We've just set camp. I am utterly and completely spent. My feet are wasted, hot, near blistering. I feel lousy. The new shoes are not working out. I've been popping Ibuprofin throughout the day, and the minor discomfort seems to subside here and there, but tonight it just exploded. I don't know what I'll do. Send these ones home? But where to buy new ones now? It is a headache to think about. Do we have to do less miles? We are consistently putting in 30s. Are there shoes out there which can handle such a beating?
Shasta dominated our views today. We've been circling the huge 14000+ ft mountain (it's just barely shorter than Rainier) for over a week now, closing in on the steep glaciated slopes from the north, the west and now the south.
We swam in beautiful Deadfall Lake this afternoon and had a leisurely lunch by the water's edge. These times are the best there are, just lying around, taking in the nooks and crannies up on the cliffs surrounding. Patches of snow still remain of some of the highest, north facing faces. It is hard to believe that just two months ago, this whole landscape was buried, completely and interminably covered with white. The trees, Western Red Firs and Hemlocks, are gnarled and twisted, like the Junipers and Foxtail Pines living at the higher elevations in the Sierra and the various firs we have seen in Washington, where the weather can be so brutal for so much of the year. I recall June when nobody knew where to go or what to do -- before the Sierras realy showed any signs of melting -- people were flipping up to Ashland and coming south, or up to Sierra City and heading north and just hitting a wall of fifteen feet snow drifts and precipitous, steep, avalanche-prone rock faces through this whole section.
It is glorious to be living here, passing up and over such tremendous creations of time and energy. I just hope my feet can keep on keepin' me on . . .
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