Day 133 (1 October)

Miles 2515.7 to 2540.6. Pumice Creek camp to Suiattle River camp.

The night was rough, it was cold and was raining hard for a couple of hours. When we get up the rain has almost stopped but we refuse to get out of our dry spot. So we decide to have breakfast in the tent and stay until 8.30am when we feel that we really have to move if we want to make our goal and camp at Suiattle River, which is about 25 miles from where we start today.

The day is absolutely miserable. It is raining nonstop. And the trail here in this section is in a very bad condition. There are tons of big logs all over the trail, practically none are cut in half to pass, some times the trail is more like a creek or completely overgrown. At noon we pass a collapsed bridge over milky water. And yes, it is still raining. So we decide to not have any breaks and not do lunch today to make it into our tent as early as possible.

After a big decent we cross another milky river (glacier water) and meet Poodlebee again. He tells us he wants to sleep at the large Suattle River as well and then hikes on ahead of us. From here it is again all the way up up for another 3 hours only to descend on the other side once more.


At about 6 pm it starts to get darker but we still have to do about 4 miles. We pass a campsite where we see a group of hikers having a campfire and spot Andrea, whom we have last seen in Kennedy Meadows at the end of the desert. We quickly say hi and then continue our hike. After about 40 more minutes we find ourselves in a very thick rainforest. And in only a couple of minutes later it is completely dark and we have to use our headlamps. Unfortunately my batteries are empty and Maya‘s lamp has full batteries but is not working properly anymore. So we have to change the batteries in the dark from her lamp to mine. After some attempts it works and we now have one working lamp. It is now only one mile further according to Guthooks. And soon we make it to this very broad bridge across the thundering Suiattle River and desperately try to find the campsite. There, on the other side we see a light. We quickly pass the bridge and see that only one tent fits there. So we have to go a little bit further up parallel to the river and spot another light. This must be Poodlebee down there, we both think and find our way down to him. And yes, it is him. He is already in his tent, successfully avoiding the now really heavy rain.

There is only one more spot, but that‘s all we need. We pitch the tent in the opposite order than usual. We start with the rain fly first and then with the inner tent, so the inner side of the tent doesn't get as wet. What a miserable day this was.

On days like this you really start to question yourself what you're still doing out here. We could already be hanging out at a hot and tropical Colombian beach soaking up the sun rather than hiking in this. But it's all part of the game. And it's now only 110 miles more!


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