5.6.18. 20.3 miles.

Wow today was a long day! Kristie and I woke up at 3 am and got hiking a little before 4 in order to beat the heat. We knew it was a full day of climbing, so we needed to get a head start. We walked with our headlamps for about 1.5 hours before it got light enough to not wear them. We passed quite a few camps with people in them, and finally got to a site where Angie, Helen, and Angie’s friend Jay and his Husky Tara were camped. They told us the boys camped near them and passed by just a few minutes ahead of us! We ended up leapfrogging with Angie & Helen all day, which was a lot of fun. They are really nice gals and I enjoy spending time with them!

We started climbing right when the sun decided to shine to the bottom of the canyon, where we were. It wasn’t as bad as previous days though. Not sure if I’m getting used to it or it just wasn’t as bad? We passed & got passed by a lot of hikers and everyone I talked to said they had a terrible day yesterday, which makes me feel better about my terrible yesterday. Thankfully, today was not terrible. I turned my music on when the sun started shining because I knew I needed motivation & I needed it before things got bad. My playlists were great, and Hamilton took me a long ways down the trail. Definitely good hiking music. Despite having music, the almost 5,000 ft climb was still pretty brutal and not very pretty. We were hiking through a burn area from the Lake Fire, I believe.

We took a few mini-breaks along the way but our goal for our lunch break was the mission creek campground, the last water for 16 miles. Quite a few hikers had the same idea: we all tried to find some nice shade to lay down. I’m happy because I actually took a nap during our siesta time!

After a long break we decided to meet 6.6 miles ahead at a forest service cabin to camp, and possibly go on further. By the time we all got there, it was getting dark and we were all set on staying here. The cabin itself is super run down and pretty creepy, so we set our tents up. The hike down to the cabin was super pretty though, similar to San Jacinto and the Sierra!