(this is a "stub" - will flesh out later)
I did manage to tear myself from the Camera issue soon enough to get the car and bike and me to the Placid Lake trailhead to overnight then after a slow sstart next morning getting packed, bicycle down to the PCT crossing on the west end of the short connector road to Panther Creek CG.
The first 3 miles of that ride was on gravel, and it turned out to be an unexpected challenge made worse due to my late morning start, because that morning workers had applied a thick layer of fresh gravel to the surface. At first I had about two feet of un-re-surfaced road on one edge, but then I encountered the grader who was completing the grading operation, and the last half of the gravel section I was just barely managing to keep my balance skidding all over the 2in deep loose gravel. Fortunately, no flats, and the balance of the 30 miles was on almost flawless pavement. There was one substantial uphill over Oldman Pass (which has a number of Snow-Park turnouts.) Virtually no cars made it a pleasant roll.
At the PCT crossing, I traded my bike for the hiking poles I had left there the night before along with some water, so I could have a lighter ride. Hiking, I discovered that my right shin (that I had banged on a low bench in a Papa Murphy's I had entered just to "look around" - I'll have to add the details of that mishap...) had swollen up and felt like a sprained ankle. Uphill this wasn't much of a hindrance, but downhill it was very painful walking. It put a bit of a damper on my mood, adding to the bummer of only having my Nexus One phone camera along. (I had just reviewed the photos taken with that phone from my last hike, the traverse around the west half of Mt Hood, with views that were certainly worthy a better camera. Still, I went through the motions of capturing images of some nice views south of Mt Hood, east of Mt Adams, and west of Mt St Helens, all within a few steps of each other, though not all in a single panorama. Lots of berries as well, blueberries, huckleberries, salmonberries, thimbleberries ripe and plentiful.
Got to the Placid Lake spur trail late afternoon, and pushed to get back to the car that day. I wasn't sure if I would be camping again at the trailhead or driving off that evening to fetch the bike, and check my email to learn whether my camera was repaired and "in the mail" as I hoped, on not. Decided to go for the news, fetched the bike, checked my mail - no news. Left him a note guessing the news would be bad, asking for specifics. Drove on early evening to the NE slopes of Mt Hood SW of Hood River, to scout out the bicycle ride I would be doing next.
Spent Thursday establishing the status of the camera and in response shopping for another Point and shoot camera. Walmart had a $99 Nikon L32 that uses AA batteries. It will do, and could still return it within 15 days.
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