What’s the best thing to do if your body tries to give up on your adventure.

 

Get out at 5 in the morning and hammer down a 28mile / 45km day.

 

The first hours were great, it took me a few minutes to get myself going but then it went well. I left some food at the motel and informed myself well about watet sources for the day and was able to carry only about 1-2 liter and filling them up at every source to keep the weight down.

 

By 13h I had walked 20 miles, ate something and had to fil up 7 Liters of water because the next water cache was 18 miles away and in the desert the heat was brutal.

 

The whole day was nothing more than walking and ignoring the pain. The last two hours were horrible and the long strech to the next tentsite got me into a forced pause half a mile before I could set up my tent for the night. I almost fell asleep while walking..

 

I finally reached the site and set up at 19h.

 

Those are the moments you can easily ignore the pain and just enjoy the nature, the view and the silence. Well the silence lasted about 20 minutes, than 3 fellow hikers joined me to sleep at the site. We did chat for over an hour, ate together and got to bed.

 

The 4th day started at 6h30, the first time I ate all of my breakfast 🙂  cornflakes with dried fruits and chocolate powder with water.

 

The first 8 miles were okay and at the cissors crossing water cache, Austin & Jasmin and I decided to hitchhike into Julian to get some pie and a cold beer. After 15 minutes a “professionnal” driver came, asked for 5$ each and drove us into town.

 

 

At Mom’s there really is an offer for hikers. Show your permit and get a free slice of pie with ice cream and a small drink for free!! The pie was delicious 🙂  I got myself a beer to drink right away and a gatorade for the way and we hitched back out to the trail to walk another 13 miles.

 

13 miles without shade and 11 miles out of them just climbing. Needless to say it might not have been the smartest idea to walk during the hottest part of the day but I got to move on 🙂

 

The views reward you for the pain you’re going through.

 

There are some amazing people out there who set up water caches in the middle of nowhere to keep us hikers alive in the heat. The tip jars are always well filled because we know that we depend on the water in the caches.

 

 

I set up camp at 20h and fell asleep right away, well right away after dinner 😉

 

I woke up at 5h30 and packed everything up quietly because I didnt heared any noise from the other campers and thought they would still sleep. After I got out of the tent they were already gone long before I woke up.

 

Although I started “late” i had a good pace of 3,5mi/h 6km/h uphill for the first 10 miles before I reached this beauty:

 

 

100mi / 160km marker

 

Just after the first 100miles I got some more water while beeing surrounded by bees, took 30 min to give some air to my feet, met a french couple and set of to eagle rock.

 

Why eagle rock?

 

 

Very impressive.

 

3 more miles and at 15h I was in Warner Springs where I got a shower, washed my clothes, bought food for the next 5 days and then set up my tent under a huge tree next to about 20 other tents.

 

They converted the community center to a hiker heaven. Cold drinks, ice cream, electricity, a room where you can stay up late and sit on a couch. For free, but donating is an obvious thing to do when you get offered this kind of kindness!

 

20h30 gonna go to bed now an trying again to set up early tomorrow to be done early and set up camp around 15h.