Upon reaching a peak somewhere in the North Cascades, Harvey Manning hastily scrawled “Tomorrow the Pacific Ocean!” in the log book. This phrase served as the catalyst for the creation of the Pacific Northwest Trail. It was 1970 when Ron Strickland, the trail’s “creator,” read that phrase. By then, all the infrastructure already existed to make such a trail a reality. The land access provisions would be another story.
Short updates
• I am now at the Pacific Ocean!
• Over the next few days I’ll be winding my way around Fidalgo and Whinbley islands on my way to the Olympic Peninsula and Olympic National Park
• So much rain in my future
• Another couple hundred miles of road walking left
Long updates
The Pacific Crest Trail is one of the more underrated pieces of human-made infrastructure in the American West. It travels for almost 2700 miles across several mountain ranges, and was created by blasting and digging hard rock by hand. The millions of human hours needed to first create the trail is rivaled by the countless hours spent maintaining it. Annual work ensures that its gentle grade continues to contour back and forth around peaks and over passes, suitable for long distance horseback riding. The high-lying, cleanly cut contour of the PCT makes it unique. You can see the trail cut miles ahead of you as it lazily winds its way through valleys and crests peaks.
Frosty Pass was the only thing left standing between the PNT and the glorious, easy-going pleasantness of the PCT. I had to fight through an endless barrage of burned, fallen-down trees stacked on top of each other like toothpicks. I struggled to gain the top of a poorly cut, and poorly maintained, switchback leading to the pass. But finally, my path connected.
I spent the next 70 miles hiking down beautifully cut trail through even more beautifully situated mountains. The glaciated peaks of the Cascades towered above me — they’re spectacular giants. Leaving Mazama, the weather also turned sunny and my feet remained dry (for an entire week).
Eventually, I had to leave the PCT and continue through North Cascade and over the similarly named pass. Cascade Pass is one of the most sought after outdoor areas in Washington; Seattle is home to outdoor enthusiasts that are *very* excited to camp around glaciers. It was bedlam. I eventually made it over the pass and out of the park, where I could return to walking road.
Dozens of paved highway miles brought me to Concrete, a town that once created absurd quantities of cement to somehow satisfy the Grand Coulee Dam’s insatiable appetite. The infrastructure built from Concrete’s economic output may last for a thousand years, but like trees on the surrounding hills, Concrete’s economy has fallen. For Concrete, their ability to exert dominance over nature now primarily takes the form of herbicide applications in an effort to prevent blackberry thickets from consuming the town. A once-mighty cement plant exists only as a ruin on the edge of main street.
The hard-paved walking surfaces full of 55-mile-per-hour steel beasts soon mellowed to gravel. For the next 100 miles, logging roads were the trail. The PNT works its way across hillsides that have been recently, and not-so-recently, clearcut. Fireweed, blackberry, and invasive grasses spring up everywhere, taking advantage of the now-treeless landscape.
In many spots, logging slash has eliminated the trail. The slash forced me to climb over large piles of debris and to cling to small-diameter residues to heave myself up embankments. Slash has been piled and pushed down hillsides, waiting to be further carried away by the next large storm. Scattered among the recent signs of logging are truly ancient stumps and cratered earth, the ghosts of immense creatures once felled to serve, optimistically, as concrete forms for behemoth water projects that may prove less ephemeral. The sound of constant cutting is carried across the hills by the wind.
At the top of ridges, the anthropocene stretches before you. Hills wear fashionable buzz cuts and treeless transects continue to the horizon. All with the backdrop of glaciated cascade peaks.
The trail works its way into secondary (or likely tertiary) growth “forests.” Really, these are monoculture tree farms, the echos of more complex ecosystems. The stumps from giant Douglas Firs are visible. Each old-growth stump could easily hold a dozen of the current trees that are no more than 1-foot in diameter (maybe 60 years old), packed densely into this corporate-created space. Even the hiker comments have changed their tune, “better hike this lovely section of trail while you can. There’s a notice posted about logging it soon.”
Over the next several days, I’ll be working my way through harbor towns on my way to the Olympic Peninsula. These are towns that originally grew to support the logging and fishing industries in the area, and are starting to experiment with new identities. As I head toward the coast, I’ll track the tides. Beaches that may otherwise be good for hiking become inaccessible during high tide, forcing me back into town and on to dutifully paved roads.
The road goes ever on and on,
Jeff