"Done" with CA! Oh, except for Tuolumne to Hwy 50 - so guess what's next...

Yep, gonna burn a bunch more gas and head south to finish up that loose end (oh, and a third attempt to finish up that little 10 mile bit of lint just north of hwy 80 Donner Pass.)

Turns out the timing will be nearly perfect to also meet up with my CNPS happy camper friends heading for Woods Lake just west of Carson Pass the weekend of July 12-13, with just enough slack time to take care of some business back in Santa Rosa, and visit with family at various points in the Bay Area, before heading to the Sierra.

This morning I sent off my bear canister filled with maybe 7 days or so of food to myself General Delivery at Tuolumne Meadows.  (I'll be picking that up after hiking from Sonora Pass north to Echo Summit at hwy 50, then bicycling down to South Lake Tahoe, catching four busses: two east through S.LkTahoe ultimately to Hwy 395, a 3rd to Lee Vining, and the fourth up to Tuolumne Meadows.  From there I'll hike 75 miles is it? back to my car at Sonora Pass.  (If this sounds familiar, it was the same plan I was going to do last year, but it was first smoked by the Hunters Fire, then at the end of the season when the YARTS bus to Tuolumne stopped running.)

So then I'll head back up here to Oregon to resume my trudge to Canada.

Also this morning still in Oregon I did a little scouting drive up Hwy 140 via Medford to Fish Lake (had a brief chat at the resort there about their PCT hiker services (cheap shower and laundry, whohoo!) and possible transit between Medford and Fish Lake (none, though I did get a phone# for a "shuttle" that runs between Medford and Klamath Falls along hwy 140 but which doesn't stop at Fish Lake. FWIW, the number is 541-883-2609 - just for my own future reference.)  

A bicycle ride down Hwy 140 to Medford is feasible (insignificant intervening climbs westward) but would be very boring.  Would still need to research bus connections from the "most-eastward" outskirts of Medford to Ashland, and then there are some expensive options or a hitch to get to Callahan's or the nearby trail at I5/Old Hwy99/Mt. Ashland.

From Fish Lake I then drove south on paved FS Road 37 past Howard Prairie Lake and Hyatt Reservoir to Hwy 66 at the Green Springs Inn (also near the PCT.)  This turns out to be a quite feasible bicycle ride, lots of mild ups and downs but no major climbs and virtually no traffic in mostly wooded but varied landscapes.  However, a bicycle ride on the steep, twisting, narrow, no-shoulder high-traffic Hwy 66 from there to Ashland would be a stressful ordeal despite it being mostly downhill.

But, there is an alternative! I can avoid having to bicycle to Ashland:  I could split the piece of PCT between I5 and Hwy 66 into a few shorter day-hike loops with the bicycle (albeit on gravel roads) and probably some out&back day-hike bits.  Divide & conquer!  So the loops from I5 to Hwy 140 would just involve my feet, my bicycle & my car (no hitches or buses.).  

The next stretch, from Hwy 140 to Crater Lake, might yet include that boring bicycle ride on 140 toward Medford, but I've yet to flesh that out.

Again, I will leave the "history" of my completed hike from Seiad to Mt Ashland to other "post-dated" posts, later.  Still need to inform my CNPS camper friends I plan to drop in on them...