Day 186 (HDT 2)

Day 186 (HDT 2): 17 miles

It was a cozy night cowboy camping in our shelter under the massive rock. In the morning, we descended down into Courthouse Wash, where we just should have kept trucking yesterday. Once we got down there, we, but mainly me, had to accept a harsh reality. The more I hike the more I become like a cat. I hate being wet. And with it raining a lot in the last 2 days, Couthouse wash was flowing heavy. We would be walking in water the whole way.

The first step was the worst. Then it started to grow on me. I just accepted this was a less scenic and dirtier version of the Gila River on the CDT, except this one had quicksand. It really kept us in our toes the whole way. It’s always alarming right away when you sink up to your shin in wet sand, but it never felt dangerous, just annoying and a little scary. I made sure to double knot my shoes today.

After walking 6 miles in the flowing wash, we decide to make an alternate at the main road through the park. I expected the water would probably only get deeper and wider as it got closer to the Colorado and we were out of water and thirsty. The ironic part of walking in water all morning was that we couldn’t drink it. It was so full of sediment from the heavy rain, I don’t think I could’ve gotten more than a quarter liter before my water filter would be totally clogged up. We walked the park road down to the visitors center where we rehydrated and @the_fanciest_of_feasts got her junior ranger badge.

We then walked a bike path into Moab where we ran some errands , I made an obligatory McDonald’s run, and I got some stuff to repair my broken tent. Thankfully a local trail angel John that dropped us off to start, let us camp in his yard which was great and allowed us to clean up our completely mud-caked shoes, socks, and legs, in addition to my tent so I could properly patch it up.

We’ll be leaving Moab tomorrow much later then I expected to considering it’s only like 25 miles into the trail but you gotta roll with the punches. Btw the mileage I’m posting is not the Hayduke mileage but instead what we roughly walked including alts and buffoonery mileage (wrong way and backtracking)