We are in Oregon now... Callahans Lodge, actually... about 10 miles down the road from Ashland. The trail runs just past this wonderful place.

Of course, we didn't actually hike here. Those of you keeping up will have read the bit about the fires. To recap, we made it as far as Beldon, CA. From there, the logistics of trying to hitchhike around the numerous closed sections of the trail became daunting, to say the least.

Our choice...skip 437 miles of trail and start again near Ashland. So her we are. The trail sits just outside.

We have lived on that trail...really lived. Often it feels as though we have lived lived an entirely "other" lifetime. This trail is almost more familiar to us at the moment than our "real" lives. Yet, somehow at the moment, it almost feels like a stranger to us.

I, for one, never envisioned this scenario. I imagined how accomplished we would feel, stopping here for a well earned meal and showers after passing our halfway point miles ago, then crossing the border, having hiked the entirety of California. It was not to be.

Our hike is not about completing the PCT anymore. It just isn't.

The vision of crossing the Canadian border in epic triumph, having walked the PCT from the Mexican border, has begun to gracefully fade. The trail is still there, but the path has become much more broad. It has been transformed by fate and fire into what we are now learning to embrace...a journey of epic proportions.

We are becoming entwined with the lives and hearts of people we would not have dreamed of meeting in the routine of our busy lives. There is a freedom of thought, and of expression, and of acceptance we have rarely experienced. And this, not only from hikers, but also from others off trail. And there it is...the point at which our journey has now begun to include so much more than just walking a trail.

We will be back on the trail today...probably in a couple of hours. We are still headed for the Canadian border, but now with a much different idea of what that might mean.

Here are some photos. Stay tuned...