Day 115: Placerville ZERO Day — Ugly American Adventures

9/8/2023

Section: Milepost 1093.4 to 1093.4

Total Trail Miles: 1846/2650

Distance: 0.00 Miles

Moving Time: 00:00 hrs

Elevation Gain: 0 ft

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Today was our 0-day in Placerville. It’s been 40 days since our last Zero day, I believe, back at Elk Lake in Oregon. We’ve been avoiding these since they kinda throw off the groove but needed a full day to get our collective “shit” together and Hanna and Evan were nice enough to help us out there.

Both had to head into work early so we woke to an empty house and walked down to Bagerlworks in downtown Placerville for some doughy deliciousness. About 15 minutes brought us down into a beautiful old town. We ordered our bagels and sat outside in the glorious sun, enjoying the warmth after an eleven day stretch that had included no small amount of rain. After bagels we headed back to Hanna and Even’s place. We had a few things that we needed to do today. Amanda got to cleaning our gear while I handled a few tent-related things. Our dear friends Josh and Maddy had sent their backpacking tent from Seattle to Placerville so i got it out and set it up to make sure everything was in good working order. The big green Kelty was about twice the weight of our compromised Big Agnes but it would do. Everything seemed to be in order from the stakes to the poles so i packed it back up and set it beside the rest of our stuff. Back around Belden i had finally worked out a replacement plan for our Copper Spur, they had decided that just replacing the rainfly would be more difficult than replacing the whole tent and had decided to send us a brand new Copper Spur - big shout out to Big Agnes! Given shipping and everything else, it had looked like they might be able to send it to Placerville for our rendezvous but they couldn’t guarantee that it would make it in time so, instead, we decided to take Josh and Maddy’s Kelty through the Sierra and get our new Copper Spur in Portland on our final flip back up. I packed up the old Copper Spur in a box and prepped for shipping back to Steamboat, CO for recycling.

The other big thing we were attempting to do today was to get our International Crossing permit into Canada. Sometime in the last month we had heard that Canada had reopened the crossing to Manning Park on foot and that we could now apply for our permits. Like many other classic government things though, the process was not easy. Instead of some kind of online portal we had to print out the forms, sign them and email them to the Canadian government with copies of our ID’s. We took a little time today to prep that all out and Evan was nice enough to print the forms at work and bring them home to us. About an hour before he got home, however, he called to let us know that Hannah had tested positive for COVID and that she was going to stay at her parents home to avoid getting us sick. We were sad to hear about her condition but she assured us that she was doing well but sad she wouldn’t be able to drop us at the trail the next day.

When Even got home, he took us to a print and scan place to mail the old Copper Spur and a few other things as well as scan our ID’s and entry permit applications. Didn’t feel great scanning a document with as much personal information as my permit had at some random Print and Scan shop in Placerville but i guess, at this point, all my information has probably been compromised anyway. Afterwards, we went to a sporting goods store to grab some gas and then to Solid Ground brewing to try a few beers. The day was super nice so we sat outside and talked with Evan and a few strangers who’s kids had done the PCT in 2022. At around 4 we headed back to the house and had dinner before chatting with Evan for a while and clocking another good sleep on an amazing mattress.