Friday, October 25th

Friday, October 25th. Day 129

Today's miles = 19 Total CDT miles 1,993.3

It rained on and off the entire night last night. It was surprisingly warm last night because of the rain clouds keeping in the heat. I didn't mind the rain because I was already in my tent before it began. But what I did mind was that it was still raining this morning when I woke up at 5am. I said "hell no" out loud which made Baboon respond with a, "yeah, no" and we both fell back asleep until 6am. One of my favorite sounds is hearing the rain hit the tent outside so I was rather comfortable during that last hour. Eventually the rain slowed to a pitter patter on the tent and I sat up to eat my breakfast. It was another fudge Poptart morning and another coffeeless start to my day. I got hiking by 8am.

The whole morning stayed cloudy as I hiked up and down countless little mesas. The trail was nicer because walking on wet sand is actually more comfortable than walking on dry sand. It was colder this morning than it was all last night so that made me a little miserable. The trail has been pretty nice so far in New Mexico. I've either been hiking on sand or sandstone. There have been a few steep rocky and difficult climbs both up and down but because of how tactical they are you almost forget your going uphill when you have to focus that much.

The only water source today was a well. Surrounding the opening were a bunch of bulls. It looked like they were guarding the water so I aporoached them carefully trying to get them to run away. They moved over a little bit which was enough for me to scoot in and grab some water. But they never took their eyes off of me. Those sharp horns were rather intimidating. I would have skipped that water if it were not the only water source all day. As I was getting water the storm clouds that had been looming over me all day looked to be even more threatening. I could see the horizon getting hit bad with lightening and the wind was blowing in my direction. I determined to make it 7 miles further before the rain and I almost made it. I made it the 7 miles but not without the sky letting loose above me and showering down. I set up my tent as quickly as possible and threw all my gear and myself in there. It's going to be another stormy night.

A cactus bit me last night and left about 20 prickers in my hand (no exaggeration). So, I spent about 30 minutes trying to carefully pick them all out. I think the cactus had some sort of toxin in the prickers because my hand throbed and was in pain the rest of the night and into this morning. I spent today being overly cautious of all the desert plants because even the ones that look soft and cuddly will bite you. The plants bite you. The trees bite you. The grassy sand bites you. The red aunts bite you. Those little flying bugs that look like miniature scorpians bite you. Everything in the desert bites