It's raining...continuously...since yesterday evening. Clouds are hanging low and heavy over steep slopes of spruce and fir. It is chilly...every inch of earth, leaf and bark is wet and dripping. We are warm, dry and well fed.

I am writing this post from the beautiful art studio of our host...I'll let Shiny tell the rest of the story...

Sunday, August 3

Totally unlooked for, out of the blue, but when we most needed it...

Actually, hiking had been going along quite well. We were feeling great and our pace had been increasing without effort, in fact, we were feeing stronger than we had the whole trip. Then, yesterday afternoon, Gregg's energy just tanked and he felt his throat get sore. We were 36 miles from Beldon, our next resupply with some fairly big climbs in between us and our destination. We decided to finish our our planned day of 25 miles, and the see how far we could get the next day before low energy turned into a full blown cold. Our hope was to get to Beldon first and find a place to rest. Then, to make matters worse, the following morning, I fell and smacked my knee pretty hard, making steep descents, such as the 6 mile one that was coming up much harder.

Grim, right?! Well, as we plodded along the following day we met three wonderful ladies from Quincy; Shelly, Mary and Janet, three friends who were out for a day hike. As we chatted, they offered to cook dinner for us and give us a place to stay the night. We were absolutely blown away! They even let me do our laundry!! What a huge blessing.

They gave me vitamins and other remedies for my impending cold, and put me to bed.

That night they cooked a feast for us...Talapia fish tacos, home made spring rolls and a salad with veggies from Janet's garden and hard boiled eggs courtesy of her chickens. After dinner we lingered over wine and talked of life, politics, hiking and many other things.

Thank you Janet, Shelly and Mary.