August 6. Day 97.

Seiad Valley to mile 1680.7.

Miles hiked: 27.3.

Got up in the pale of the half moon and packed with brain cottony from a few too many beers last night and set out following my moon shadow west along the empty 2 lane highway for a mile until the trail peeled off and began the big climb up out of the valley. I was coming off two nights of not enough sleep and was feeling slow and out of rhythm. The trail was steeper than the PCT normally is, which is fine in general but today not the best for me. Or maybe it was. Maybe I just needed to huff and puff and work hard and force myself back into the efficient stride which has served me well the last couple weeks. 

Seiad Valley 

The trail climbed 1,000 feet a mile for the first 4 miles, ascending a thin finger ridge with successive high points named Lower, Middle, and Upper Devil's Peaks. Then over the next 7 miles we went back down a thousand and then back up 1,500 feet and eventually settled in to a gently rolling ridge walk. It was smokey again, and a helicopter was flying around making me wonder if there was a new blaze near the trail, but I'm pretty sure there isn't. During the climb there were good views back down into Seiad Valley, but up on the ridge it was just the haze and dark silhouettes of ridge after ridge. 

Heading up to the right of the close peak then around the left of the next one. 

In the afternoon time seemed to halt with the sun seeming to have stopped in the thick hazey sky and the trail through a tunnel of trees and smoke with no distinct landmarks with which to distinguish progress. I slowed and tired and decided to camp a bit earlier than I was planning and not try to get in to Callahan's tomorrow evening. 

I set up camp for my last night in California on a dusty saddle above a spring, wedged between the trail and a dirt forest road, with a cool breeze eliminating any chance of mosquitoes. I stopped walking just a bit after 6 so had plenty of time to chat a bit with Driver and Pit Stop and do some reading.

Birds:

Spotted Towhee 

Northern Flicker 

Steller's Jay

Sooty Grouse 

American Robin 

Brown Creeper 

Rock Wren 

Wrentit 

Bushtit 

Red-breasted Nuthatch 

Mountain Quail 

Oregon Junco 

Wilson's Warbler 

Mountain Chickadee 

Hermit Warbler 

Black-headed Grosbeak 

Common Raven