A day that had it all; pain, annoyance, relief, joy, excitement and sadness.
It started with the a long morning of descending into town. It would be 18 miles downhill from where I was camped. Even though I generally don’t mind hiking downhill, 18 miles is a long way, and all that elevation loss is tough on the knees and feet. I left camp around 0700, put on a podcast and started cruising down. Not sure yet if I wanted to stay in Sierra City I knew I couldn’t take too much time to get there.The General Store that held my packages would not be open forever.
A shame, but once again the scenery wasn’t really doing it for me. Mostly the trail crossed through pine-forests and only occasionally upon reaching a clearing in the fores, I’d get a view of the valley. The valley-views however were again mostly trees. I felt tired. Even though it’d been only a four day stretch, it had been a tough one, and after getting into Sierra City, I would have hiked over 100 miles. The daily mileage had indeed gone up. I didn’t meet any of my hiker buddies today. Photo-op and Rocket had pushed on further than me yesterday and were now in front. About 7 miles away from town all of a sudden the GPS of my phone died on me. This left me frustrated because I now had a detailed map of my surroundings, but no clue as to where I was in relation to them. Several attempts of restarting my phone and the app left me with nothing. No success. I knew where to get off trail, and I knew I would be alright, but because the app had been working just fine this morning I was worried there was an issue with my phone. If for some reason the GPS-function of my phone had gone haywire, I’d have a bigger problem. In these remote area’s I did not expect to have an Iphone-repair-service handy somewhere. I hoped I would be able to sort it out after a decent charge, in Sierra City. Just before arriving at the highway, the trail wound upwards. The small but pretty steep climb, was a nice little kick in the guts just before heading off trail. Nice…
At the highway I fortunately got a ride quickly, saving me the additional 3 miles of roadwalking into town. At the patio of the General Store there were a ton of hikers hanging out. Photo-op, Rocket, Snow-White, Birdman, Mach5 and others I didn’t really know (yet). I went in the store and collected my packages. Since I no longer carry a bear-can I bought two odor-proof bags to carry my food in. They are basically very large and durable zip-locs.
I supplemented my resupply-boxes with some extra food from the store. The plan is to hike straight into Chester, some 140 miles from here. At the store they maintain a cunning approach; there’s no price tags on any of the products. I only had to add approximately 1.5 to 2 days of food to my resupply-box, so I did not grab a whole lot of items. When I went to pay at the register though, the screen lit up an astounding 55.01 dollars. Cha-Ching! Nice doing business in Sierra City…
I deleted my interactive maps-app hoping that after installing it again, the GPS-issue would be sorted out. Because there were some 15 hikers using the Wifi, it was terribly slow and downloading the app, maps, and way-points took forever. Finally it got done, and relieved I went to the bar to enjoy a cold drink, and hanging out with Dr. Strange.
Around 1800 I decided it was about time I headed out again. Once again I quickly got a hitch out, and back at the trail-head it was time for some dinner. Nothing luxurious, I still had some tortillas, cheese and salami to finish from the previous stretch. With a little under two hours left before sundown it was time for the final grind; halfway up a steep 10 mile climb were some tent-sites. Even though my pack was now pretty much filled to full capacity with a fresh resupply and heavy, I started charging up the hill. If I could get the 5 miles done before 2100 I wouldn’t have to pitch my tent in the dark. My rested legs felt strong, despite having hiked 18 miles already today. I flew up the hill, and made it to the top before nine. Nice! There were a couple of hikers already camped which showed me a free spot. Relieved that it was not crazy late, I was just happy to write my entry and ready to get to bed at a decent hour. After laying out all my stuff, I hauled my body back in my tent, and that’s when I heard a ripping noise. Immediately I realized I’d somehow cut another hole in my sleeping pad, which was now deflating in record time. I’d forgotten to take my sunglasses out the side pocket of my shorts and when sliding over the pad they’d cut a pretty large tear in it. I was so bummed out!
This is the second hole I had to patch up, and I’m not sure how much longer I will be able to rely on it to stay properly inflated. I asked the other hikers if anybody had any appropriate tape, and fortunately someone did. I tried patching the tear as good as I could, but the pad kept deflating and deflating. I used some small patches of my duct-tape too, but it did no good. At this point (after writing the entry) I now have probably inflated my pad seven or eight times over. Oh the tragics of the trail... Pretty frustrated now it was time for some drastic measures. I tore of two gigantic patches of duct-tape and taped over my earlier attempts. I’m fairly certain that it will not last the night, but there’s nothing else I can do now. Maybe I will stick it out for 6 days on a shaky pad, maybe I’ll go back to Sierra City to see if I can find some stuff (superglue?) to patch it up properly.
What’s the point of never knowing at all?
When every step I take is always too small.
Maybe it’s just something I can’t admit,
But lately I feel like I don’t give a shit.
Motivation such an aggravation
Accusations don’t know how to take them
Inspiration getting hard to fake it
Concentration never hard to break it
Situation never what you want it to be
What’s the point of never making mistakes
Self-indulgence’s such a hard habit to break
It’s all just a waste of time in the end
Don’t care, so why should I even pretend?
Motivation – Sum 41
