It is sometimes hard to be disciplined and get up quickly with the alarm for an early start but the last couple of days we have woken with relatively warm weather and there is strong incentive to get in as many miles as possible before we feel the full heat of the sun.

As we headed out Rob took a couple of panoramas of the mountain views and was a little behind. There was a shrill loud whistle repeated 2 or 3 times and Rob hurried towards us thinking we might be in trouble and I ran back down toward him with the same thought. We looked about for someone who might have been calling for help but couldn’t see or hear anyone. Just a bit further along we heard the same whistle again, followed by 3 more short blasts, again nobody answered when we called out. As we rounded a corner we saw a fat marmot sitting up on a rock. Although we didn’t see him call, we assume that he was making the whistling call!

A pika

As we hiked in the morning, we passed others coming from the other direction who told us that Deep Lake was really pretty so we headed there for lunch and, being as hot as it was, I took a quick dip before lunch.

Today we added another native berry to the list we have sampled on the trail here in Washington – thimble berries – they are ripening now and very tasty. Others we have enjoyed are: wild strawberries, black topped raspberries, salmon berries and huckleberries.

We hiked another 10 miles after lunch and are camped near a creek. Today’s total was 24.9 miles.