Day 41 : Timothy Lake

Start – Timothy Lake (990 m)
Finish – Trooper Spring (1340 m)
Daily Distance – 37 km
Ascent – 1050 m
Descent – 700 m

Of all the lunch spots, on all the trails, in all the world, he walks into mine.

The long anticipated, but in the event, poorly planned, meeting of north and south has finally happened.

8 years after meeting while walking the Te Araroa trail, and then in the intervening years never quite managing to get together in person, we’re back! That it happened at a random creek in Oregon, when we live in neighbouring countries is a little ridiculous, but such is life.

Based on patchy communications and when we left previous towns we anticipated to meet at some point during these few days, but without phone reception couldn’t arrange a more precise meeting spot. The original hope was to catch up with beer and burgers, but the timings didn’t work. Scaling back expectations, river water, peanut butter wraps and string cheese had to suffice.

Lunch stops on trail don’t generally last almost 2 hours, but reminiscing about old times, like the section we spent sharing a canoe while paddling down the Whanganui river, takes time. Also sharing observations of America, trail life on the PCT, and catching up on non-walking life.

Sadly we both still had distance to cover, so couldn’t spend all day sitting around. Chris in particular has an urgent appointment with the Timberline Lodge breakfast buffet in the coming days, which requires careful scheduling.

We have a tentative plan to hike together in the Black Forest, as neither of us have ever been. Hopefully we manage to organise that in fewer than 8 years this time.