Day 117

24 miles

Hiked over Knifes Edge in Goat Rocks wilderness

Where do I even start to describe today?

First, we started out our day knowing we were going to have some amazing views of Mt Rainer as we progressed through the Goat Rocks Wilderness. This wilderness area is definitely a beautiful treasure of Washington. The trail was pretty exposed as we climbed up to the ridge and this gave us some great views of Mt Adams behind us as well.

Then we sidelined past a neat waterfall and climbed up towards the Knifes Edge. At one point, I could see a part in the bushes as the trail reached the first crest of a ridge. Cheerio, Shuffles, and Pebbles were ahead of me and had stopped there. I assumed it was because there was a neat view. Unfortunately, we all found ourselves overlooking a huge plume of smoke from a wildfire a couple ridges away. This was very disheartening as it looked like the trail went in that direction. There was nothing for us to do except look at the map to confirm that we do move away from the fire, and know we were hiking towards the nearest road. It was also sad that the smoke obscured any view of Rainer.

Knifes Edge is part of a ridge line traverse which is very narrow and steep. We scrambled up to the top of it and could over look a few miles of trail that stretched along the ridge line. It was so beautiful even though the smoke from the new fire and southern fires obscured any view of Rainer. I was really looking forward to seeing Rainer because of its glaciers.

With the little bit of service on the top of knifes edge, we found out the section in Northern California is fully reopened! This was great news so we can go there and complete as many miles of the trail as possible.

Then we found out there are fires near the Canadian border and the last maybe forty miles of the trail are closed including to the monument. This was so demoralizing to find out. It felt like our goal we were hiking towards was snatched away. There is just something about a terminus monument that is sentimental and fully signals the end of a trail. I have been envisioning our moment ending at the monument for the whole trail and it is very motivating to have that kind of goal to work towards. I’m not sure what to envision or work towards now to signal the end of our journey. I highly doubt the trail near the border will open by the time we reach that area or later in the season with enough time to finish before the snow comes.

The rest of the day we hiked slow and without motivation. We were sad and even though we can go and complete the California section now, which we are grateful for, it is rough not being about to end at a monument. As far as we know, the fires aren’t threatening any homes but is just forested land.