Sol Duc to Bogachiel Day 2

We woke with the sun, munched on some breakfast and broke camp. The whole process was made easier by a piece of equipment I think is essential to an enjoyable backpacking trip, the French press travel mug. We had to back track a little down to Deer Lake again so we could make our way to the Bogachiel River Valley. We took a slight detour through the bog that feeds into Deer Lake. It was a pretty amazing sight. Due to its sub alpine location on a North facing slope the snow pack around Deer Lake persists much longer then other parts of the surrounding area. This leads to a decrease in the growing season and other biological processes. The result is that it must have taken centuries to grow this bog that was thick and deep with organic matter.

We got on the right trail, which steadily began to incline complimented with sightings of wildlife and cool lichens Pilophorus acicularis or “Devil’s Matchstick”.

(Though they look fragile they are actually quite rigid.) This was the most arduous day of hiking with a lot of up and down stretches. There was a brief yet spectacular view of Mt. Olympus, though none of the photographs could capture its splendor. At one point we descended about 1200 ft in a mile crossing the tiny percolating streams that fed into the emerging Bogachiel River. We made it to Twenty-One Mile camp (counting the miles from the end of the trail we were heading towards if that makes sense) fairly early, but tired and gross. The camp had a shelter, the operative word being HAD…

Well at least we didn’t need it, we were happy to be at a low enough elevation we could build a fire. We were in need of a refreshing bath and found quite a lovely spot to clean up.

Monika did get the joy of listening to me shriek when I plopped down in this snow fed stream to clean myself. Did I mention we could build a fire? We enjoyed another nice pot of organic mac n cheese, this time with salami, and tucked ourselves in for some much needed sleep.