We left Bend after meeting some friends who did the Appalachian trail for some breakfast and got the three weirdest hitches on the trip so far. The first woman explained to us that the hands of God told her to pick us up that day. The second hitch we got was from a guy who "always picks up hitchhikers" because he was homeless in the area for three years. Then his sister, who looks like she's twelve, mentions to me that she works at stars. Knowing I've seen this before, I wrack my brain when I realize it's the strip club that was across the street from our hotel. Uncomfortable, I keep making small talk until they drop us off. The last hitch we got was from a 92 year old woman who couldn't figure out that her car was locked to let us in. Finally she got it and we hopped in. The next challenge was turning on the car. After trying to put the off car in drive for five minutes, she realized the car wasn't on. Unfortunately her new hearing aids weren't working so our helpful tips on the car we're lost. But we did make it up to the trailhead where we ran into two sets of trail magic. We didn't get too far from the bagels and doughnuts. We hit the trail the next morning and struggled over a long lava rock section with wind blowing the rain sideways at us. It rained hard that morning and we were soaked and cold. Luckily around noon we hit the 2,000 mile marker and the sun started to peek through. To celebrate we finally drank the shots of fireball we had carried since mile 900 for this occasion. The day turned into a nice one and we made it 30 miles out. We woke up to an amazing sunrise lighting up the whole ridge but when we left the tent, the freezing cold air hit us and we realized the day wouldn't be the greatest. We got hiking fast to beat the cold and made it another 30 miles that day. After a few more long days we made it to timberline lodge where we got picked up by our friend sad fish and taken into hood river where he lives for a nice zero day. We got to go paddle boarding on the river and then were treated to the best home cooked meal I've had on trail. Unfortunately we had to leave and get back on trail. We left timberline and took a few days to get into cascade locks, taking the amazingly beautiful eagle creek alternate. There we met up with a bunch of through hikers and spent the day playing corn hole in the local park. We slept next to the Columbia River and woke up looking into Washington. Today we cross the bridge of the gods and enter washington, our last state on this trip. Only 511 miles left until we cross the border into Canada.