July 7

Distance today: 15.1 miles

Mile marker: 95.6

The vacation away from the trail came to an end as we prepared for a long climb out of Stehekin Valley following the Agnes Creek.

We woke up to a mostly empty campsite. Those not picking up a box got on the early bus to get a jump on the day – including our friendly Australian farmer from Perth who’s lives quite a life.

Alex went to get one last shower before hitting the trail and I ran into the only other employee at the post office other than the postmaster. I asked if our box was there and he confirmed it was and that he had spreadsheets about the various hiker boxes.

Once the post office opened, it was a rush of all the hikers crowding the tiny room including our Colorado friend from the first day on the trail and a new friend from Boston we met the night before. We divyed our things from the resupply box and lugged our heavy packs to the bus stop. We sent a postcard in the mail too.

We had the same bus driver as the days prior and heard many of the same jokes (now I know how Alex feels listening to my jokes). Once the bus dropped us off, we immediately hit the trail.

Our first stop was lunch at about 4.5 miles in. Our legs felt good it didn’t seem like long at all. Jason had cheesy shell pasta and Alex had a melted king-sized Snickers. We dipped our feet into the cold river water while we ate.

The climb out started fairly slow and the trail was in good condition. However, a fire from prior years made the campsite at 12.3 miles unsafe with many dead trees waiting to fall. So at 10 miles in we stopped for water at the nearest safe camp and saw how we were doing. It was either setup camp here and have a difficult morning or push on to the next camp 5.5 miles ahead. We read that the trail leading to that camp was a bit overgrown and with many downed trees.

Our fresh legs from the rest at Stehekin made us push on. We eventually ran into the Australian farmer and chatted a bit before grabbing dinner for the last 2.5 miles. Jason had dahl and Alex had beef stew

The trail was certainly overgrown. We didn’t lose sight of it, but it was a lot of ducking, dodging, pushing plants and tree branches out of the way, and jumping under or around or over downed logs. We thought we’d make decent time to setup camp early, but the trail made for slow hiking. However, we did see some beautiful scenery along the way.

We got to camp late and set up by the fading daylight and our headlamps. We’re good at setting up the tent and everything now – we could probably do it with our eyes closed. In all, it was a good productive day and a departure from our time in Stehekin. Tomorrow, we’ll finish the climb out of Stehekin Valley and continue heading towards Stevens Pass for our next stop at the end of the week.