Before we had left home I'd penciled out a plan (penciled out, as in "this might be fun to accomplish, if it works out"). The plan ended at Etna Summit, the end of Section "P." Ending here would be a great start to the season; we'd have done over 128 miles on the trail, and be set up to start a four day backpack through the Marble Mountain Wilderness next time up.
After our hike to Carter Meadow Summit, we needed one more twenty mile hike today and we'd be at this goal. It looked like a relatively hard hike though, lots of up and down, south facing areas that were sure to be warm, and 19.6 miles total.
The dogs came:
We started into the uphill right away:
I'm proud of how competent a hiker Tricia's become (Katie too, but she wasn't on this trip). Here's a shot of her waaaay out ahead with the dogs (try squinting). As usual she's seemingly unconcerned that her "trip leader" and "mentor" is so far behind:
Snow patches were fun on this hike, but in two places they also provided serious and very serious difficulties:
Here's the serious difficulty (a long, tedious and challenging work-around of a several-hundred yard long, steep section of snow which covered the trail):
The very serious difficulties came near the end of the hike. There (when we were already tired) a more than quarter mile long, north-facing part of the trail was covered with really steep snow. It took a huge amount of energy to work around and over this. And the "over it" part was objectively dangerous in that in many places a slip by any of the three of us would have meant a broken leg. It was difficult enough in this last area of snow that we didn't take photos (we were all too focused to think about them). I also used the old mountaineer's trick of using a well shaped rock to cut snow steps through a bunch of the more exposed sections.
Other parts of this "south of Etna" trail had been hit hard by winter too. We had lots and lots of tree work around/overs (although where the fallen trees were just really terrible, during the last two miles, a trail crew had cleared dozens of tree-falls with what looked like an incredible amount of work):
A notably hot part of the trail led uphill above South Russian Creek:
It was in this section that we saw some of the most intriguing granite formations too in this "Russian Wilderness" that I'd never heard of. This buttress was across the creek (long, long approach though, so I'm sure it's unclimbed):
But right above the trail was "The Statue" and large formations and a huge steep slab nearby. The rock quality looked very good in this area, and a potential climber could pack in and stay at Statue Lake, a few hundred feet behind the similarly named rock formation:
Tricia's always dealt with the heat in practical ways:
Payne Lake was beautiful (one of only two lakes that the trail touches in all of Section "P"):
We gained a view of the part of Highway 3 that ascends Scott Mountain from the north (right to where we were camped):
Another "routine" (i.e. great) view over, in this case, Smith Lake:
We were tired by the time we saw the road at Etna Summit, but mightily pleased to see Vicki and the truck:
The rest of the hike was a nice downhill cruise; very satisfying. A quick drive into Etna led to a tasty and filling meal at "Dotty's" restaurant (after all, we've gotta support the local economy).
We stayed one more night at Scott Mountain before packing up in the morning for the long drive home. And, just as we were packed, three young ladies came into camp looking for help. These three were "bouncing" through-hikers in that they'd hiked from Mexico to Kennedy Meadows south, hit too much snow and were now hiking south from Ashland. Unfortunately one of the three had a very serious foot issue (I think she had a stress fracture). The last three days of hard hiking had proven to her that a mere ten days off the trail weren't enough help and she really needed to see a doctor.
We'd learned through our stay that Highway 3 has very little traffic (especially on weekdays). So we rearranged the packing, got her and her pack in with us, and made a seven hour drive into an eight hour drive by taking her straight to the E.R. in Yreka (if not us to help her then who?).
Our next trip for this summer starts with that same drive (in reverse) on July 6th. And then the 49 mile backpack in the Marble Mountains is first up. I can hardly wait.