May 5, 2012

The wind was howling last night, it was peaceful though. We were camped among cottonwoods, and for some reason there were a ton of hummingbirds around. One kept flying around a tree, checking me out. As soon as I would turn to look, the bird would retreat to the other side of the tree. It was a game of peek-a-boo, that both me and the bird seemed to enjoy. Makes me fall more in love with nature and not want to leave this area anytime soon. But I am excited to get home to Lauren. The PCT is right around the corner too.
  The hiking was a bit rough this morning. Easy to follow road, but the sand made for pretty slow going. It was beautiful though. The area is wilderness and protected for good reason. The sandstone has many colors to it. Red, white, tan, black, orange, all mixed together in waves. Its really a neat area.
  We were on D=rt time today too. We both have very different hiker styles. I try to get up early and get miles in early. D=rt prefers to sleep in, take a siesta, then hike late to get miles in. We have done a good job compromising on this trip so far, but I decided to hike D=rt’s way today. The easiest way for me to do that was without a watch. So I took it off first thing. It went well too. We hiked a bit later, but never rushed, and still got in 21 miles.
  The best part of the hike today was hiking the East Fork of the Virgin River. It’s super beautiful. Red Sandstone cliffs on both sides of us, hundreds of feet high. The area between cliffs is often 10 yards across, so we are forced to hike right through the knee deep river. We did come to an obstacle at the end of the day. The river narrowed and went right through a tight shoot. It seemed tricky and a bit different than the guide described. So we backtracked and found a place to camp, and checked the GPS to make sure it was right. It turns out that it is right. We are guessing the water may be a bit high. That is why it is so intimidating. We have a rope right now for Orderville, so we plan to use it to rappel down tomorrow morning. It’s only a 10 foot drop, but looks super slick, with a deep pool right beneath. Seemed sketchy at first, but with rope, should be fine. Everything will be wet though, so I will be doing my best to waterproof everything come morning.
  That is one thing I love about this trail. It seems that we ask ourselves on a regular basis, "is this really the route?" Most of the time it is the route and we just have to put our big boy shoes on and go for it.