Wed. July 20      Miles today: 11.3       Total so far: 1,239.4          Begin Washington Section J

I got up early and did some writing before breakfast at the Pancake House, which in my opinion has the BEST coffee I have ever tried, and then helped Bill with his writing.  At 9:45, I was at the Chevron waiting to see if our box was there…the cheery mail-lady arrived…and hurray, there it was under the table in her post office closet!  Whew, and thankyou to the Lord!  I ran back to the Summit Inn with the box, because time was running out–we had to be out of our room by 11:00.  As fast as I could, I sorted and packed the food and supplies that were in the box, and the motel maid was already knocking at the door before I finished.  She had begun her cleaning work as I stuffed the last items into our packs.

Before hitting the trail, we went to the store for one last ice cream.  We are learning now–when in town, do everything you can to reduce your calorie deficit, and that way you have a lot more energy for the trail!  And what a wonderful trail it was!  Remembering how awful the trail was getting INTO Snoqualmie, I’d expected more of the same going OUT.  But no–the “out” trail was smooth, wide and well cared for.  About a mile or so up, we began to notice FRESH trail improvements, and then voila–a whole volunteer trail crew eating lunch.  They were nearly all old retired folks like us.  We had to dodge around a big hole they had dug to remove a large rock.  We thanked them VERY fervently for what they were doing!

The trail took us up and up into the Commonwealth Valley–not a commonwealth of different nations, but of different MOUNTAINS.  The valley is ringed with very distinctive peaks, from gray, pointed, ziggurat-ish Mt. Guye, to colorful Red Mountain.  An older Sobo we met was very helpful.  He told us which creek up ahead was good to get water at, and also his experiences on the PCT alternate route. He was right about the creek–excellent water there!

As the trail climbed higher, we could see Interstate 90 far below in Snoqualmie Pass, and near the top of our 2,400 feet of elevation gain, we had awesome views of the mountains ahead.  Our pace was really slow, however–Bill’s foot really hurt from plantar fasciitis, AND we were carrying over 7 days worth of food, which made our packs really heavy.  But finally,  there was the top–a narrow gap with a “whole different world” on the other side.  Beautiful!  But the trail down was scary for me, with a BIG dropoff on one side–but only one side, so it wasn’t as bad as Goat Rocks. 

Finally we reached the first of the Alpine Lakes for which this wilderness is named, and needless to say, we met a lot of dayhikers on this clear, warm afternoon.  We were so high now (5,500 feet) that we could see Mt. Rainier sort of floating on the horizon, above beautiful wildflower meadows.  The mountain valleys here are huge and deep.  We reached more lakes, each in its own mountain setting, and by 5:30, the trail had brought us to a pretty saddle where we ate supper-with-a-view.  This is one of my favorite things about being on the PCT–being able to sit down and rest and eat, with a fantastic view of mountains or lakes or whatever!

Climbing on, we reached almost 6,000 feet at Needle Sight Gap, where we set up camp on the grass below the Gap, with a beautiful evening view of Mt. Rainier, to pretty to block by setting up our tarp.  Wild goat fur was lying in tufts here and there; I picked some up to look at it, and found it was very soft.  Marmots were all around us, discussing us (I think!) in loud, squeaky voices.  We looked at our bulging food bags.  There was not a tree in sight where we could hang them out of marmot reach, so we tucked the bags right next to our sleeping bags.  Then we spent a bit of time wrassling with the camera–it’s been saying “battery depleted” when the batteries are new.  We keep nursing it along–there are TONS of photo-ops up here!  The scenery we’ve had today is amongst the best we’ve had so far on the PCT, and we are very grateful to the Lord for helping us get this far!