Thursday, September 27, 2012

9/13/12

  Goldmyer hot springs were amazing. We soaked in the pools last night and it was by far, the coolest hot springs I had ever been in. The springs flowed out of a cave and there was a 20' long pool inside of  the cave. It was really pretty and hard to leave. They even had a changing room nearby. We need one of these springs at the end of everyday.
   I slept amazingly after the soak, and woke up late feeling refreshed. Lauren went in for another soak this morning while I made some tent stakes out of sticks. I must have left our stakes somewhere, possibly Rob and Maggie's house. It felt good to make stakes though, simple, but I cut them to size and put notches in them.
  We started hiking about 9 AM. I was anxious to hike fast, its been so long since we really did a big day. But Lauren's knees were slowing her down to about two miles an hour. I ended up hiking ahead a-ways. I really enjoyed the straight-forward climb of the trail up to Dutch Miller Gap. Not much for switchbacks, and good and steep.
   The smoke is terrible here. It burns the lungs a bit and really dims the views around here. Its still  beautiful, but its harder to see the texture of the huge mountains that surround us. I guess 65 fires were started by that storm on Saturday, no telling where the smoke is from. But so far, no closures on the PCT.
    We walked together the last 8 miles of our day. Found a great campsite with a view of the valley below us. Made 21 miles today.
   I think I am about ready to be done hiking this Summer.

No comments:

Post a Comment