Today was a fairly uneventful hike. It was hard to get up for some reason – our bags were especially comfortable in the cool morning. Finally we got ourselves in gear and headed out. We passed the Pit Dam at the end of Lake Britton and walked across the top of its spillway. A diversion tube to one side was spewing out a massive volume of water.

After crossing over we climbed steeply for a bit before leveling out. After a few miles we reached Rock Creek, where we cooled off and did our laundry. The creek had an awesome swimming hole, but it looked like a death trap to get down to it. The water was too cold for our tastes anyhow. This marked the start of an 8 mile climb that took us up through the forest over occasionally overgrown trail. Hikers joke that section O (which we started at Burney Falls) stands for overgrown, since this part sees less trail maintenance than others.

We fought through the brush and dodged poison oak until we reached Peavine Creek and had lunch with a few other hikers. The rest of the day went in a similar vein, but with less climbing. The trail condition got worse – more overgrown and rocky (a tough combination) and washed out in places so that a big channel full of stones ran down the center of it. Combined with the heat and a few open burned sections it made for a rough hike. We stopped after a few miles to load up with water and then continued on until dark before we made camp. This stretch isn’t as dry as the rim we came over, but it does have limited water sources. We camped up on a rise with a lovely view of the fading sunset. They have been especially colorful lately, probably due to fires and the haze in the air.

– Posted from the PCT

Location:Pct mile 1447