Day 106
Seiad Valley (mile 1653) to mile 1672 , 19 miles
Cost: camped, free
Everyone at the campsite slept in… obviously trying to put off the massive 5,000 foot climb up out of Seiad Valley that was waiting for us.

I was up and packed by 7am and still no-one else had stirred! Breakfast started at 7am at the cafe so I decided it would be a good idea to eat something other than just a granola bar dipped in peanut butter. Dundee and KC came and met me in the cafe and we all had a huge breakfast.

We then decided we needed to let the huge breakfast digest so we went back to the RV camp and sat down… Until 11:30am! Again, not my smartest move on this very very hot day! Note to self, try to leave before the hottest part of the day when climbing 5,000 feet over 8 miles!

There was one mile of road walking to get to the trail and we were hot and sweaty just doing this!

Both sides of the trail was full of poison oak and I thought for sure that today I was going to end up covered in it, I don’t know how long it takes to react but I really hope I’m going to be ok.

Climbing up… looking back down on Seiad Valley

It was steep and very hot so we stopped every few miles in a shady spot and let our bodies cool down.

Each water source we came to was a trickle (just as the water report said) but today of all days it would have been nice to find some fast flowing streams that we could jump into!

We had beautiful views of Mt Shasta and a gorgeous sunset and found a terrific camp site on a saddle just before it got dark.

Mt Shasta in the distance

It was freezing cold when we sat down in the dark to eat dinner so we both cooked a big hot soupy dinner (ramen), then KC surprised me with 2 beers that she had carried out of town with her 🙂