Miles hiked: 22.3
Mile marker: 1142
I misplaced by earplugs somewhere yesterday, so my night was filled with potential bats jumping on my tent. Or something like that.
Anyway, I didn’t sleep the best and I’m exhausted.
We get moving and it’s another perfect morning with weather that’s neither hot nor cold.
We’re not even three miles in when I find Bumper waiting by a creek.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, thinking the others are ahead of me.
“Waiting for y’all!” he says.
I guess we all had to stop for a bathroom break.
We hike on until we reach a picnic bench filled with hikers. Luxy has service so she’s placing an REI order to ship to Chester. Rafiki and I jump in on this because our shoes are wearing thin on the bottom.
An hour later and we’re still here. I think today is going to be another long day, as it’s almost ten o’clock and we’ve done about six miles!
We keep hiking and soon we go up a long ascent that takes a long time. I’m hiking alone, thinking about family stuff, when finally I spot a flat tent site.
I drop my bag here since it’s lunch time and walk to look at the view of mountains.
Lunch is windy and slightly cool as we sit around the tent site.
“I have bad news, guys,” Luxy says. “My REI order was flagged for suspicious activity and they canceled my order.”
“Again!” I say. “This is the second time REI has done this!”
We’ll just have to place the order at another time. But we don’t have too much time since Chester is only a couple of weeks away.
We hike into an open ridge. It’s beautiful and wide open! I can see Lake Tahoe to my right and mountains to my left. The sky is bright blue with splotches of puffy white clouds.
Rafiki is way ahead of me, so I make it a goal to see if I can catch him if I just increase my pace slightly. I do this sometimes when I get bored.
The ridge line closes into woods. Down some switchbacks now, I slowly gain on Rafiki.
I’m right behind him. He slows down to look at his phone. He turns and sees me then jumps.
“I didn’t see you there!” he says.
I’m glad I can be called stealthy!
We sit down to filter water when I see we have service. Two other hikers soon join us as we wait for Luxy.
“I need a riddle to pass!” Scooby, a tall guy with a reddish beard says.
“What has eyes, but can’t see; can run but has no feet, and smells but has no nose?”
They roll this one over for a while, until I give the hint all thru hikers have it. Orange Man, another hiker, guesses.
“Shoes?”
“Yes!” I say.
Luxy joins us. We place the REI order, mainly consisting of Luxy’s injinji socks since hers wear through after about three days.
We hike on. It’s a big uphill, but after a while we finally run into Bumper at the campsite.
It’s been a long day and I’m ready for bed!
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