PCT Day 124 – Bucket List

Windigo Road (mile 1878) to Shelter Cove Resort (mile 1906)

The crinkling hiss of sleeping pads being deflated pulls me from sleep. My body feels reluctant to return to the waking world but once I realize we’re the second to last tent left in camp I rouse myself to eat breakfast. Surprisingly I feel pretty good after our 30 mile day. Everything except my feet which feel like painful puffy loaves of bread. I was sleeping around packing things away and delaying the moment that I’ll have to put on my shoes. Eventually there is nothing to do but to walk and hope that the deep ache radiating from my toes to my heels eases. Starman on the other hand feels less enthusiasm for hiking today after our big day and we decide to take the Oregon Skyline Trail alternate into Shelter Cove which will put us closer to water all day long and shave a little distance off in the process. I don’t like the idea of cutting things short just for the sake of ease, but I also don’t like the idea of forcing unnecessary miles upon a tired hiking partner. Plus, I’m not sure a few additional miles spent hiking through dense trees and forest fire smoke is really going to make or break this hike.

And dense trees and smoke is exactly what we get. The trail is mellow and kind underfoot and we make good time below the flat white sky. Winding through a hall of mirrors where everything is trees trees trees and occasionally another hiker.

It’s mid afternoon when we pop out on the road and decide to make a go of hitching the last little bit into Shelter Cove. On average Oregon has proven to be a harder state to hitch in than California ever was. So we are completely shocked when a Mercedes Benz screeches to a stop on the shoulder and reverses back towards us. Starman and I are grinning at each other like confused children who have just been told Christmas has come early. As a rule of thumb, luxury cars don’t give rides to hitchhikers. They’re far more likely to give you the shrug of rejection that says “I would give you a ride, but I’m too rich and you’re too dirty.” Getting a ride in a luxury car is a unicorn, one which I never thought I’d see on this trip. But even I can be proven wrong.

Our driver is a Saudi Arabian woman named Ava who peels out into traffic before I can even get my seatbelt on. She tells us in accented English that once she saw that I was a woman, she had to stop—that women need to look out for each other. “Men” she says “they can manage just fine on their own. They have been given enough handouts just by the virtue of their gender. But women, we need to look out for one another.” In our short ride Ava tells us she has just moved to Oregon three months ago. That she’s here to get off the track that was laid out for her back home. “We’re alike in that way” she tells me “you and I. We saw what was the norm, what was expected of us and decided to do something else. Something that feeds your soul.” Her smile is contagious, splitting her warm face and crinkling her eyes. Her short dark hair is run through with copper highlights and billows in the wind from the open window.

When we arrive at Shelter Cove she uncoils her long limbs from the car, bare legs under tan shorts, long slender arms coming from a flowing white tank top. Starman and I hop from the car and Ava joins us, walking to the edge of the water to take a picture of her new home state.