Our first day in Washington was a beautiful one. We were nearing the 500 miles to the border mark and feeling like we were getting somewhere but knew we still had a long way to go. Uphill was enjoying his new shoes and my ankle was feeling better: at least I wasn’t limping too badly. It was a long climb up from the river and we had actuallYplanned to do a short day and only climb part way up the mountain due to how late we had gotten out of town. It was a long 12 miles to the top of Table mountain and there was barely any water and none on top. We filled up at the last creek of the day around 7 miles in and continued on. The terrain was steep but it was wooded with big beautiful trees all along the way. We carried enough water for camping the last few mile to a campsite about ten miles out of town where we had planned to stop but the sites were really slanted and it was still early so we took a break and talked to a couple of southbounders, that had already taken over 2 months just to cross Washington, and then decided to climb on another 2 miles to the top with our heavy loads and hope for flatter ground. It was a beautiful day and we were still energized from town calories so the miles went quickly and we were soon on top and set up to camp. While making dinner Uphill discovered that the big can of fuel he had purchased at the store in town wouldn’t screw onto his stove. This was a problem. He was contemplating walking all the way back down the mountain to town to find a different fuel can but I told him to try my small can and it screwed on so I tried his can on my jet boil and it worked so we just swapped and all was well.
Early the 21st we were up and on our way. We only planned to hike 23ish miles which started off down Table mountain. It was a beautiful sunrise and a great hike through the woods on soft trails. I listened to birds singing and buzzing bees. Flowers were in bloom and creeks babbled along many with bridges making dry feet a guarantee. It was a great day in the woods and a quick one. I hiked down Table mountain crossed the saddle and Rock Creek and climbed over Sedum Point in no time at all. From there it was down across Panther Creek rd and on to just shy of Panther Creek itself where I found Uphill setting up camp amongst some colossal, venerable old trees. It was still early afternoon but we’d made our miles, plus we had time to kill since Uphills family planned to meet us after we finished to give us a ride; there was no reason to finish early and it was a beautiful spot. We relaxed and walked over and checked out the official Panther Creek campground that was nearby. I filled up my bottles at the potable water well since I was still without a filter and we returned to camp for a lazy evening in the woods. Mile 2182.7 a 23.7 mile day.