Saturday, July 6th

Saturday, July 6th Day 18

Today's miles = 17.7 Total CDT miles = 263.5

I slept well last night. I only woke up 4 or 5 times. (I normally wake up more then 10 times a night even when not on trail). What I'm glad I didn't wake up to was the noise of the animal by the tents. Baboon said that he woke up in the night hearing a noise but stopped worrying once he heard it gallop. He concluded that it was a deer and went to sleep. I wake up when a mouse walks by so I must have been really tired to sleep through a deer.

I didn't get packed up and moving until 8:30am. The first 4 miles were mellow but the rest of the day was pretty much all uphill. The sun came out the trail became exposed and I spent most of the day trudging up mountains, which I suppose is what I came out here to do. It never seems as hard when your sitting on a couch thinking about it. The trail was beautiful today, though, making it all worth it. There were plenty of open views.

Water was scarce today. The trail went up along the actual continental divide so there was no real water sources. The first water source I came to was a little lake that had some good camping. I decided to cook dinner there with the ample water and I went to filter some by the lake which is when I heard the rustle across the water. I pointed it out to Monkey and after a minute he heard it as well. Then we heard more noises behind us and to the side of us. So, instead of eating dinner we grabbed our things and booked out of there with bear mace and ice axe in hand. The trail from this point went STRAIGHT up! It was probably the steepest part of the CDT that I have come across yet. Needless to say, we were not moving anywhere fast. After a few minutes of hiking we found a note on a trail from a fellow thru hiker saying that a momma bear and two cubs lived down by the lake. So, it was a good decision not to cook there. Unfortunately we ended up not eating dinner at all tonight. After the lake we hiked for a few miles before realizing that the trail went up along the spine of the mountains and that camping would be scarce. So, Monkey and I decided to set up camp. It is also cold out tonight so I was worried about the wind if we pushed on a few miles. Monkey hung the food and I set up our sleeping gear (we only set up his tent because we were tired and wanting to just get to sleep). I am glad we did because I was so cold tonight and needed to steal heat from him.

The plan is to wake up early and get to town tomorrow after a 17 mile hike. Water is scarce tomorrow as well and I have to hike off trail .5 miles one way just to get water. Not looking forward to tomorrow's hike but definitely looking forward to town. Its been almost 10 days since I've showered. Yikes!