Have had great luck with cell service for the past 3 days. Called Shirley around 11 am EST. As I posted yesterday, the trail climbs uphill from Castella. I have hiked from 2100 ft elevation yesterday morning around 10 am CA time to 7400 ft this morning. This time I climbed around the back side of Castle Crags and Castle Dome, large granite formations jutting up like a huge fortress. The terrain is beautiful and quite different than that hot stretch of logging land out of Sierra City. The rocks here are full of iron which gives them a rust color. What is so amazing that I can see the actual trail from a distance of 5 miles. I'm hiking around and on the ridges of mountains that look like upside down bowls - it takes days and days to hike around the bowls and I can see the trail behind me for 2 miles or more. If it wasn't for the haze from the wildfires, I'm sure there would be beautiful views of Mt. Shasta and Lassen Volcano - but it is too smoky to see far away mountains. I'll post photos of this section as soon as possible.
Keep hiking,
Greybeard
