Day 86

Day 86 (cdt 11): 29 miles

Last morning in the gila and it gave me the boot on the way out. It was the coldest morning yet. My water was frozen, along with my shoes. These are some problems I haven’t dealt with since the AT. Back then, I actually never got water the night before since it would just be frozen anyways. After sitting on my shoes for a few minutes they were finally loose enough to force on.

Most of the day was walking on a dirt road in the middle of giant pastures of golden grass. Maybe this is the real golden state. It was a beautiful day even in it’s simplicity. I saw a couple herds of elk running ahead of me today. I also drank from my first much less than desirable water source today, a large brown stagnant pond. Also from a cow tank later in the day but the water was actually pretty great there. Although I still have a little bit of the gila alternate left before I reconnect with the official CDT, my time with constant water sources is over.

Later in the day I was getting pretty worried. I saw smoke right in the direction I was going. I saw a sign earlier today that the fire danger was high so I was really hoping something didn’t break out. I didn’t have any service so I couldn’t check anything or call the forest service. I started looking at my map about how I might have to maneuver around this and it would’ve been a massive loop backwards and very much out of the way. Thankfully a truck passed on the dirt road and I learned that it was a controlled burn thankfully. My spirits lightened up after that. And I was even treated to a beautiful sunset.

Last video was my camp spot from last night. I almost forgot to mention I had a final destination moment this morning. I sat up to start getting things around after laying down all night and less than 30 seconds after I sat up some chunks of rock fell off the top of the cave right where my head was. It wouldn’t have killed me but it damn sure woulda hurt.

Song of the day: About a girl-nirvana