Shasta Bally Backpacking, Day 2

Up with the sun at 5:30am, Matt went to get our bear barrel and cook breakfast. Minutes later, he was back in the tent and we were both asleep. By 9am, finally warmer and the wind had subsided, we decided it was probably time to get up.


By 11am, we finally broke camp, really late by our usual standards. My stiff legs ached with every upward stride. We stopped for a snack at that same beautiful overlook area.

When Matt put his pack back on, one of his outer straps had come loose. At my eye level, I tugged on the loose cord. There wasn't much slack, so I had little to grab hold of and had to pull swiftly. One brute tug later, I lost my grip and smacked myself, closed-fisted, square between the eyes. The world went black for a moment and I nearly fell over. Doubled over, hands on my face, I checked for blood, certain that I had broken my nose. Nothing. Well that was a relief. My nose quickly swelled up and caused a headache. I'm glad I had packed ibuprofen, because it hurt a LOT.

About an hour later, and up another 1,500ft., we hit our first patch of snow. The snow was packed, but the sun melted a glossy, slippery layer on top. It was difficult to navigate and stay upright with the heavy pack. I much prefer deep snow. We chose to hide our packs in nearby bushes and summit with just the essentials.



The climb to the top was all snow-field and difficult to follow with all the Moto-Neige tracks stopping and turning around. The driver had clearly gotten lost several times before making it to the top. He never did find the road. This was our first backpack trip with cell phone coverage. We sent a text message to my sister, via Tracfone : Hey I'm writing you from a mountain top!" We could see in every direction. Storm clouds brewed in the west and sunny Redding in the east. Sailboats meandered around Whiskeytown Lake, seemingly unaware of the approaching storm.

My favorite part of the day was our descent through the snow : a glissade in rain pants. It took us 1/4 the time to go down. In our Alaska backpacking experience, we pretty much had mastered the different types of terrain (muskeg being my least favorite---ugh!). The sandstone? mountains here rendered our skills useless. The only one we did use was the rain pants slide. :) It was so much fun!!!!






Hail pelted us just after we were reunited with our backpacks. I was glad to have my rain coat for that part. We saw the clouds darken and lower. If this were Oklahoma, that lowering cloud and nearby scud clouds would indicate a tornado was brewing. The panoramic views of the storm passing just to our north was like watching a movie plot unfold. Matt told me later that he hoped for a tornado, just to see one form in real-time, from a safe distance.


We had significantly under-estimated our fitness when we reached the previous night's camping site, just two miles from the car. Usually we are SLOW, and expected to be slower with the run beforehand. YAY MARATHON TRAINING! Between that and the Six Week Six Pack and 30-Day Shred, the backpack didn't produce any really sore spots. Typically, I'd fall asleep with a sore back, but I just awoke with a somewhat stiff one. The stiffness quickly went away too. We decided to stop and camp for the night before deciding what we'd do for the rest of the weekend.


Drying the rain gear on nearby downed trees, we enjoyed some quiet rest-time in the sunshine before it got dark.