PCT: WA Section I - Snoqualmie Pass to White Pass / Highway 12 (SOBO)
Day 153 - 10/6/25 - PCT? Naked?
Distance: 24.9
Mile Start / End: 268.3 - 293.2 = -24.9
Weather: clear, sunny, cold
End Location: random tentsite
Lessons Learned:
Woke up just after 7am
Left around 8:30am
Gonna go for the “Say only PCT for a day challenge” to spice up the bland forest scenery
Buddha pod, talked about distractions - some really good quotes:
“We find ourselves distracted from distraction by our distractions” - TS Elliot
“To be everywhere in distraction is to be no where”
Typical PNW forest
Bear grass, huckle berry, white trillium, ferns and moss blocked in by thick evergreens
Passed a girl NOBO Hiker
“PCT”
“Yup” she replied
Nice, we both kept hiking
Trail magic!
“PCT?”
I was handed a key lime lacroix… my favorite
“PCT” I said as to say thanks
The other hiker began asking me questions
Shit this is gonna be tough…
“So did you start at the border?”
“PCT” I said and pointed down, hoping to convey that yes, I started at the Mexican border
“Cool, and now you’re going south? Where did you hop up from?”
I stared at him and thought about saying PCT again 😂
He stared back at me, clearly I understood him
I was screwed…
“Alright I can’t do it” I said and explained the self imposed challenge I was doing and how I didn’t expect to see anyone, let alone trail magic
The hiker’s name was Windchime and the Trail Magic provider was Dean
Dean was the dad of a PCT hiker named Tea Time and has been offering his son support
He made me a turkey wrap with mayo, amazing thank you
Sara (now called Marmot) and her dog Riley pulled up
Tea time and his mom also pulled up
Left 1:30pm
So much for the challenge but I’ll try it another day
I was certain this was the last bubble
3.5 mi to water
Got to water around 3pm
Trickling spring with bark spout
Filtered water on the grass in the sun and it dawned on me
I could probably knock off the hike naked for 1 mile challenge right now
It was actually warm enough for a change and felt like there was no one around
So after I filled up water, I sent it
I put my bandana over my crotch area in case someone came by, but it was an extremely liberating experience
I just wish I had tried it earlier😅
After a mile I put my clothes back on and kept hiking
Saw Jaci
Glad she didn’t see the naked spectacle
She said she was feeling discouraged, the weather said snow was coming in a few days
Snowline going down to 4000 ft
Hearing this made me happy I had flip flopped, but concerned for my friends still going North
I just hope they are safe
Quick tuna break
4 miles to last water before dry camp
Down
Put on LOTR 2
Chapter about the Ents… great more trees
I can’t escape 😅
Beautiful maples all at different stages of autumn, red, yellow, orange, green
Quick water pit stop 6pm
4 more miles to camp, straight up🥲
Passed a hunter with primo set up, I said hi and he gave me a Gatorade zero 😌
Made it to camp around 8pm
Set up, dinner and tv around 8:30
Bed around 9:30pm
Day 154 - 10/7/25 - Happy 5 Months
Distance: 21.8
Mile Start / End: 293.2 - 315 = -21.8
Weather: Sunny, clear, stunning
End Location: some ridge
Lessons Learned: need less to appreciate more
Woke up around 4am
Thought about starting
Too cold and windy, back to bed
Woke back up 6:30am
Dirty chai and bear claw 🤤
12.5 mi to Cabin
Left 8:30am
Uphill through thick woods
Took wool base shirt off and unbuttoned
Contemplated quick detour for Blowout Mountain
Nah, too windy and cold
Blew off Blowout Mountain
Stunning ridge views
Mt Rainier!
Wowww
Windy
Passed section hiker Bob
3/3 cover girl hiking, easy breezy, and beautiful
Break at camp and spring for water and deposit around 11am
Thought I wasn’t going to have water until the cabin, thank god
Sat in sun
Washed face and refreshed, lovely
Charged headphones and ate trail mix tortilla
The silence was lovely
Left around 12pm
A song by the elovators came on
Love them
queued a bunch more I had downloaded, such good vibes for a sunny day
“Wind on my back” 😌
Cabin in 4.7 mi
The smoke give the entire day a golden glow
Made it to the Mike Urich cabin, 1:50pm
Cooooool
Nice meadow called Government Meadow
Explored the cabin, not much to see but quite lovely
Lil photoshoot on the porch
Cheers to Mike
What a beautiful life
What a beautiful day 😌
Left 2:30pm
Tune in, Smurf out
“Catching Fireflies” by Revivalist
Water in 5.2 mi, camp in 10
Mostly up
Magical old growth forest
I moved silently and startled a group of Elk
Truly incredible animals
Earlier I had thought the idea of hunting sounded appealing but now I don’t think I could ever do it
They’re just such beautiful and graceful animals
The forest was teeming with life
So damp, so quiet, so beautiful
Green moss, blue spruce, and dark beauty
I took my headphone out, amazed by the silence and lack of light
And the solace
I walked in silence and thought about which song I might want to hear later
I take music for granted and abuse it a little too much, listening to it at all times of the day
If absence makes the heart grow fonder, then silence must make the music sound sweeter
I thought about the accessibility of everything in society
We have access to so much but care for so little
We have too much
We need less to appreciate more
But how do you “sell” less in a system that rewards relentless growth
And how are we supposed to grow forever on a planet with limited resources?
As I hiked through the magical forest, evidence of an forest fire appeared
It was sad to see such beauty be tarnished and replaced with destruction
I reached an overlook and whistled to imitate and elk bugle
And elk bugled back, such a cool moment
Saw a cat footprint as I went uphill, meow
Jack-o-Lantern Mushroom?
Passed water flowing from metal pipe, but thought spring water would be better
It wasn’t
Went back down
Break, smoked salmon - yum
Felt like a fat cat as I laid on my mat
I imagine a mountain lion watching me with mutual cat-like respect
Game respects game 🤣
Left around 5:15pm, 5 miles to camp
Stunning sunset as sweet as Tupelo Honey
“Either way” by Chris Stapleton
And as always “The Sun is Shining down” by JJ Grey
I found a nice little ledge for camp around sunset
I pressed pause to save it for later and set up camp
Made dinner, ramen bomb with chicken packet and watched the stars for the first time in a while as I ate
To think the stars
shine only for you,
Is both selfish and stupid;
They shine, all the time,
Whether watched or not,
Brightly and unbothered
Quietly relaying
The reflections of space
I made some bed time tea
Yogi wisdom: “May all beings be happy”
Damn, they’ve done it again
So spot on… every time😅
I thought about the trail coming to an end
I’d like to get two tattoos, one on each thigh facing me so when I lay or watch a sunset I can see them:
Yellow swallowtail butterfly with the PCT trail on the wing (in color)
Elk (traditional ink)
I’d name the Elk, Teddy Roosevelk
I don’t know what I’d name the butterfly…
Episode of Geordie Shore
Then bed around 9:30pm
Day 155 - 10/8/25 - to Packwood
Distance: 13 mi
Mile Start / End: 315 - 328
Weather: cold, cloudy
End Location: Packwood
Lessons Learned:
Woke up around 7:30am
Cold
Cold enough to make a dirty chai in bed
Opened up the tent door to see the sunrise
Ate honey bun and drank coffee while watching the sunrise
Then a cloud rolled in a ruined the view
Closed tent and packed up quickly to avoid the tent getting too wet
Left around 8:30am
13 miles to Chinook Pass (start of fire closure)
3 miles to water
Hiked with no music
Beautiful ridge walking and views of Mt Rainier
Burnt forest though, glad it was cold
More cat prints
As I increased in elevation, the ground crunched beneath my feet in the spots where the sun hadn’t hit yet
It was desolate, and I liked it
I passed a girl going NOBO and gave her a smile, thinking maybe I could do the “say only PCT for a day challenge” if I saw no one else
Filled up water at trickling spring around 9:45am
Nice hiking, up and over a few more passes
Walked high above Crystal Mountain Resort
Looked awesome with Rainier in the background
How have I never been there?
There are so many cool ski resorts I just took for granted
I also could never justify not going to Mt Hood Meadows once I had bought the season pass
I would do things differently if I moved back to Portland
Took a little trail mix tortilla break at Bear Gap around 11am
Requested a Garmin Weather update to come up with a plan for the fire closure
Up
The weather forecast showed:
Tonight - cold rain
Thursday - cold rain
Friday - cloudy, no rain
Saturday - light snow (1 in)
Sunday - cloudy
Monday - snow storm (23 in)
I came up with a plan
I would get a hitch at Chinook to White Pass and do a zero day tomorrow, then huff it through the Goat Rocks before the snow made them dangerous or impassable, then get to Trout Lake before the snow storm came on Monday
Cool peaks and spires
Sour Dough Gap, no sour dough though
Met a retired gal named Denise, she asked what I was going to do about the fire closure
“Try to get a hitch and go around I guess”
She said she could help me out if I was still on the road by the time she got done with her hike
Sheep Lake stunning
Thought about doing “swim across a lake” challenge
Nahhh, I was more interested in the toilet at the trail head
Passed a group of older ladies wearing bible verses on their shirts
They asked me about the trail
Planted idea for a possible hitch with them as well
Saw Igloo about a mile from the trailhead and chatted with him
Apparently he got arrested in Bend for slapping a guy that was being creepy to a girl and was off trail for 2 weeks
The judge that heard his case was a female and appreciated his candor (and probably empathized with the girl) and dismissed the charges
The law enforcement had taken a lot of his items though including his weed
So I gave him some trail magic and he gave me some cookies and peanut butter in exchange
He told me that the fire closure section wasn’t closed anymore and shook up my plan a bit
We took a pic and said goodbye
Trailhead around 1pm
Took care of biz, threw out trash, and tried to read up on the fire closure
The Bible ladies came down
Then Greenhorn
He was like 3-4 miles behind me the entire time since Snoqualmie 😅
Glad he finally caught up
He was in the same boat
Fuck the rain and fuck the snow, let’s skip the fire closure and get to White Pass😂
Asked the Bible ladies for a ride and they declined politely
I understood but found the situation ironic
If only they would read the verses on their shirt…
Talking about love and kindness is fine but showing it and living it is more important and often harder to do
That’s one of my hold ups with organized religion
The people the preach the most tend to actually do the least
They use religion and the verses on their shirts to reassure their belief that they are a good person but when it comes to actually being a good person, they cower
And when they disagree with someone, the bring out their book and point to a line that they’ve read but never truly lived
It’s a gaudy dance of deception
God bless their hearts
Greenhorn and I walked along the road and stood for a hitch just before the Mt Rainier sign bridge
A guy named Al pulled over and could get us a little bit of the way to White Pass
He had no Bible verses on his shirt
He gave us 2 cold wine coolers (pina colada and margarita) he had laying around, they were cold too
He dropped us off at an intersection
I opened the pina colada to put in my water bottle but saw a truck coming so put my thumb out
He pulled up and said he was going to Packwood
Quick sidebar with Greenhorn, we were down for Packwood - there would be more lodging there and would be easy to get a hitch up to White Pass the next day
Chris was the guy that gave us a ride
Ex marine who was trying to hunt elk for his first season
We talked about the restaurants in Packwood
He told us everything was pretty good except for the Mexican restaurant “Nachos”
“I wouldn’t touch that place with a 10ft pole” he explained
He dropped us off at Cliffdroppers for burgers around 3pm
On theme, Greenhorn got the Elk burger and I got the Sasquatch burger
Scarfed down and looked at places to stay
Settled on the Packwood Inn (inexpensive - $120 total after tax, free laundry, good comments)
Walked over
Checked in - the clerk said that laundry had to wait until tomorrow at 9am when housekeeping got back, bummer
Showered up, let Greenhorn go first since I had something weird going on with my foot
I researched my foot - it hurt and felt like a blister but was actually a series of little craters called Pitted Keratolysis
I thought it was early trench foot but turned out to be something less severe and not contagious - but still hurt
I showered and put Neosporin on it
Then we went to the store next door
Got kombucha, coconut water, chocolate milk, mango mochi, cheese, apple, a banana, and a reduced bag of vegetables for $1 = total $40
Back to hotel
Then discussed dinner
After much deliberation, we decided to take our chances at Nachos
Seemed semi healthy and economical
Took half an edible
Walked over
It was packed! 20 min wait or we could sit at the bar now
Sat bar
Enchiladas verdes with avocado and a corona with lime
Delicious, I don’t know what Chris was talking about😅
Churros for dessert (not the best I’ve ever had)
Back to hotel
Only downside was no tv, so we both watched shows on our own separate screens
Ate mochi 3 ice cream bars 🤣
Then watched Geordie Shore
Bed around midnight
