July 15th, 2024
Mile Marker: 663.7
Miles Hiked: 25
We woke up this morning groggy as ever. Neither of us slept well last night. We were all snug and ready for bed around 10:30 or so and then around 11 PM I heard footsteps around our tent and branches breaking. Of course I thought it was a bear.
I woke Journey up, we sat up, and listened for a while then Journey yelled out and we could hear it run off. Okay, coast clear?
Nope, it came right back as Journey had drifted off to sleep again. Branches breaking and footsteps around by where our food bags were. Eventually Journey decided to get outside the tent and he stumbled upon a deer very close to our tent. It was startled and ran off but both of us knew it would be coming back again to eat whatever special grass lay there.
By this point it was midnight and our original plan was to wake up early to get out before the sun. That clearly did not happen.
We did however get out of camp early around 7:30 AM since we decided to cold soak our breakfast and have coffee in our water bottles for the first couple of miles.
I was surprised by how much I liked it, since it’s hot and there are still so many mosquitos. However, we got bug spray and it’s such a game changer thank goodness!
We started out with a short decline then a 3,000 foot climb. It was long and took us all morning to get to the top.
On the way up we passed a cabin that was run down. I always wonder what these things used to be used for?
We also went over many creeks that we had to figure out how to get across without getting our feet wet.
Once we got on top of the climb we had beautiful ridge views and then stayed up high for a while.
We stopped for a quick lunch at a spring and realized we are now being swarmed by bees. They don’t ever sting us but they land and we think they like our salt? It’s quite a bizarre experience, I can almost pet the bee while he’s on my leg. Hard to see in this picture but they are all over our packs too.
We played leap frog with Raspberry today, she would always pass when we stopped for a break and then we would pass her hiking.
Around 1:30 Journey and I were starting to feel very drained. It was hot and pretty exposed and with no sleep, we were dragging our feet.
We decided against a nap since we had many miles to cover and decided to listen ti music instead.
We came across many lakes today and then around dinner time decided to wash off and take advantage of the beautiful lake.
We had almost passed this lake and I told Journey I wanted to have some fun. It’s hard when we know we have planned for 5 days of 25 and days like today when the miles crawl by we don’t get much time to stop and smell the roses.
So we decided to eat dinner and soak a little and then packed up and hiked another few miles. I immediately felt better after dinner and a wash. It’s the little things.
While hiking on we saw two different deer at two different locations that were right on trail and standing their ground. It was adorable the way they twisted and turned their ears when we talked to them. There is something so mysterious and lovely about deer.
Today was another big elevation day and we made it halfway up a climb and called it quits for the day since it’s 8 PM. We ended at this beautiful lake and to our surprise Raspberry was there as well.
All we had to do was hang our food bags and set up our tent and as Journey threw our rock bag to hang food, somehow it got wedged in the tree. Thank goodness Journey has spider like skills and hopped on up, poked it with a stick, and I pulled it loose. 😅
Good views today, tomorrow should be a little easier elevation wise!
Hope we can sleep tonight!
Iz and Oz
Izzy + Ozzy 