Hurricane Creek Hike

Eagle Cap Wilderness, Oregon

After updating on internet, I drove around Joseph, OR and explored Wallowa Lake yesterday evening.  The lake's most picturesque, but slightly over populated around the Wallowa Lake Lodge.  With my stomach begging for some type of input, I turned the Wagon away from town and social interaction and prepared to settle into wilderness campsite cuisine.

Despite nature's best efforts, I managed to get a pretty respectable fire rolling last night at the campsite.  Trying to multitask between cooking Cincinnati Chili and starting the fire, however, caused the dinner to be slightly overcooked but my near starvation state looked beyond that and it was a wholesome meal.  Granted, the rain did return for a few minutes, soaking the open supply & food boxes, but the inferno was large enough to laugh away the droplets.

Around midnight, something tame when bump-in-the-night and woke me from my slumber with little startle.   Taking advantage of being awake, I opted for a short nature break.  The sky had cleared up since the earlier showers and I took in the richest display of stars I've ever seen.  Being a few hundred miles from anything larger than a village has its perks and the lack of light pollution was evident.

This morning, the sky was overcast as I froze cooking a delightful breakfast of oats, cereal (avec lait sans l'eau), and a banana.   After breakfast, I walked to the Hurricane Creek trailhead to do some recon on if I should hike today or travel northward.  Meeting a nice man (who may have had a titanium left leg-I wasn't quite sure but his ankles were skinny enough to make my biceps look massive) at the trailhead, I asked how the hiking was.  He said it was spectacular, so I returned to the tent to load the pack for an adventure.

Per usual, I took out with an overloaded pack and just about no idea where I was going.  Not wanting to get lost, I set the ultimatum to turn back after three hours regardless of where I was.  The hike up the valley was scenic and not remotely difficult.  The path followed Hurricane Creek, occasionally touching its waters before climbing a few hundred feet above it.  If I wasn't taking a rest week to put off being overtrained, the trail would have been a perfect running route.  At the first stream crossing, I just about fell off the slick fallen tree I was using as my bridge.  Further up the trail, I met an odd area where all the trees in the valley had fallen down facing north.  Must have something to do with aliens.

Coming to a stream that was about 6" too wide for me to jump, I decided to end my forward progress and turned uphill, scrambling up some knife-sharp scree to check the view while putting myself at times in considerable danger.  Obviously, I exaggerate and survived just fine.

Back at the trail proper, I started walking out as I had hit my 3-hour time limit.  The sky had started to clear and the surrounding peaks began to show themselves for the first time of the hike.  A half-mile from the trailhead, I talked for a few moments with a nice older woman wearing a neck pillow and thought I was from Bend when I told her I was from Maine.  Apparently, I slur my speech.

Now, I find myself at Mad Mary's, the same diner as last night with free internet and fine coffee.  An overly intelligent obese tourist just commented it was snowing when the rain drops outside took the size of robin's eggs.  Stunning.

Later this evening I'll be starting another fire, assuming my wood isn't soaked (which it probably is), then I'll be calling it early for tomorrow's early escape to Hell's Canyon a few hours up the forest service roads.  The Wagon will make it just fine.  

No worries here.

Wagon Miles:  300,887 start to 300,895