Friday August 23, 24.2mi/38.9km

Forest Road 1144 (805.6/1362ft) to Baker Lake Road / Concrete WA (829.8/850ft) (WA)

Kate and Semi-Sweet said good morning as they walked by my tent, they were hiking at 6:30am! I went up the hill on a short side trail to check out the hot springs.

There were some people there taking a soak (at 7am!) with their two loud dogs nearby, so I left. The hike was easy all day, on flat terrain. Most of the day was spent circumnavigating Baker Lake. I suppose there are usually better views, but it was lightly raining and foggy.

The trail was wide, a nice old road, and I was happy having no wet plants to push away.

At the top of the lake, the trail crossed the inlet stream, Baker River, on a long swingbridge. Those are always fun.

About mid-afternoon I realized that I had already covered 19 miles, and I could make it into town tonight if I kept going another 5 miles. So I did!

I crossed the dam, and it wasnt as high as Ross Lake dam, but still very long.

I got one final view, Mt Baker was trying to poke its head out of the clouds. Cool!

I got to Baker Lake Road at 4:45pm, and started hitching. The second car picked me up! It was a nice ride down to Highway 20, where I hitched another ride to Concrete WA. The second driver was a strange dude, but entertaining. His business card:

I got to town at 5:30pm, checked into the Cascade Mountain Motel, and then walked next door to the pizza place for dinner. The appetizers were delicious!

After a nice hot shower (it had been 9 days!), I watched some mindless TV shows in a warm dry bed, life is good!