I had low expectations for Trout Lake. A tiny town next to trail with only a diner, a taco truck and a small general store? That usually meant mediocre food, bad resupply and everything taking an eternity. I braced myself for a long hitch and even longer chores once in town.
I was wrong on all accounts, except the diner. The people of Trout Lake had set up a shuttle service that ran every couple of hours to get hikers as efficiently as possible in and out of town. Once there, we were ushered to the general store (which had superb resupply options), a big charging station, a lawn where hikers could hang out, laundry (that was donation-based) and soap and towels for the showers. I was in awe how smooth everything ran, especially considering the large blobs of hikers that poured into town with every shuttle.
The local taco truck was the place to be for lunch and Half and Half and I decided to get there before opening time at 11am and start the inevitable queue. Only one person, Sporkless, was already there. Slowly, other hikers started to pile on. At 11, nothing happened and the truck didn’t open. At 5 past 11, someone in the crowd went ‘This would never happen in Germany.’ Of course. Not much after, the windows of the taco truck swung open and Half and Half and me placed our order, mine for the supposed hiker favourite, the ‘Wet Burrito’, an ill-chosen name if you ask me.
I’m slowly warming to the new bubble of mostly new people around us. There’s Butterfingers, a hilarious guy from Texas, I really like him. He had a story about someone from the start of the trail who only carried out vegetables to eat. After a couple days, around Julian, he got terrible stomach cramps that didn’t go away. His solution? To only pack out meats and cheese for the next section.
Then there’s Crocs, handing out slices of watermelon that a friend brought her. Tripadvisor and Cinderella, the most wholesome couple I’ve seen in a while. Bilbo’s group of speedy boys, who we will most certainly lose one of these days, as they’re way too fast. Birthday Boy, my lookalike according to my friends, most likely due to his orange hoodie and similar beard. Beast, who is much nicer than her trail name suggests. Da Vinci, sending boxes from Trout Lake to every stop in Washington, once he discovered resupply wasn’t going to be great everywhere.
Finally, there is an interesting mix of people I knew from before. The biggest surprise was Smiley (the American one, not the German) and Puppy, a couple I met in Lake Morena on day two and subsequently never saw again. Princess and Pebbles I hadn’t seen since Cajon Pass either. Squirrel Daddy and Boots, back to hiking together. And as we were leaving, Galileo and Singsong got out of the arriving shuttle.
Mash and me got in one of the trucks driving back to trail, with Squirrel Daddy and Boots in the back. Our driver, MJ, joked she would hit every bump in the road. It turned out, she wasn’t joking. Almost giddy with excitement, she tried to hit every bump as much as possible, making those in the back jump up.
Soon after getting back on trail, I bumped into Solemate. With her around us, the old gang is back together! She seemed pretty down though, the Washington heat was probably getting to her too.
The tree cover thinned out into a burn area and further into more meadows with sparse trees than the dense forest from the past 2 days. In the distance, we got a spectacular view of Mt Adams. This was the Washington I imagined!
We camped next to the mountain and watched one of the best sunsets on trail. This was amazing. I felt the excitement for the trail and everything around it soaring in me. Tonight was also the night a big solar storm was going to hit earth and we would be able to see the northern lights all the way down here. So I told everyone at the camp site they should get up at 10pm to see.
At 10pm I myself got up and heard several tent zippers open. Of course there was absolutely no northern light to be seen. The stars however, shone all the brighter, the white sheen of the Milky Way visible in the sky, so I didn’t feel too sore.