Almost Done with One State

I've almost made it out of California, I'm at Seiad Valley, mile 1653.4. I should be out of the state tomorrow! My opinion of the Northern California section of trail has changed a few times over the last 10 days. That is probably a good thing because the first few days after leaving Burney were not pleasant hiking. The area was having one of the hottest heatwaves in recorded history which didn't make for fun hiking weather. In addition to that, there was so much wildfire smoke I didn't get good views even when I was doing exposed ridge walks in the 105 degree sun. Due to these factors on the 100 miles between Burney and Mt Shasta, my opinion of Northern California was pretty low by the time I got to Mt Shasta.

After Mt Shasta my opinion really flipped. Leaving the road, the PCT climbs up through the Castle Crag wilderness. This was the first section in a little while that was amazingly gorgeous. The climb was awesome and once that was over the trail provided fantastic views for miles. After that wilderness area, the trail went through the Trinity Alps. The Trinity Alps leads directly into Marble Mountain wilderness. All of these areas were beautfiul. Additionally, the weather improved, the temp dropped below 100, and the entire experience was a good one. These few days were easily the nicest on trail since the Sierras for me. The only downside is I saw almost no one - in total I think I saw 5 thru hikers in 4 days.

My enjoyment of this part of trail has gone down a bit the last few days. The weather changed from dry and hot to humid and kind of hot. I think the humidity is worse. Even when I start hiking for the day everything feels damp. When clouds roll in in the afternoon there is mostly thunder and lightning without much rain. Hopefully the rain increases and helps with all the wildfires or the humidity goes down a bit and hiking becomes a bit more pleasant.

From here it is only two days until this state is finally over. It will be a big psychological boost once that happens. It feels like I have been hiking through California forever (since April 30!). It has been a good state but I am ready to move on. The downside of finishing California is Oregon has a ton of wildfires that are affecting the PCT. Currently two of the coolest parts of the whole trail are closed, the Crater Lake rim trail and Eagle Creek trail (it goes behind a waterfall), because of fires. Hopefully by the time I get there the fires are out and the trail is open. If not, Washington will have to make up for it.