Date: July 10, 2017
Miles: 1588.3 – 1597.3
From our camp in the Russian Wilderness, we had a sunny nine mile morning walk to a highway that led in to our next resupply stop, the small town of Etna.
When we reached the roadway, a trail angel named Lionheart happened to be pulling up to drop off a truckload of hikers at the trailhead. I recognized her since we both follow each other on Instagram…it was great to meet her in person! She let us cram a bunch more into the bed of her truck and she drove us in to the Hiker Hut at the edge of town, which is a building that sits next to a lovely Victorian bed and breakfast and has bunks, a small kitchen, a shower and laundry machines for hikers to use.
They also had a handful of bikes with various broken parts – the chain kept falling off of mine and Roi’s only had one pedal – that we used to get to the two restaurants and to run errands in town. I learned that hiker legs don’t necessarily translate into biker legs as my thighs burned trying to pedal up a slight incline. It was still better than walking!
One of my errands was to pick up a new ZPacks Duplex shelter at the post office, which I took back to the hiker hut and immediately set up in the yard to check it out. It weighs a lot less than my Big Agnes tent, is plenty spacious, and takes up less room in my pack. The farther I hike, the more important those qualities become.
In the evening we went back to one of the two restaurants to get some dinner, then went back to the Hut to hang out with the other hikers that were rolling in. It was great to eventually lay down on soft grass and, despite the occasional jarring noise of giant trucks rattling down the nearby road, I slept like a rock.
