Wonderland Day 12 Last Day!

Today is our last day.  I'm sad but I would like a hot shower and a hamburger.  We have 10 miles to finish back at Mowich Lake where we started 12 days ago.  It feels weird that we just walked all the way around Mt. Rainier.  I feel the best I've ever felt on a backpack.  In fact, I can say that I feel fabulous.

 

We crossed many rivers that washed the trail out during mudslides or flooding and we followed cairns like this to find the path through to the other side. 

 

After a decently easy 7 miles, we had a 3 mile ascent to climb up to Mowich Lake and finish.  I kept thinking I could see the top but then it would be a false top and the trail would loop around to an even higher point.  It was a 2300 foot climb out of there. 

 

I started chanting Hamburger, Shower, Hamburger, Shower on our way up and out. 

 

I prayed out loud too since I was way out front and hiking by myself.  I was just filled with gratitude that I could physically handle the 100 mile load and thankful to my family for putting up with these hiking shenanigans.  My heart is full.

 

What's this?!!!  .2 to Mowich Lake!  Then we got swarmed by day hikers.  Little spandex clad gals and cologne coiffed dudes sped by us.  I felt totally violated.  We continued our slow plod up that last .2 of a mile and then we crested and emerged into Mowich.  I was overwhelmed with emotion.

Ranger Andy greeted me and asked "How many days?"  I couldn't answer right away.  I leaned over my trekking poles and hiccuped a few sobs.  Then I straightened up and said 12 days.  He clapped and yelled CONGRATULATIONS!  Then Nancy and Ingrid emerged from the trail and we screamed and hugged and cried.  And then, if you can believe it, Ranger Andy asked to see our permit.  HaaaHaaaaHaaaa! 

 

I was able to eek out one more picture from my phone before it gave up the ghost.  The mandatory hamburger at the end of a long hike! Or a bacon cheeseburger in this case.

 

Here's our start and finish pictures. Interesting to see the little differences.  Don't we look awesome after walking 100 miles?

 

 

 

I'm always sad when a trip and a blog report come to a close.  I can really feel a little depressed now which is why it's so important to have something else on the horizon.........................

Wonderland Day 11

I didn't take many pictures today since I have to restart my phone every single time I take a picture plus it was a short day. 5 miles from North Puyallup to Golden Lakes.  It looks like the rain may be tapering off today, thank God.  Since we have a short day, we lay in our sleeping bags for quite awhile because it's so cold and everything is sopping wet. Once we finally start moving around, we start packing up in short bursts and then go back into our sleeping bags to warm up.  LOL. 

When it's time to put wet socks and boots on, it take a few deep breaths to mentally prepare that initial shock of cold, wet socks and then sliding feet into squishy wet boots.  UGH.  We finally start walking around 11am. 

We saw lots of mushrooms today.

 

I decided I better do some Big Foot calling and knocking while I'm out here since this is prime Sasquatch territory!  I let off a couple of Whoops and listen to see if I get a response.  Nothing.  I do some knocking on a tree with my trekking poles.  Listen......nothing.  Big Foot is smart enough not to be out here in the crappy weather.  Keep it Squatchy!  Bobo would be proud.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnAQkL-1HgQ

Golden Lakes Patrol Cabin

 

We are climbing up as usual and I have my head down plugging away.  I look up and see a man standing on the side of the trail with giant hedge trimmers in his hand.  He is staring at me and doesn't say anything so I feel a little creeped out.  When I get paralell to him, he says "Hi, where you headed?" I hesitate because I don't want him to know where I'm staying the night!  But I go ahead and say "Golden Lakes."  He nods and then says "Can I see your permit?"  It dawns on me then as the National Park patch on his sweater comes into focus, that he is a ranger.  Oy!  Ingrid is the keeper of the permit and we wait for her to ramble up and then dig it out of her pack.  We exchange awkward chitchat with this guy and then continue on.  He was a little weird.  First ranger we have seen in 11 days.

This is what a few days of rain and not brushing my hair looks like.  Maybe there's a chance I actually scared Big Foot away?

It's raining and I'm looking at Ingrid from the vestibule of my tent.  I have just finished drinking some miso soup to warm up the old bones.  Having taken stock of my remaining food stores, I will have just 3 peanut butter and 2 coconut butter packets remaining out of 18 pounds of food.  I say I have my food dialed right in.  I got a lot of comments about how much food I had and I have essentially eaten it all. I have eaten lower carb on this hike than usual and I have had way more energy than usual.  My food throughout the day has been relatively lower carb except for dinner which were mostly the carb heavy Mountain House meals.  I have increased my protein and fat intake as well.  I'm eating about 2500 calories a day.  At home I "attempt" to eat less than 50 net carbs per day but out here it's around 150.  Like I said before, all I need to do to have normal sugar numbers is do extreme exercise 8 hours a day.  Obviously, that's not gonna happen.  I've pasted my food list at the bottom if you are interested.  Edited to say: I weighed myself this morning, 2 weeks post hike, and I weigh the exact same as when I started the hike.  This tidbit also tells me that my food is spot on.

 

Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner	Snacks
NA	NA	Chicken & Rice	Quest bars, Epic bars, Hidden Valley Protein Bars, zuchinni, strawberries, nuts, dark chocolate, coconut butter, protein powder
Eggs	Tuna/Parmasan chips	Lasagna
Protein	Burrito	Teriyaki Chicken
Eggs	Tuna/Parmasan chips	Beef Stew
Quinoa	Chix salad (Packit)	Beef Stroganoff
Eggs	Tuna/Parmasan chips	Chicken & Noodles
Protein	Peanut butter/Flax crackers	Beef Stew
Quinoa	Peanut butter/Flax crackers	Beef Stroganoff
Eggs	Tuna/Parmasan chips	Spag squash
Protein	Burrito	Spag squash
Quinoa	Chix salad (Packit)	Lasagna
Eggs	Peanut butter/Flax crackers	Teriyaki Chicken
Eggs	Peanut butter/Flax crackers	Beef Stroganoff
Quinoa	Tuna/Flax crackers	Chicken & Noodles

Wonderland Day 10

Have I mentioned that it's raining?  Everything is wet and nothing dries because it's 45 degrees and raining.  All of my socks are wet.  My underwear is wet.  Everything is muddy.  I have no dry socks to wear at night so I use my Crazy  Compression sleeves as pseudo socks.  Pull them down over my feet; the toes are still open but it affords me some warmth.  #crazycompressionambassador #crazyclan

I am reminded why I don't live here anymore.

Today is our longest day at 13.5 miles from Devil's Dream to North Puyallup.  Everytime we mentioned to someone that we were doing Devil's Dream to North Puyallup, they made a facial grimace and visibly cringed.  So we thought it might be hard.  We got going an hour earlier than usual (7am).  I expected a 12 hour hiking day.  But since it was cold and raining, we really didn't stop much for breaks and were finished in about 9 hours.  We tried to take a lunch break at one point.  We sat in a tight little row on Nancy's zpad under a few trees, trying to get a little out of the rain.  Hunched over our spam, tuna, and payday bar, respectively. Absolutely effing miserable.  I thought about laying on my mom's couch and eating her home cooking in front of the wood stove. 

We also had to cross the Tahoma Suspension Bridge today.  It was really high and there were boards missing!  WHAT!  Seriously.  I get halfway across the bridge and have to take these giant steps over missing boards with the bridge swaying and slick in the rain.  So unbelievable.  I almost crapped my pants. I didn't video that one because I was too flustered.

My phone issues have progressed to having to reboot every time I take a picture.  I hope it lasts 2 more days!  My glucose meter is non-functional at this point as well.  They are very sensitive to cold and wet weather. 

My feet look like prunes.  I hope I don't get athlete's foot.
 

Tahoma Suspension Bridge

 

Smiling in the rain. But since my underwear is wet, I'm just putting on a fake smile for you.

 

A brief peek at Mt Rainier

Attempting to dry out the tents in the 10 seconds of sunshine.