[pct-l] The Thousand Lakes Wilderness, Clarke's Original PCT route, vs the Hat Creek Rim

[Deems]

A simple guess is to make a straighter trail line with a little less private 
land easements, and the Rim trail avoids some prime timber producing lands 
on the south side of the Hat Creek Valley. The usfs drilled some deep wells 
on the HCRim, but produced no water. They intended to set up water tanks at 
the HCRim Lookout, but the rim and lookout burned up in 1987. Today, the 
hikers rely on the locals for water drops at Cache22 and Cache44, and with 
no usfs budgets today, their intent to keep tanks full of water would have 
been empty. They should have built it on the south side of Hat Creek Valley 
from Burney Falls to Lassen. There are many differences between the 1935 
route and the current one, check out these original maps. Clarke avoided the 
Marbles and Trinity Alps, which is one section where the current route is 
superior to his version. His route was about 2100 miles, vs the current 2650 
one.  PCT history can be fun, and a great way to understand the trail's many 
changes over the decades.
http://pcttrailway.pctplanner.com/maps.html  1935 PCT Trail Maps Click on 
each for a larger one.
http://pcttrailway.pctplanner.com/map07.html  Map#7 showing the 1000Lakes 
section
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Wow, all that so near to the Hat Creek Rim? I thought the Rim was
interesting and enjoyed walking it. I think I would have enjoyed your
spot more.

In my opinion, the PCT makes a lot of poor route choices that keep
you too far away from water and pretty places.

If the trail originally went through the 1000 Lakes Wilderness, and
there are still trails there, why did they choose to route the PCT
through Hat Creek Rim instead?