I woke up early with condensation starting to drip off my tent and on to me. Quickly packed up and got going, on what was probably the warmest morning of the whole trail so far… and I was camped at over 10,000 feet!
There was lots of climbing to be done today, but mostly in smaller chunks with descents between each. I was walking along early and it seemed like my trail dead-ended into a lake… which I then realized was a really wide creek! It didn’t turn out to be too deep, but I put together that this was the creek all the northbounders had told me was their hardest crossing. I can imagine how bad it would have been early in the season.
I caught up with Hui again after that and he talked through all the climbs, telling me about his photography gallery/website and other stuff. He is a forester in NYC…he basically deals with keeping their trees healthy and putting in new ones.
The rest of the day was just more slogging for me. Except for the last few miles, all day was on the same annoying rocky terrain as yesterday, killing my shin. I did give it a good soak at dinner though, which really helped.
I’m going to bed now, in my most sheltered camp in days which is perfect because it is thundering outside and there are very big black clouds rolling in. So glad to be in my tent! On a related note, I am slowly becoming the Karate Kid of “mosquitos in my tent” killing. Picture me with chopsticks, except I’m so good I can do it with fingers, killing the stray mozzys that manage to get in my tent with me.
Daily Summary
Date: Aug 20, 2011
Day 57
Daily Distance: 22.9 miles
Trip Distance: 1099.2 miles