Day 88: 20 Miles
After eating a hearty breakfast, we said our goodbyes to Flyfish, who is getting off trail for a few days to deal with an injury. We got a hitch to the trail from a nice woman from Alabama. She was headed the opposite direction, but she read our sign that said we were hikers and needed a 9 mile ride, so she turned around and drove us up to the trail!
Today was full of what hikers call PUDs- pointless ups and downs. I’d say they weren’t totally pointless, it provided plenty of nice views. Still, the trail in this section is very meandering. We headed North, then West, and will soon turn South, so it feels more like pointless back and forth to me.
Today was our first full day of hiking with dry feet since we were in the Winds! Our water carries are longer, but haven’t been too bad. The mosquitos are much improved, but we might be dealing with more flies in the coming days. We camped by ourselves tonight, near a stream. Enigma is a few miles ahead of us so we’ll probably see him in the next few days or in town.
Day 89: 30 Miles
We didn’t make quite as much progress as we wanted today, mainly because it was hot with lots of ups and downs.
Also, I got sick in the night and was feeling a little sluggish today. Fortunately it seems like just a quick bug so hopefuls all is better. In the evening we ended up doing a 2 mile detour when we missed a junction and lost a ton of elevation.
Still, the scenery was very pretty today. We’ve started seeing some Southbounders, maybe about 4 over the past few days.
Day 90: 34 Miles
Today was Paul’s birthday. It was a hot one, with more ups and downs.
It was a headphone kind of day, in other words a little boring. I listened to an audiobook all day as did Paul. We passed a few Northbound hikers we hadn’t met before, and hiked until nearly dark to get closer to town.
Tomorrow morning we just have 11 miles to Lima.
Day 91: 12 Miles
It was a 1,000 foot climb this morning, then mostly flat and downhill toward Lima.
We made it to the road into town around 11:00, which was actually I-15. Hitching from a highway is never easy, and I’ve never hitched on an interstate, but the 4th car that drove by was actually a shuttle for hikers run by the local motel. We didn’t plan to stay the night in town, but it’s super cheap here and so many hikers!
Our friend Z got off trail about 80 miles ahead and hitched back to town for the night before heading out of state for a wedding, and Enigma is here, so we’re having a little trail family reunion. Back to trail tomorrow morning.