Heather [hikeabike],
Congrats on being the first! I hope to do the OTT after I retire, in a year or two. You have inspired me.
Re: Your bike-over-head photo - As a windsurfer [and now also a kiteboarder], I've been spending 1-2 summer weeks in the Gorge since ~'87. I can visualize the almost exact place, in the Hood River area, you are standing in.
Re: Orajel (topical anesthetic for your bum) - Awesome idea! I'll add a small tube of that to my 'bum kit' [A & D ointment].
Re: Mosquitoes - You say the head net wasn't needed, but what about the netting for sleeping? And many skeeters' to fight while biking?
Ciao,
Barry Ritchey
 

As promised, if you scroll part way down this write-up you can find the logistical details of my experience on the southern portion...

Make it CA, OR and WA, then you have a West Coast version of the TD, with endpoints in Vancouver and TJ! Do it the logical south to north running direction. Hit as many brewpubs as possible for bonus points...

Guess this means we need to get cracking on a California route to connect into it....!

Top photo: At the end of 2016 CTR.
Bottom photo: Nice and shiny again after a bath.
The price works out to about $48 and then you add on something like $7 for USPS Priority Mail...

Just read about the Oregon Timber Trail in Bikerumor.
668 miles, 66K climbing, no summer monsoon [what I hate about the CTR]... It's only a matter of time, or are there plans already being made, that this becomes another ultra...
http://oregontimbertrail.org/

Sold to Mike for $65

If you're heading northbound the spring is about a mile past Marshall Pass on route.  It's a small pipe coming out of the hillside.  There is usually water running across the road so it's hard to miss, even if you're heading southbound and haulin' down the dirt road.
  If you've hit the singletrack you've gone too far.

RE: Monarch Crest Spring - Between Marshall Pass and Green Creek Shelter
I rode Monarch Crest [as a fall ride] for about 3-4 years, after knowing there was a spring along that section of the CT and missed it, even though it is relatively obvious when you finally find it.
The spring, with pipe out of the rock, is located on what I suspect most people would consider as singletrack, not doubletrack.
It's about a quarter mile south of the Green Creek Shelter. So, if you are north bound and come to the lean-to shelter, you need to backtrack.
During last year's CTR the flow-rate was pretty low, but I've never seen it totally dry. I've never filtered. If you can't trust this water source, what can your trust. Chock-full of minerals, and probably a wee bit of heavy metals too, but it's not your lifetime water source. Enjoy the awesome taste!
The spring is on the uphill [east] side of the trail.
South of the Green Creek Shelter meadow, it's on a section of trail in the trees, south [heading to Marshall Pass] of it is alpine [above treeline] single-track. Maybe there's another double-track spring I'm not aware of.
Look for a section of trail where you bike across a short bit of crumbled scree, which may or may not be wet.
The actual pipe sticking out of the rock is probably less than 10' from where your tires roll.
If you are NOBO and miss this, next water will be after you drop into Fooses. Finding water in Fooses is NOT a challenge.
Edit: Photo - Google Earth view looking east, "103" is Green Creek Shelter and spring is "105" or to the left [north] of 105. For sure the spring is not south of 105, where the trail comes out of the trees.

Sale pending...

Sale pending with Justin...
Edit: Sold to Justin.

What, no Tenmile Sufferfest, because of a silly fire? Gosh, it just wouldn't be a real CTR without a lovely HAB and brake-bake over the Tenmile Range.
I'm just two weeks post-op of rotator cuff surgery, so I'll be living vicariously thru all of you guys and gals. Have fun, ride smart [be flexible and adaptable] and don't make the news.

Selfish plug: In case any of this is needed last minute, I just posted four FS items [2 are now sold] in the classified forum: Spot3, seat bag, bar bag and Zpacks Hex Solo. I'll delete this in a few days, or ASAP, if someone has a prob.

[For Sale: Boulder Bikepacking Gear Seat Bag, Small]

For Sale: Boulder Bikepacking Gear Seat Bag, Small
Greg Wheelwrright make me this custom seat bag. Similar in size to the small Revelate Pika.
Dirty bike photo: the roll top strap tail normally sits flush with bag.
Weight ~240 grams
https://bolderbikepacking.wordpress.com/saddlebags/
Retail $110. Asking $55 shipped to CONUS
Send PM if interested.

[For Sale: Revelate Sweetroll, Small]

For Sale: Revelate Sweetroll, Small
The smallest of the three sizes. Manta Flap included.
On-the-bike photo: I didn't use the Manta flap. Mounted with the two Velcro straps [not included] and running the brake cable in front of the bag.
Bag has a minimal amount of wear against the steerer tube, because I put slick tape over the steerer tube.
Not included: Chile Rojo or rojo straps.
https://www.revelatedesigns.com/index.cfm/store.catalog/handlebar/Sweetroll
Retail = $110. Asking $65 shipped to CONUS.
PM if interested.

[For Sale: Zpacks Hexamid Solo Tarp Tent]

For Sale: Zpacks Hexamid Solo Tarp Tent, with removable tub floor and carbon fiber pole.
Total weight: main canopy, pole, bathtub floor and all guy lines/adjusters = 353 grams
That's right, a total shelter weight of under a pound. OK, add 6 Ti stakes, at 6g each, 36g total, and you are still under a pound.
[pole = 61g, tub floor ~90g, canopy/lines balance].
Total time pitched is under 10 nights. All of that time was at night or twilight, no direct sunlight.
You can unclip the floor and use a ground cloth instead, but the tub floor is so convenient, light and tailored to keep from extending beyond the drip line.
The Cuben fiber storage sack is somewhere along the CTR, perhaps now woven into a most awesomely strong bird nest.
Carry the pole separate from the tent, to prevent it from rubbing itself or something else.
I always set it up using only 6 stakes. Add two more if you want to pull-out the rear wall.
Pull-out lines are either Dyneema or reflective trace Z-Line with adjusters.
BTW, I'm 6'2" and it was plenty long. See photo.
Not included: the red strap in the photo, storage sack or stakes.
Why am I selling it? Because I just had rotator cuff surgery and it's a bike-free summer.  
http://www.zpacks.com/shelter/hexamid.shtml
Retail for canopy is $299 + $95 floor + $30 pole = $419
Asking $275 plus shipping to CONUS.
PM if interested.

[For Sale:Spot Gen3 - w strap/biner, packaging and set of unopened AAA lithium batteries.]

For Sale:
Spot Gen3 - w strap/biner, packaging and set of unopened AAA lithium batteries. A set of used batteries are still installed, but lifetime is probably 50%. Suggestion: Make your own leash, to save some weight over the heavy stock strap and biner. Whatever you chose to do, make sure to leash the Spot! A label is affixed to the back, to make the SN and Au numbers visible without having to remove the battery cover. It will be up to you to open an account with Spot and pay the subscription fee.
$55, which includes CONUS shipping.
Send me a PM if interested.
7-15-17 Edit: Price now $55

Yeah, ka-ch$ng!
BTW, the 18650 battery is a Li-ion rechargeable. It's probably the most common standardized battery type and is used in notebook battery packs. Seems to be a lot more common in Europe as a drop-in battery, compared to the US and its fixation with AA/AAA sizes. A disposable replacement for one 18650 is a stacked pair of CR123 batteries.
Good luck wading thru all your choices. I currently have my purchasing blinders on...

Thanks for your thoughts, Yogi!
...
Dynamos are a pretty BIG leap in terms of price tag to get things set up, and it's a little daunting: you got the hub, wheel built around it, the light, the light/usb the switcher box, the usb power thingy, the battery - whoa! That adds up!
...
I've been pretty happy with my Fenix light, and just grabbing batteries, but I'd like to not use so many batteries, for long-term costs (which may be hard to break even in < year!), always-on light, and the ability to charge things without needing to go to town would be awesome!
...

I'm pretty sure that almost all the hubs output about the same power. There are differences, but not much to be of practical concern.
Here's the issue with any dynamo hub system, how the varying output impacts your device(s). If it's a light, you speed-up to eventually reach a turn-on threshold and then the light eventually hits its max output. Go below the turn-on threshold, and the light either turns-off or the light slowly fades if it has a built in buffer/capacitor. I have an Exposure Revo, which has a few minutes of reserve capacity, but any extended HAB or slow grinding climb below 5-6 MPH and light essentially becomes too dim. Solution, I switch on my helmet light for sustained HAB. Even with my eyes, with lenses starting to cloud a bit, you need much less light to HAB vs. bike.
Other electronic devices do not like this threshold cycling [GPS, SPOT, phones, etc.]. It's like constantly plugging-in and unplugging your phone charger. The way to get around this? Either never ride slow [yeah, right] or store the dynamo's sporatic output into a battery pack of some type. Unless you are riding very fast, you can't power a device [like a light] and a battery pack at the same time. However, you can do something like charge a battery pack during the day and then use the dynamo to directly run your light at night. At night, you can charge and/or run other devices with the battery pack. You may not be able to totally go without spare batteries, but this technique can extend the run times of your other GPS/phone devices.
There are many ways to come up with a dynamo system. When I got into this, the main reason I got a dynamo was to have a reliable night riding light, which didn't depend on batteries. I guess my primal fear was running my night light dead and getting caught, attacked, eaten by the boogie man.
Powering other [than light] devices? After trying a USB charger to directly charge a helmet light [BD Revolt] and/or a small battery pack, I've mostly side-stepped the issue by using an 18650 helmet light [Fenix FD30?] and a small charger for the 18650 batteries. It's hard to beat the storage capacity of the 18650 cell. They can store something like 3500 mAh. The Fenix light will run an honest 10 hours at the 150 Lumen setting, which is enough for many nights of setting up a camping and HAB in the dark, when the dynamo light has faded. I've given up on trying to charge/power my SPOT, eTrex GPS and iPhone. I just carry spare batts for the SPOT3 and eTrex. The phone - I dumb-down to airplane mode and just use as my camera or emergency phone. I top-off the charge when I go in and out of civilization.
Edit: Three more comments...
1 - For bikepacking the K-Lite's 1200 Lumen might be overkill. 500-800 is more than enough for loaded bike speeds [However, for 24-hr endurance races, 1200 is nice. Power corrupts and more is never enough.].
2 - Easiest way to extend the battery life on the eTrex 20/30 is to really try and avoid using the backlight. I illuminate the screen of my eTrex by aiming a LED light I rigged up to run off the 5V USB tail light port of the Revo [a long story. Search for my post on that.]
3 - Latest generation SPOT [3?] has a much longer battery life than the previous generation.

Thanks for the reply!
Looking at, https://www.kliteusa.net/product-page/klite-backpacker-pro-light-1200-700lm-w-standlite
I'm scoobied at the choices.

If I'm running a PD/Shim. hub, it seems that I would want to choose, "Light only SP/Shim", but there is another choice, "Light AND USB". What the heck is that other choice about? I would like to run this with a switch to be able to hook this up with a USB charger. I *think* that switch is sold separately, and the USB charge is most def. sold separately.

I emailed them, and their response was to choose, "light and USB" - am I missing something important for a SP/Shim choice?

SP's PD-8X hub comes with an adapter sleeve with allows it to be used as a traditional 100 mm QR hub. Sliding out the sleeve, it's not held captive at all, allows the hub to be used with a 100 X 15 mm axle. As far as I know, this hub does not work as a Boost hub, without making some end caps and shimming the rotor... or a combination of that if you don't mind a wheel off-center by ~3mm.

Sorry if I'm reviving this thread -
...
* Hubs with some sort of future-proofing. I'm most likely getting a hub for 100mm/QR, but it would be nice to get it to work with 115/thru axle
...

Good luck guys and gals! 
Life, work and health have conspired to keep me out this year, but I'll be cheering everyone on.
No big drama and stay off the local and national news.

I think wheel dishing is required if you don't shim the rotor. In a perfect world, spinning perfect wheels, there would be no dish at all between the hub flanges. Re-dishing is mentioned in the WolfToothComponents link. I like the eBay kit. Necessity breeds invention... Much more elegant than opting to shim the caliper...

...I don't see why you would have to redish the wheel?

If you use the regular SP PD-8 hub, you are stuck with a 100mm QR axle. The PD-8X works with either traditional QR or 15mm TA. That hub comes with an aluminum sleeve, which fills up the 15mm bore and has machined ends to to work with a QR.
Boost? I think the problem isn't so much the end caps, but rotor alignment. Re-dishing the wheel may be required, which sucks for bike-to-bike swapping. I think the rotor to rim distance growth is about 3mm.
You could probably machine some spacers as a hack, but you would have to live with a wheel about 3mm off-center, with respect to the rear wheel. That's probably within tolerance for some bikes, but could be an issue with your bike not tracking straight. It would also be a bit of a mental hurdle knowing that your wheels are off-center. Lacking any personal experience with boost wheels, I'm not your expert. However, see this links below to get a bit of insight on the issue...
http://www.wolftoothcomponents.com/products/boostinator
http://enduro-mtb.com/en/tech-talk-whats-the-boost-standard-all-about/

...
Also, does anyone know if the more popular dynamo hubs like Son 28 and SP have the ability to swap out end caps to be able to swap the wheel between forks with normal 100mm spacing vs 110mm boost forks?  My hardtail has 15x100, and I may upgrade my full susp bike, but many seem to come with boost forks now.  A dynamo wheel for each is definitely not in the budget!
...

PD-8X update:
In the fall of 2015, I started using a Shutter Precision PD-8X laced up for my Ripley LS. I continued to use the hub on my Ripley for all of 2016. I didn't log the day and night training hours, but it was a lot. I'm guessing I logged over 3000 miles in 2016 alone, including a 24-hr race, AZT 300 and CTR. The wheel is now on my Ti hardtail winter commuter. No issues. But YMMV.

...As for the people at Shutter Precision.... I will bite my tongue for now.