Day 44: nocturnal wanderings, and 600 miles!! :)

Friday 6/1/12
Miles 566-602 (36 mile)
Elevation 6,337ft

11:30pm
The coolest experience I had today was when I came to an open part of the trail, the sun was setting to my left and the moon was shining on my right, and a deer hopped right across the trail. I thought that was pretty rad. That's the 2nd deer I've seen on the trail.

Anyhow, I'm trying to switch my body to a nocturnal system, and there's basically 2 ways to do that: sleep all day or stay awake all day and night. I chose the latter.

This morning I didn't get on the trail til about 930am. I hiked for about 7 miles and I saw a bunch of hikers taking a break under some trees so I stopped too. It was around noon and I don't like hiking during the hottest part of the day anyways. I set my tent up and tried to sleep there after everyone had left. I think I got maybe 2 hours of sleep. I started hiking again at 530 since I had 10 miles to go til the next water source.

The sunset was really cool!! I wish i got a pic of it but there were too many tall bushes in the way so I couldnt get a clear shot. But I got a pic of the windmills at dusk and a cool one of the moon too.

Anyhow I didn't get to the water source til about 1015pm. I love hiking at night the temperature is so much more favorable. Problem is the winds are around 20-30+mph right now. Ugh. At least it's not super cold wind.

So anyhow, I'm sitting at the water source now, which is a spring fed cow trough. Kinda gnarly but eh, its water :). I just cooked some food and made a mocha (I add a hot chocolate packet to coffee). The next water source is about 19 miles away. Ugh. So basically I'm gonna hike through the night and see how far I can get. I'll either bust the entire 19 miles or take a nap somewhere then get to that next water source before noon tomorrow and sleep there til evening, and then hike again. So anyhow, here I go! Geez I hope this wind calms down its pretty gnarly right now. That or I hope i don't have to walk on any ridges. Lol.

10:30am
36 miles BAM! Holy crap that just royally kicked my ass. I'm gonna pass out now, and perhaps wake up on Monday. Lol. Now that im back up in elevation theres actually trees again! Oh, I hit 600 miles around 9am :). I also got some sweet pics of the sunrise.