Friday, July 5th

Friday, July 5th Day 17

Today's miles = 19.2 Total CDT miles 245.8

This morning I got to make my oatmeal on the picnic table before heading out on the trail. The first 6 miles of trail flew by. My feet felt good in the morning. I couldn't really feel my blisters. The hike was in the woods this morning. There were trees that were alive! Lately I feel like all we've been hiking through is burn area. The green things didn't last long and after about 6 or 7 miles I was back in a burn area and a new burn area at that. The dirt was still charcoaled. Black soot got on everything.

I took lunch today sprawled out on the burned ground. After lunch I started to feel my feet. I hobbled up a pass just in time for the storm clouds to roll in. Monkey and I pretty much ran down the pass to a guard station (which was locked) where we ate dinner. I didn't really want to hike on past the porch of the little cabin but I knew I needed to get more miles in. We hiked 3 or 4 more miles when it started to rain so Monkey and I decided to set up our tents. We were only .8 of a mile from where we wanted to end up so I didn't feel too badly about cutting the day a little short. I didn't enjoy setting up camp while it was raining but I got most of my stuff ready before the heavy rain started. All in all today was a pretty nice day. I had good energy and the hike wasn't too tough.