Chester - midway point - Belden

Upon returning from Alex and Allison’s wedding celebration in Portland, we headed back to the trail via rental car, eventually failing a hitching effort that turned into a 1h Uber. We made it to the trail on Labor Day night, and we started hiking from a campsite. We were surprised by some trail magic as some of the campers offered us some delicious pasta and chocolates for dinner: “CAN WE FEED YOU?”.

We walked 42 miles to Chester passing through Lassen Volcanic National Park. This area was affected by the Dixie fire in 2021 but it’s been recovering ever since. We were expecting toothpick burned trees and soot everywhere but the area it’s actually covered in growing underbrush. This was the trail one morning:

In Lassen NP we were able to get some delicious food for dinner and breakfast, halfway to Chester!

Once we got to Chester, it started raining. Probably one of the last summer storms, so we decided to stay. We got a huge salad and pizza there.

It was late and most of the hotels were closed since it was a Tuesday but the night was saved by the trial angel: Tami, who had an apartment on the upper floor of her garage where she hosts hikers. She met us stay there even though she wasn’t home!

We continued our journey from Chester, back to the trail thanks to a ride by another trail Angel, Lisa. We then walked to halfway point of the PCT (1325 miles / 2120 km). We celebrated with our (unintentional) matching outfits and Fireball shots.

We proceeded our journey to Belden not meeting any more sobos but seeing lots of new names in the trail registries. We were welcomed with good food in Belden but no showers or laundry. Also a very expensive resupply but we had a box coming in the mail from Seattle 😝

And the journey continued to… Sierra city!