Day 119: Timothy Lake

August 16, Day 119: 2081.3-2083.7

Miles Hiked: 2.4

Gratitude of the Day: I’m thankful for my friend Sarah for making the long drive to Bend, picking me up off the highway, spending a short stay in Bend and then driving around the fire closure. 

Back to trail, but first to navigate around the fire closure in the Jefferson Wilderness. There’s a remote section of trail closed and there are a couple options to get around. We decided for the middle ground option and drive from Bend to Timothy Lake. This unfortunately cuts off 80 miles of trail, but the other alternatives meant either cutting more miles or having to do a lot of driving to pick up maybe 30-40 trail miles. Walking through the closure was not an option for me and I even asked the Ranger that stopped us the other day what the fine was and he said it was $5,000. So off to Timothy Lake it is. This was another reason I had Sarah bring my truck when she came to visit was to drive myself and any hikers I was with around. So Hiccups and Kitty Titty took me up on the offer and after a slow start to the day left Bend around 2pm. It was a 3 hour drive to Timothy Lake and by the time we got there and finally got our packs organized we didn’t walk away from the truck until 6pm. We all took a picture with Sarah, got a big hug and decided to just do a couple miles to the first water source. That leaves is 14.2 miles to Timberline lodge tomorrow where I’m meeting Collin and Ali to hang out and have their famous breakfast buffet the next morning. At camp tonight Kitty Titty and Hiccups taught me a card game called Golf, it’s a fun game and can’t wait to get home to play with friends. As I lay in my tent tonight a screech owl is flying around camp making a bunch of ruckus.