PCT 2023 - Day 39

The one with the anniversary, 600 miles and a friggin big snake!!

📍 Location: MM 583 to MM 603.1

🥾 I actually walked: 20 miles (mainly uphill!!)
💰 Money: No money spent
⛑️ Health: I was feeling great until lunch time when I took off my shoes. Where I’d taped my foot for my achillies issue, I now have a big blister that runs along the edge. I pop it, drain it, hand sanitizer it (used the last of the alcohol wipes yesterday) and dressed it. It still hurts!

☀️ Weather: chilly first thing but by 8am the sun came out and I was soon moaning about the heat!!

🍲 Food: Breakfast bars (2), hazelnut coffee, noodles for lunch and beef stroganoff for dinner.,

💤 Sleep: Sleeping underneath a wind turbine with its swooshing noise all night makes for a restless sleep. Luckily Steve wasn’t snoring, so that was a bonus.

THE LONG WINDED VERSION:-

🌄 6.30am - Packed up and we have a fabulous sunrise through the trees. It’s a busy campsite as this was the first water source in 17 miles! Today we have 20 miles before water but the elevation is not as high. When you are on a trail the key is to keep hydrated. Everyone talks about how far it is to the next water source. On the FarOut app people comment to say if the water is flowing well. In previous sections the water sources have been a few miles apart, but this section is tough with 14-20 mile water carry’s.

👰‍♀️ 651 am - Yippee, I have service and receive a message from my lovely husband to say happy anniversary. 22 years today we got married. Love you Matt. Miss you see you in just over a week.

🌲 Currently walking through the wind farm. These huge wind turbines are towering above us. We soon enter a forest trail section which is fairly cruisy and easy walking. I hear my feet thanking me for not having to do too much incline and they like the soft pine trail! We have lots of shade and it’s very pretty. I wish the whole trail was like this.

👋 803 am - “Is that jukebox?” says a voice from behind. Its Tour Guide. She started on the same day as us from CLEEF campsite in Campo. Its lovely to see people from our original trial family. TourGuide is doing really well and she will smash it all the way to Canada.

Ah….. a chipmunk poses for a photo. Cute!

🌵 9.07am - A quick break before we exit the forest. We can see that we are about to go back out into the desert mountains. Oh joy!

🐍 10:05 am - OMG! I swore again as I leapt to the right. A massive big snake on the left-hand side of the trail was probably about 4 foot long. It was black with one big yellow stripe down its back. Once I composed myself for nearly treading on the thing, I took a photo and video. My heart is still beating fast but this snake is rather elegant.

👩‍⚕️ 1120 am - Most people pass us as we are hiking slower than everyone else. As we hear a person approach from behind we instinctively pull over to let him pass. He is limping quite badly so we ask if he is ok. Matris (may have that wrong) from Germany explains how he heard a “pop” and now has pain on the bottom of his foot. We sit down and I get out my little chair. He puts his foot in my lap and I tape up the sole with some KT tape. His feet stink but it doesn’t matter. We all stink! I’m not sure if it helps but he says thank you and we send him on his merry way.

🥪 12.45pm - lunch time! Over 10 miles done and I’m ready for a break. TourGuide is here and then Sketch turns up. More noodles!

🥾 2:20 pm - and we’re off again after a nice long break, 9 miles to go. I’m looking out for that 600 mile mark. The blister on my right foot is giving me some pain so I’m limping a bit. Hey Ho, let’s get this shit done!

⚡️ 2:40 pm Wow! An electric pylon has collapsed and we have to duck underneath it without out packs touching anything. We can hear the cracking and sizzling from above. I then spot a ring of rocks which suggested that someone actually camped here! How crazy is that? That pylon could fall at any moment.

🦎 3.10 pm - This climb is relentless. It just goes on forever. To amuse ourselves we take videos and photos of a horny toad. These are difficult to spot as their camouflage skin blends with the sand. We spotted a couple though.

🪓 3:15 pm - “Hey, is that Nathan” shouts Bloom as two figures approach us from the opposite direction. “It sure is” said a deep voice. Nathan and Michele are part of a trail maintenance crew and have been cutting down trees/ bushes etc and helping to clear the trail for us. We actually saw them back in Mission Creek many many moons ago. Bloom knew his name as it was written on his work helmet back in Mission Creek. We chatted for a while and gave them our thanks. This trail would be even more challenging without volunteers like these kind people.

🌲 3:45 pm - Once again we are walking through gorgeous Forest Trail section. The ground is soft and pine cones are scattered along the trail. I love the wooded sections of this trail. The sun trying to peak inside to see what is happening beyond the trees.

🏃‍♂️ 5:16 pm I realise that I’ve not out recorded anything to video for a while (for YouTube) so Bloom and I set up a quick “walk by” shot. Just as we are done, we turn around to see a bare chested man running down the hill. He also runs by my camera which is still recording! Lol. As he whizzes by he said “found my earphones, see you at camp!”. We giggle and I can’t wait to see the video!

🌲 5:32 pm - Blown down after blow down. This is now turning into a full body workout as we climb over and crawl under the fallen trees.

🕺 6 o’clock and we reach a big milestone of 600 miles! I complete a little video for Theresa who made a SHOUT donation and asked me to do the 500 mile song dance. It was good fun. 😂

⛪️ 6.26pm - The strange things you see in the woods! A massive sign showing Gods 10 commandments. See photo

🏕️ 7.30pm - made it to camp! We are pitched about 0.2 from the water source but we have enough water for dinner and breakfast. There are just the two of us here which is lovely.

Night night everyone and thanks for listening to my rambles.

Signing off.

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