I am camped at the far edge of the Pumice Desert at the north side of the Crater Lake Park. Thi sis the prettiest camp I've had so far, but I'm hiding in the tent because of all the menacing yellow jackets that have plagued me since I first tried to set up camp. It's almost dark and there's still a few around.

The first spot I tried had a swarm of about 50 shortly after pulling out my tent. I guess they could smell the moisture on it. We are all looking for water. The cache at the junction wad down to a couple of liters! (NOTE: this is the cache we verified only a couple days ago had an ample supply.) Supposedly the cache in about 6.5 miles is loaded. I sure hope so!

The climb today up to the rim went through some real pretty country alternating between meadows with flowers and flowing creeks and old growth mountain hemlock. It was very nice, until the trail got crazy steep and the same time, the mosquitoes started swarming. I climbed 1,000 feet over 2.3 miles in just under an hour. I thought I was gonna die for sure. It took me an hour to recover up at the Rim Village. I had a salad and some potato chips and hung out on the patio with the other thru hikers. Most of them took the shuttle I think except for one who shared the same experience.

The rim trail was spectacular of course and only busy at the pullouts. It was not easy as there were many ups and downs. Quite a few sections were that loos sandy pumice stuff...tough up hill.

As I hiked, I kept flip-flopping with the guys from the patio as I think we were all taking plenty of breaks. They all beat me to the water cache though, but they saved me enough to make it through the night and morning. Couldn't spare any for the yellow jackets!