Day 14 - Hot Rocks! — Walking People Out of Poverty

walkingpeopleoutofpoverty.ca is the personal blog of Peter Thorpe, long-time Opportunity International Canada supporter and Walking People Out of Poverty founder. For Dan Murray’s blog and information on OIC, please click here.

Start Time: 6:30am
End Time: 6:45pm
Start Mileage: 2395.80
End Mileage: 2410.60
Distance Walked: 14.80 miles
Elevation Gain: 5092 feet

On Day 12, we endured the short walk down/up into Snoqualmie where we enjoyed a zero on the 13th. This gave us the chance to enjoy a shower to clean up and I relished washing my hair. It was also great to have a really good breakfast. Cameraman was gracious enough to buy everyone’s breakfast.

We left the Summit Inn at 6:15 am but it was 6:30 am when we reached and left the trailhead.

We had a very big day ahead with just under 3000 feet of climbing, straight off the bat, and the temperature was expected to hit 32 degrees. We started up the trail in good spirits and at the beginning the climb wasn’t too bad. After a few minutes the trail started to turn gnarly, this term means the trail becomes terribly rocky and is difficult to navigate.

Every now and again we would get a glimpse of the sun and it was climbing ever lower down the mountain. After about an hour or so a young female trail runner came up the trail and was by us, and off up the hill and gone. Every once in a while we had to stop for a water break as although the sun hadn’t entered the forest it was still warm. Eventually we reached the point of the trail I had been dreading, the infamous Kendal Katwalk.

This is about a hundred yards of trail that had been blasted out of the mountain to link the trails that came to an abrupt end at either side of the mountain. It was a sheer drop off, but fortunately the trail was a good 8-10 feet wide and so we were able to cross no problem.

Our next destination was a water source where we planned to have lunch so we pressed on and eventually reached our destination by about 11:40 am where we eagerly found the shade to sit and relax. It had taken us 4 hours and 50 minutes of hard climbing and we had ascended 2862 feet. After lunch we had another 2300 foot climb ahead of us which would take us through the afternoon and this time we would be exposed to the fierce heat that was building.

After lunch we loaded up with water as we all felt it was going to be a long afternoon. We set off and the climbing began right off the bat. We picked our way gingerly through the rocky path and it was slow going. Plus the heat was beginning to build. During the entire afternoon, there was no shade plus the rocky path we were walking on was beginning to bake, it was becoming miserable, especially as there were no water sources. I ended up putting my bandana on my head, under my cap, to stop the son burning my ears. It looked silly but it worked. The other challenge we faced was the team were beginning to stretch out and we we were losing touch with each other.

We came to a turn and knew we only had 350 yards to go. We looked up and the trail stretched up and up before angling to the right. All we could do was keep going and that’s exactly what we did. It was unbearably hot, and we believe the temperatures were in the low to mid 90’s. There was no quit in the trail but we had no choice but to push on. Once we reached the top we waited a few minutes and who should show up but John. We were going to wait for Woody and Payday but thought it would make more sense to head down to camp and get them fresh water, so down we went. It was a long tedious slog down the mountain as the trail was very rocky and so the going was slow, but we finally made it. Both Woody and Payday showed up as we were getting organized so alls well that ends well.

It had been a long, gruelling day but we had all come through it.

Now for some photos. Lots of them!