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May 26, 2015
Day: 2 Daily Miles: 46 Total Miles: 96.25 Hours Hiking: 15.5
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| Sunrise from the top of the Laguna Mountains. |
May 26th, I made it 46 miles, or just passed mile mark 96, to point 0540698E 3672917N UTM. Whoa, where to begin, lets see... I started off about 5:20 am. It took about a half hour to get ready in the morning. I woke up at about 4:50 am or so. And then, it was fairly easy going up on top of the Lagunas, kinda heading towards the road that drops you down. Nothing too notable about the morning really. Just trying to put the miles in. It started to get hot as I dropped down off the crest, to Chariot Canyon I believe. I noticed lots and lots of tourmaline crystals and all kinds of fun rocks strewn about the area.
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| Hiking the ridge of the Laguna Mountains. |
I was feeling OK, I was tired, kind of...the night before I had to kind of force myself to eat, my dinner was kinda of...I was getting nauseous on sweet things, well kind of on food in general, but sweet things really seemed to set it off. And then, basically throughout the day, it just kind of kept getting worse, I wasn't really into food at all. My body was just not happy when I ate (laughs). It made me feel sick to my stomach, the moment I could smell or taste something, usually sweet, my body would be like, NO, I DON'T WANT IT! and kind of get that verge of throwing up feeling. That kinda continued all day, but I hiked for a while, only passed two other hikers that were camped at Pioneer Mail, way back at the beginning of the day. I got going down to the Rodriguez Fire tank, which was dripping some water, LOTS of bees. I filled up there to get my down to Scissors Crossing, which there was a nice surprise. It’s funny, that I've hiked twice before and some of these water supplies I have never ever used or seen or noticed before, but this [Rodriguez] was a new one for me, but right on trail, which was great.
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| Smooth Agave blooming near Scissors Xing. |
I forgot my poles there....and had to do about a 50-100 yard backtrack...so UGH!! It was actually the second time that day...the first time I had only made it about 10 ft before I had to turn around and grab the poles, so.... You know its all part of getting used to hiking with things and whats your normal thing to do, it's to carry trekking poles. Yeah, so once I got passed the Rodriguez Spur, it seemed to just get HOT. There was a good amount of wind, but when you are just baking in the sun, it's pretty awful. The worst part is that it reflects off the ground, it's not just beating you from above, it's getting you from below too, especially through that area, it's lots of light granite color, so it really reflects the heat. But I got to Scissors Crossing. There was a good 8 gallon [water] cache from some lovely trail angels, and I stocked up. I took about a 40 minute break there, 20 minutes longer that I would have liked. But I got my feet taken care of, finally got some food down and hydrated. I filled up my complete store of water, which was about 4.5 liters, because I knew the next stop was probably Barrel Springs, as the Third Gate Cache was about 0.5 mile extra, which I don't really need to do!
So, then I started up the big...uuuggghhh....The San Felipe Hills..... they are… one of my least favorites, mainly because they go in-and-out, contouring every freakin' little crack and crevice on that side of the mountain. You sit there and you look and you can see the trail way over there, and yet you go around the corner and you go waaayyy back into this other canyon and come back out of that canyon and go into this other canyon. You know, then an hour later, you're finally where you could see the trail, which didn't look that far away. Plus, its west facing, so in the afternoon it just gets blasted by the sun, thankfully it’s kind of on a cliff face, so you get wind intermixed with walking, but it just gets hot. And, it’s all rock, so the rocks absorb the heat and reflect it right on out back at ya. I wasn't feeling that great going up it, it was about 2:00 pm when I started up the climb....27 miles in, in the middle of the afternoon, you're not feeling so good, especially cause I think I'm actually getting sick.
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| Smooth Agave above Scissors Crossing. |
Scott, my brother, who dropped me off at the border, his family has been fighting something for about 2 weeks now, so I might have a little bit of that trying to creep its way in, as my body being stressed and worked out hard. But other than that.. I.... take breaks here, take a break there. Find a little shady spot, sit down. You know my goal was really 49, but I made 46 and truly, that's really all I needed to happen. My plan is set for 46 miles a day so that's really what the goal is, instead of trying to beat what I did last time, because I should be able to beat what I did last time, just because I know a heck of a lot more things and how to do it better. So, yeah, I really just slowly chipped away at the San Felipe Hills...I got to the Third Gate Cache, signed the register...there were two people talking a little ways down the trail in the bushes. And then, it was pretty much sunset....I made the climb....kept climbing, kept climbing, kept climbing, FINALLY, after about a half hour after it was dark, I made the top, where it was kinda flat again and starting to go down. I noticed that the wind was really wet, so it was going to be really foggy down in the Warner Springs Valley, so I decided not to really push a lot farther, especially since I don't really want to hike passed 9:00 pm, I really want to try and keep to getting 8 hours of sleep, or as close there to as I can. That usually means stopping about 8:00 pm....... HOLD ON, I got a gate here....gate close... (clinking noises).
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| The start of the climb into the San Felipe Hills. |
So, I stopped at about 8:45-9:00 pm I actually stopped at what Halfmile calls the "Billygoat Cave". It’s a little 8 ft mining adit, and because it was so wet out, I thought that I should just hide in there so in the morning I won’t be sopping wet. Which worked out well. I could sit upright in there, so it wasn't too claustrophobic and it was dry and had a more than less sandy dirty floor, which was soft and it was a little too warm actually, but outside was pretty cool and wet, so I think I did alright. Besides feeling not 100%, I mean I know I should feel tired, especially being only day 2, my body definitely not used to it and such, but I definitely feel off, like most of the day I tried to eat a snack and I could not salivate, my mouth was just dry. My body was sweating, but then again my head wasn't sweating at all, so there were just these little things that were off...we're just going to see... I didn't feel so good last night, was very happy to stop, we'll have to see how tomorrow goes.
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| The climb up and out of Tule Hole, closing in on Mammoth Lake, Sierra Nevada Mountains. |
