - our previous record had been 27. But not no more. On September 20th, we logged 30 miles. Count it.
During the 30 miler, we met a group of locals out for a day hike. They were wonderful people, who took our trash out for us and insisted we take their watermelon jolly ranchers. The kindness that hikers experience is just humbling sometimes.
The trail continued to be gentle for the next day, only to remind us of what it's made of on Monday. Rugged, rocky trail, with prickly bushes on both sides, and 5,000 feet of elevation gain (and a corresponding 5k of elevation loss). There was also an 11 mile dry stretch that we messed up, so we didn't have any water for 7 miles. We went out with a bang. The last night sleeping in the tent was bittersweet. I'm not going to miss the claustrophobia and the occasional sleeping on slopes and sharp rocks. But making your home under the stars is pretty magical.
On Tuesday, we had 9.74 final miles to go. Amazing to think that I used to consider ~10 miles to be a "big day," and now it's just a little something to bang out before town. The hiking was weirdly annoying still - thorny bushes, the return of poison oak plants along the trail, and lots of boulder fields. It was also a weird transition back to the populated world. We could see a dam and power plant on the Columbia River for much of the hike, and we had our snack break (final gu! Final fruit leather! Final soy jerky!) on a pipeline. We passed by a few houses, and then just like that, the trail dumped us out on a busy road with a sign saying "Bridge of the Gods, next right." So we did what we do best: took a bunch of pictures, then kept walking.
Bridge of the Gods was awesome, when I wasn't fearing for my life. Imagine a busy 2-lane highway, going over an old bridge where you can see through the structure to the water below, and no sidewalk. Fortunately cars gave us a wide berth. It might have been our smell.
When we got to the end of the bridge, the final trail magic started. Pedestrians are supposed to pay a toll, but the woman glanced at is and announced "if you're doing the trail, you don't pay." She then directed us to the East Wind drive thru, where all thru hikers, Cheryl Strayed included, stop for ice cream. Sent a final Spot message from the diner, then hitched into Hood Rover. Got a ride with two super friendly Moms, who not only drove us, but also gave us a tour of the town, including all of the breweries. They stopped a guy on the street ("he looks young and cool, he'll know where to go!") to get a lunch rec for us - Moms are the best. Lunch was amazing and the beers were free, as a congrats gesture. Our waiter also said he was going into Portland tomorrow, if we wanted a free ride. Heck yes we did. We then checked into the local hotel, where the check-in guy explained that he probably wasn't going to fill up tonight, so did we want a free upgrade to a suite? It was more space than we knew what to do with - I'd estimate our tent would fit inside maybe 30 times - and it was awesome. Maybe being off-trail won't be so bad after all.
Now we're in Portland. We ate our faces off at some food trucks yesterday and today are going to see a matinee at an independent movie theater about "The Camino," Spain's 30-day pilgrimage hike. I guess I shouldn't let the Spot get dusty.
Going to write a more thoughtful summary of the adventure in the next few days. But now, I'm off to enjoy my 3rd shower in 24 hours.
Captions:
1. The Knife's Edge
2. Yoga on an ice field
3. Huge cairn with Mt Rainier in the background
4. Big herd of goats, for which goat rocks wilderness is named
5. Reading an HBR article that the Wharton leadership office sent me at White Pass. That article was later very helpful as we used the reverse sides to make a hitchhiking sign.
6. Rainy day.
7. Rainy day river crossing - small streams get treacherous in the rain.
8. Fall colors!
9. Dr. Lance-a-lot, doing his thing. Still dealing with blisters in the final days.
10. Cool bridge
11. Cool sky
12. Camp on the last morning. Note: we ceased doing bear hangs a few weeks ago. Now, we do a "mouse hang." If a bear wants our food, s/he is welcome to it. But stay away nice!
13. Final on-trail water source. We're back to faucets now...
14. Final trailhead
15. Justin going over the Bridge of the Gods. Scary!!
16. Hard-earned ice cream.
17. First meal out. YUM.
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