Had a late start and slowly descended down to Cascade Locks, the lowest point on the PCT. We got a teasing view of the town 8 miles away then descended down through trees to the sound of thunder, hoping we’d make it there before the storm got us!

And 1000 miles walked!

Somehow this ended up as a 31 mile day. I think we were all below our best and feeling tired in the morning, but it was Little Red’s 50th birthday so in the German tradition she offered us lunch, so we all took a detour off trail to the Lost Lake general store for burgers, over 3 miles each way. The food was very welcome and invigorated us all, so we pushed a long way to reduce the miles we will need to do to get to Cascade Locks tomorrow.

Early in the day we saw the spectacular Ramona Falls.

Felt unwell this morning so didn’t go to ski, but did manage the buffet breakfast.

Relaxed and had a midday snooze in the tent until we set off some time after 2pm for a short walking day. We got great views of Mt Hood as we skirted round, with strongly flowing creeks and snow patches.

I wasn’t at my best today, in fact the last couple of miles to Timberline Lodge seemed eternal.

Timberline lodge is a great depression era building and a ski resort on the slopes of Mt Hood. It is a spectacular building well worth a visit in itself. Moreover there is skiing here all year round.

The buffet lunch was good and I ate way too much. We then spent the day relaxing in the lodge’s public areas, with couches and real fires. They also had good local beer…

We camped 5 minutes away in the trees on the trail so we could come and go. I went to bed with the intention of getting up early and doing some skiing, but felt ill in the night so sadly didn’t.

A long day through picturesque scenery with woods and lakes, in fact my longest day so far.

Being a weekend lots of people too – but the best by far was two couples camping and fishing by Timothy Lake who treated us to fresh fruit, trail mix and a beer! More than that we got chairs and good company. It was tempting to stay there but we wanted some more miles so we could reach Timberline Lodge tomorrow in time for the buffet lunch!

Rick kindly gave us a ride into Sisters for breakfast and then on to Redmond.

It turned out the only plausible was to get to Olallie Lake Resort was by Lyft (an Uber competitor), and more strangely it was much cheaper to get it in Redmond than Sisters, even though the route took us back through Sisters!

It was quite a long drive which 10 miles before our destination turned into a forestry department road – good job the Lyft was a large 4×4. To the drivers great credit he didn’t complain even though we could only do 15mph there onwards.

Olallie Lake Resort is a lovely place, hard to get to and with no WiFi or mobile signal, so a great place for a getaway. They have cabins to rent right on the lake. Sadly we had to get some miles in and walked for a few hours through thick forest.

The mosquitoes are just starting to get annoying….

It snowed during the night and dropped to freezing. Whilst I was fine with this some of the group expressed reservations about continuing, and I could see their point since our information was sketchy and it was still snowing, with possibly more weather coming in. Moreover we were scheduled to climb to 7000’+ so likely deeper snow.

So the collective decision was to return to the Highway and make our way to Olallie Lake, some 50 miles up the trail, where we knew for sure the conditions were acceptable to everyone.

It turned out a hitch was difficult, but after maybe an hour we struck lucky, with Ali not only picking us up but offering a night to stay! Ali and her husband Rick were incredibly kind, fed us burgers and gave us a nice place to stay in their guest cabin.

A busy day as we drove up to Bend and got a taxi to the trailhead on Highway 20 at Santium Pass.

Bend has probably the biggest concentration of craft brewers in the US, so we had a late lunch at the ‘Crux Fermentation Project’.

When we started hiking we expected snow about 10 miles in but were surprised to find it after 4 miles. With the likelihood of not finding a decent camp spot for many miles we stopped there.

We needed to get to the road pretty quickly to get back to Medford or Ashland to hire a car to flip North. So consequently we started walking at 5.30am and headed down a pleasant wooded trail.

Good time was made, and for the second part of the day we traversed lava fields, hard on the feet but interesting.

At the road we struggled for a hitch. A local tradesman passed us by and didn’t stop, but felt guilty later and turned around back to get us! Not only that he took us to all the places we needed! A star.

We booked a pickup at Medford Airport, but due to an error they didn’t have the car at all. Boomerang was insistent though and they ended up giving us a minibus instead! Loads of room.

We stayed at a motel and will head to Bend tomorrow.

Had a great breakfast at Morning Glory before getting an Uber out to the trailhead.

We started off about 11.30am for the short section to Fish Lake. North of there towards Crater Lake the snow is still annoying, and there onward practically impassable.

Easy walking, good weather and lovely views, with the bonus of ending up at Klum Landing Camp on Howard Prairie Lake – hot showers!