Oh man I had the woooooorst sleep last night :( Surprisingly it wasn't because of the 20+ mile day yesterday. For one there was a huuuuuge lump in the ground where the middle of my back goes. Also, I had the craziest, detailed, long, horrible dreams! I must've dreamed all night because it didn't feel like I had any peaceful rest at all!
We left Robin Spring just around 8am because I was moving snail-speed. Still not too late to get some hiking in before the sun gets too hot!
Some pretty blue and purple flowers that we've never seen before.
We were bummed to soon leave the forested area and the trail dumped us back into the rolling desert before 11am.
The day was overcast but still very hot! Maybe overcast isn't the right word. The sun was behind some super thin clouds that magnified it's powers and burnt my legs and Claire's shoulders!
We climbed up biiiiiiig straight long hills to make up for the nice down we enjoyed in the morning:
There was no shade for a few good hours but we finally squashed underneath a few low Joshua trees for some shelter at around 1:30pm. It was hard to move because there wasn't much room and if you moved too far you'd get stabbed by its sharp leaves.
We rested for a bit with the umbrella over our heads to aide the spotted shade. We left at 3pm; we would've stayed for longer but the ants were trying to reclaim their homes!
It must've been lizard o'clock because shortly after that I saw these two guys within 3 minutes of each other.
We kept walking in the heat and finally found a little nicer shade around 5pm. We sat down for a load off and ran into Alex and Liam. We had seen them at Casa de Luna, met them in Hikertown, and we've been flip-flopping with them for the last couple days. At hiker town Liam had given us a full jar of Justin's maple almond butter, which is now all gone :)
By 6:00pm we had already walked 17.07 miles when we stumbled across a nice looking campsite. We kept walking off-trail towards a giant boulder and we found an even better one!
We wanted to have a nice early night and have some daylight after getting the tent sent up so that we could prepare for tomorrow and get a lot of sleep and a super early start tomorrow since we're back in the true desert heat with no shade.
Last night we set up the tent in the dark and by the time we're all settled for bed and I've finished my blog, it's normally waaaaay past my bedtime!
Oh so, funny thing: Now that we've stopped night hiking, our friend Mr. Moon has been showing his bright face. "Oh, you're actually trying to sleep at night? Here, let me shine my love upon you.." Oh moon, if only you were shining bright on the sleepless nights through the desert..
Well, that's about it for today! We walked a lot all day in the heat. Our last few days have been a 15, 20, 17, and tomorrow we'll try for another 20 miler! Aside from some shoulder pain and a little blister on Claire's hand from her trekking poles, our bodies are feeling pretty good and neither of us have any new feet blisters! Hooray!
-Thanks for reading!
Hooray for no new feet blisters! Is shoulder pain from packs or from sunburn?
ReplyDeleteFriday must've been a night of nightmares all around. I had nightmares, and so did Myongsoo, and so did mom! And YOU! Wow.
Weird, huh?
I suspect the flowers are Lupin. Thanks Donna for sharing the name of that fatty horned lizard. The second one is most definietly not a salamander. Salamanders live by wet places so they can maintain the coat of mucus on their bodies. Yeah, salamander would be dead in 5 minutes out in that heat! From the spots I would call it lepoard lizard! Totally just made that up. I have no idea. ;p
Beaautiful campsite, lovely view.
Claire is having the shoulder pains and its deep within her left shoulder blade. She says it feels like it's not near the surface. It seems to happen more with heavy pack weights and uphill stretches. Hopefully in the Sierra it will diminish as we'll be carrying 1 liter of water instead of 4-6!
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteSomething I've never seen on a blog but that I observed on my little trek the other day (with a pack that ended up WAY too heavy 😜) was if i loosened the straps on uphills and tightened them snugly on the downs it wasn't as brutal on my traps and shoulders... Maybe that's common knowledge, but I figured I'd offer anyway. That kind of nagging pain is no fun!!
DeleteWe've also found that to be true! I'm glad you're backpacking that makes me so happy! Our pack weight started suuuuuper heavy. Since we're on a through hike we eventually got rid of some gear and now we're pretty light!
DeleteNice post and pix. Funny how most of us are almost oblivious to the moon and yet it is a constant and effect so many things on our planet. Thunder and lightning here. I was going to Step out for a walk along Boulder Creek, but thinking better of it as I am not equipped or experienced as you.
ReplyDeleteOh man, last time we were in thunder we got hailed on!! I'm glad you're enjoying Colorado!
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteWhen I was younger the horny toads couldn't be missed in the desert. Now you can't find them unless you are lucky.
ReplyDeleteWhen we were climbing Mt Whitney the desert heat and sun was so intense that sunscreen didn't do the job. The only thing that I had for further protection was polyprop long johns. Quite warm but they worked. I do look for the blog every day. Success!
Also amazing that you run into as much connectivity as you do for the blogs. You tell a good story and write well. Thanks
ReplyDeleteYeah I've been pretty impressed with the service out here! This last stretch was dead for a few days, but I can always upload a bunch in towns! Thanks for reading Uncle Dean, it means a lot!
DeleteIt's a bummer about the diminishing lizards.. There also use to be a bunch of tortoises out here but we saw none :( excited for Whitney, hopefully the heat isn't too bad this time of year yet!!