Day 22: Better day, desert Oasis

May 11, Day 22: Mile 286.7-307.9

Miles Hiked: 21.2

Gratitude of the Day: I’m thankful today for cool water that runs through the desert and ends the day with a soak in a back country hot spring.

I slept so good last night, I went to sleep around 8:30 and barely woke throughout the night, by the time I needed to get up to relieve myself it was 5:30am and I decided I should probably start packing up and head down the trail. At 6am I was back on trail and today started off much better than yesterday. Perhaps the good night of sleep or maybe a lighter pack with some food gone and not as much water helped the mood.  I walked the morning until the first small creek water crossing at Holcomb Creek 5.5 miles down the trail. I’d sit there drinking fresh cool stream water and eat breakfast for 30 minutes. 

Then it was off again, I’d leap frog two hikers that had hiked the Appalachian Trail together, Motorcycle Momma and Knee Deep. The rest of the trail family still hadn’t caught up. At lunch I can across an oasis I didn’t want to leave. This wonderful beach that I soaked my feet in the water and had lunch in the shade of a large creek side tree. Both Motorcycle Momma and Knee Deep joined me. Motorcycle Momma (MM) is from up state New York and works for LL Bean. Knee Deep is a retired firefighter from Illinois. I sat at the beach front oasis for an hour and 45 minutes and decided I should probably start hiking. With 12 miles already done I was aiming for another 20+ mile day to camp at a relatively known backcountry hot springs called Deep Creek Hot Springs. 

 Left the oasis at 12:45 and just down from the oasis was another milestone, mile 300.  After a couple pictures, I would hoof the 9 miles to the springs with only stopping once, not that I had much of a choice as I walked on an exposed side ridge without much shade. Once I reached the hot springs at 5pm, I stripped tou skivies and plunged right into that cool clear water!  It was wonderful!  I could feel the dirt, salt and sweat leeching off my body. The hot springs were amazing and not crowded as it was a weekday. I alternated between the cool creek water and the hot springs pools for 2 hours.  Then set up a cowboy camp just up from the springs, washed my clothes in the creek to get all the dust and sweat out, had a good dinner of couscous with spam, dried tomatoes and dehydrated veggies. To top the evening off, I’m camping creek side drinking a caramel hot chocolate with whiskey. It was a good day on the PCT today.

Meet: Erik, trail name Cool Cat.  Cool Cat lives in Beaverton, OR and at one time was an engineer at Intel. Then 5 years ago he was sick of his job and decided to move to Thailand and teach English as a second language. He did that for a year and then when Covid happened he moved back to the states and has been doing the same remotely from home. He got his trail name because he’s a cat person.