PCT day 85 - mile 1898 to mile 1921

Today I went down to Shelter Cove Resort to resupply and get a shower (2$ for 3 minutes! haha).

I woke up to a quite spectacular sunrise, the sun was bouncing of surrounding snow with a reddish hue, giving the landscape a warm and calm atmosphere. The descent to the valley was quite difficult for the first couple of miles as the footprints in the snow has largely melted in the sun yesterday, so I spent a lot of time watching GPS app and scratching my head but eventually the trail returned to it's good old dusty self and I could pick up the tempo again.

Few miles before the resort I have encountered black bear number six, this one following most of it's predecessors commenced escaping procedure at my first glance, but at least I managed to see his whole posture before it dissapeared into the woods. It also coincided with the mosquito levels dropping down to acceptable levels (I saw the last bear just before the 'mosquito hell' at Fish Lake Resort) it looks like bears are not fond of the bloodsuckers as well.

I arrived at the Shelter Cove Resort few minutes past 9am just in time for the store opening. The owners set up a special PCT tent by the lake (which I just realized I forgot to take a picture of) with benches and tables, power outlets and a microwave. And have I mentioned 3 minutes of shower time for 2$? Unfortunately the restaurant was closed, the chef has quit few weeks ago and the replacement cook they employed last week managed to cut himself on the job already, so sadly there was only microwave to help us prepare some food. The shop itself was poorly stocked and overpriced so I just bought few snacks and something to nibble on while I was recharging the phone. I took the three minutes shower for two bucks and actually managed to do it in that time! Trail efficiency at its finest.

There was couple of people seated at the PCT tent when I arrived, mostly section hikers but also Quicksilver whom I was meeting on the trail for the last couple of days, he had a great contraption which allowed transferring gas from one gas canister to the other by joining them (the one you wanted to transfer gas into had to be cold and the one you want to drain gas from hot, physics!) he helped me to top up my canister using one of the ones left in the hiker box (I also picked up some couscous and a fancy Patagonia dehydrated bean meal from there). I spent just over two hours in the resort chatting and sorting out my backpack and headed back to the trail around midday.

Rest of the path was fairly snow free with many small lakes scattered along the way which also provided us with the only water source for the next 50 miles - it tasted good though, no fishy at all. I finished hiking earlier and set up the camp on top of the hill overlooking one of the lakes. It's been a good, not too challenging day, next stop is the town called Sisters or the town called Bend just behind it, I should get there day after tomorrow, until then it's just me, snow, lakes and my heavenly guardian mosquito friends.

Shelter Cove Resort:
The lake had enormous fish, I think this was some kind of trout:

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