Day 140
September 5
2412-2434.5
22.5 miles

The rain came down quite heavily for a period of time, but everything seemed okay in my tent. Of course, this was one of the few nights that I needed to get up and pee. I waited for the rain to lighten before putting on my rain jacket and getting out of my tent.
In the morning hours, the rain was light. I packed up my possessions in a similar manner as I had unpacked them last night, trying to find the driest ground I could to set down my stuff sacks. As I started walking, the sun peeked out from behind the trees.

I climbed another thousand feet, emerging from the forest, and rising above the clouds.

The landscape was quite beautiful. Once I followed the curve of the trail back to the same direction I had come from, I sat on some rocks to have a snack. A couple of pikas and marmots were close by and kept me company.

As I walked on, I met a man headed in the opposite direction. He wanted to know the name of the mountains that I had just come from, but I was unable to tell him. “I’m just walking,” I said. He laughed.

The trail turned and started a descent. The landscape reminded me of the Sierras.

A couple of hours later, I ran into a couple more people. A woman was sitting on the side of the trail, waiting for her husband. She asked me to tell him she was there when I saw him. He seemed in no rush. He asked if I knew that the bridge over the creek had collapsed, and said that people were walking across a fallen tree, pointing down to where an older man was just emerging. This other man came up to me and asked if I was Wendy. A bit startled, I said yes. He told me that Story Time had told him I was close behind. (I don’t know why he was telling everyone that!). We chatted for a minute and then he pointed to the fallen tree that started well before the water.

It was of a large width and didn’t seem to be much of a problem at first. Still, my breath shortened and my heart started to beat faster. As I got closer to the water, the tree became narrower. I was doing fine until I looked down at the rushing water underneath me. Suddenly, I felt dizzy, and got scared. Because my pack always leans to the left, I was pulled over that way and fell into the water blindly. It was up to my mid-thighs, but I landed on both feet. I felt embarrassed about falling and hoped that no one was watching me. Now, I had to pull myself back up onto the log. After only a couple more steps, I made it back onto the dirt. My body was shaking. Luckily, the water did not damage my phone or camera. My hands were scraped and my skirt was wet, but I seemed to be generally okay. Getting up the steep embankment with the dirt giving way was almost harder than crossing the creek. Once I made it back to the PCT, I looked down at the water and saw a person sitting across from the broken bridge. If they hadn’t seen me, they surely heard me fall in! Oh, well. It was time to get moving!

I had another huge climb in front of me. It was six miles long and over 2,500 feet. I grew more and more tired as the afternoon turned into evening.

I made it to the top of the ridge and watched the clouds turn color from the setting sun.

Minutes later, thunder boomed overhead. I needed to hurry to find a place to camp. I wanted to get off the ridge, at least. I moved as quickly as I could. In the near darkness, I found a flat spot just off the trail and got to work setting up my tent. I knew it was about to rain, so I tried to get the lines as taut as possible. I threw my groundcloth, sleeping bad, and sleeping bag in, followed by my stuff sacks and backpack and then went to find a place to pee. Just as I got into my sleeping bag, big flashes of lightning lit up the sky. The bolts turned everything red and they were sustained for longer than I had ever seen before! At first, my heart started to race, but then I put my hands on my stomach to calm myself down. Nothing was likely to happen. And if I did die, I wouldn’t feel anything anyway! Thunder roared through the sky and bolt after bolt lit up the entire interior of my tent with the color red. Even when I closed my eyes, it reached the back of my eyeballs. After a few minutes of staying awake to watch the intensity of this show, I realized I was too exhausted to keep my eyes open any longer.
The rain poured down as I lied in my sleeping bag and the wind kicked up the dirt and blew it inside through the mosquito netting, covering everything like it had done in the dessert. Only now, it was wet dirt.