May 12, 2021
Miles: 25.1 miles
Steps: 53,708
Got hiking by 6am again with a quick little uphill before finally get into real hiking trails. This was the first time it felt like the trail was going through the mountains and not just around.
Through out the day one needs to be very alert of where the trail is as soon as you think you are on the right path you soon find you are not. In 3 days this has happen at some point during the day. It’s been helpful to look at my map before taking off that way when trail markers are far between you know where to go.
5 miles down trail was when I hit the water cache. I ran into more cows and like yesterday they wanted me out of there, they just kept staring. The bull of the group didn’t look happy so I walked far around and kept eye contact.
At the water I filled up 4 liters to get me to the next one 13.5 miles later. I was hiking through desert terrain but weather wise felt cool because of the breeze so with the level terrain it made for quick hiking.
At top of this one hill I saw lots of green and a water tank. There was a lot of shade at this spot and water but it wasn’t even 10am yet and I had plenty of water so moved on. There was a big leak in the tank, a bolt was missing.
After that it was little ups and downs to my long 4 hour lunch break. I was planning to get to the next water cache before stopping but I came across this one tree about 0.5 mile from the water cache and couldn’t pass it up. I still had about a liter of water so I stopped, ate lunch and took a nap.
Right before my lunch stop I had to squeeze between a bob-wire fence. There was just enough space in the middle of the wire to set my bag through then for me to crawl under. I really did not want to rip anything or get a nasty cut from the bob-wire. I’m pretty sure I’ll have more of those crossings, not sure why they won’t make a gate in those spots.
It was a half mile hike to the highway and the water cache box. As I was walking towards it I could tell there was something on top of it and around it. As I get closer I see that its a pack on top and 2 hikers underneath their ground tarps to get out of the sun as there was no shade to be found. Luckily for me I had stopped when I did. Those were the first people I had seen since Ray dropped me off at the border, about 57 miles in.
Once I loaded up on water I was on my way to camp. There are no real campsites on this part of the trail so all I knew was I was going to hike about 8 more miles.
As I was walking across this big open area, not really on a trail, I see what looks like a pile of rocks. The closer I get I see it’s a hiker. Then closer it looks like he was squatting to use the bathroom so I kept my distance. The guy ended up walking by me later while I was eating dinner it turned out we was just tired and resting as in that area it was so easy to lose your direction and the trail.
Finally made it to camp just as it was getting dark. I saw a large elk or something similar to one right as I got to my campsite. Once I set up camp I went straight to bed as I had a 4:30am wake up call so that I could get to Lordsburgh by lunch time.