It’s Basically Flat

Well last night was interesting. Sometime in the middle of the night I woke up and found that my tent had collapsed on me. No big deal...so I sat up and started putting my pole back up and putting the stake back in the ground. At the same time, my bladder decided it was full and must be emptied immediately. I tried not to panic as I was trying to keep my tent up, find my Kula cloth, and not pee in my tent. I finally got the tent up and was able to pee.

Thinking all was well in the world, I crawled back into my tent and pulled my quilt over me. As I nestled in to fall back asleep, I figured I would dose back off. But no...the intestines decided that my bladder had had enough attention and they needed some. I was thinking why could this have not happened before I got cozy in my tent again. I scrambled again as I tried to find my headlamp and dug through my bag looking for toilet paper. I made a mad dash for the privy fearing how much time I had before all hell broke loose. After dodging the brush and random tents, I finally made it to the privy. I swear these things keep getting smaller the farther up trail we get. At least the sky was clear so you could see the stars and had a nice view. After my 30 minute series of events, I finally was able to curl up and go back to sleep.

When morning finally came, I felt rested and even felt like making oatmeal. I made my concoction of oatmeal, powdered chocolate peanut butter, powdered milk, and honey. It hit the spot and I was ready to rock out 16 or so miles.

The hike this morning wasn’t too bad and 3 or so miles in there were some rocks you could go out on that had some beautiful views. Dingo and Straps were there too and we were all taking pictures. Light Saber wanted to go climb the rocks, but I squashed the fun and told him that, while I didn’t doubt his climbing ability, if he fell, I would feel obligated to stay and help and I had miles to do.

Not too far afterward, there was a beautiful ridge walk. It was such a clear day which made the view that much better. As we were coming down off the ridge, we hit the 300 mile mark which was exciting. After the climb down, everyone was hanging out at the shelter eating lunch. I had planned to go farther before stopping, but everyone knows I’ll never turn down a social lunch. We hung out for a few before moving on.

The next climb was to the top of Big Butt. There was nothing super special about the rocky climb or the view, but obviously everyone had to make some jokes about it and the large crack at the summit.

They made me lead when we left the top. I couldn’t go too fast down the rocky decent, but as soon as I hit the regular trail I was flying. Normally I go fast downhill since it feels better on my knees than going super slow. When I have people behind me though, I always feel like I’m slowing them down so I feel like I’m basically running. You know the meme of Jack Sparrow being chased across the beach...that’s the mental image I have every time I have people following me.

Several people stopped for the night at the shelter about 7 miles from where we ate lunch, but 22 convinced us that in 3 more miles there was a “secret hostel” talked about in the comments on Guthook and they had pizza. He also said it was “basically downhill.” They put me back in the front again and off we went. I will tell you that “basically” meant there were definitely some reverse downhills in there.

We finally came to the road and started walking toward the hostel. The owner, Tim, was nice. We all picked out pizza and I grabbed a Mt. Dew while we waited. Duck grabbed the last meat lovers so I was giving him a hard time about stealing the last of everything I was going to get, first the English muffin at the diner, now the pizza. Tim grilled the pizza while we were hanging out there. This was the first time I’d ever had a grilled pizza.

While we were hanging out Salamander, Burp, and Cinderella, came to get some snacks. The little Jack Russel dog came barking at Salamander. We assumed he wasn’t a fan of his short shorts.

With our bellies full, and honestly lots of crazy things happening with the mixture of pizza and Mt. Dew going on in my stomach, we walked a 1/4 mile up to a campsite where Salamander, Burp, Cinderella, and Ringer were. We set up and got a fire rolling. I didn’t last too long cause when 22 showed me all the sweaty flats I had to climb the next day I was already tired.

Oh yeah...we have coined new terms so elevation change. Actually flat is just that. Sweaty flats are uphills and hurt-your-knee flats are down hill.