August 26th - Clackamas Lake to Near Rushing Water Creek

Managed to wake up before sunrise today. Were were looking forward to finally reaching Mt. Hood and getting a little closer to home.

Hiked over super easy terrain for the first half of the day. The 2nd half of the day made up for the easy 1st half though. As the trail got closer to Hood, the terrain got steeper. It was exciting to finally reach the Timberline Trail (the trail that circumnavigates Mt. Hood which I had hiked a few years ago). It was the first time on our trip that I was on trail that was familiar. We were going the opposite way though and I quickly found out why we had gone the other direction previously - the climb up to Timberline Lodge on sand was a butt kicker. We had already done 25 miles and we were hungry. But knowing food was at the end really helped.

Reached Timberline Lodge just in time for dinner. We were were bummed to not be able to get pizza, but each enjoyed a sandwich and beer and then shared a bowl of gourmet mac and cheese. It was difficult, but we managed to escape the Timberline vortex after just an hour or so and hiked another 5 miles to camp on the west side of Hood.

-Tori