What a wonderful evening. As we lay down on our tyveks in anticipation of our first night of cowboy-camping we watched the sky change colors while the sun set. I played some mellow tunes as background music on my phone and we just lay down, gazing at the stars. It wouldn’t be for long that the meteor shower started. I must have caught some seven or eight shooting stars within the hour! It was amazing. There was really no place I’d rather be than there under the canvas of stars with my friends.
After a while, each of us started to doze off, and I found myself fighting to stay awake. The trail-fatigue won and I fell asleep.
Waking up to my first night of cowboy camping was cool. I’d fallen into a very deep slumber and with my head tucked away deep into my sleeping bag I woke up way past sunrise. The views into the valley with some of the lingering smoke were pretty spectacular and we took our time to pack up our stuff and hike out.
After a leisurely breakfast we started around 0830 and were pretty soon hiking in the sun, beneath blue skies again. It felt great be outside and out of the smoke once more, really making me appreciate the clear air. Unfortunately my feet hurt pretty bad this morning, so I hopped on the vitamin I train, which gave me some relief for the first couple of hours.
At our first real break-site we run into Peach-man and Free-wheel again, who were also enjoying a relaxed start of their day. Yesterday they had hiked a couple of miles further than us. We kept hiking as a group for the majority of the day, but around noon when all of the others hiked ahead at one of the water-sources, I lost them. I simply had to stop for an early lunch because I was running on fumes. I had a little chat with Benjamin Button and Bond before chasing the others. For some reason my phone had not properly charged overnight, so I kept in in my pack as it was connected to my power-bank. We had agreed on meeting up at the lake that was coming up as lunch-spot. After some time of hiking without music or podcasts or checking my phone I was longing for some tunes, so I grabbed my phone again. I checked my online maps and saw that I’d missed the side-trail leading towards the lake. I hiked back 0.2 miles and climbed 0.2 miles up the hill to join the others. I did not see anybody there however. When I looked at my maps again, I learned that I’d gone to the wrong lake, and the one we agreed upon was another 5 miles further up the trail. My excitement from thinking I’d made real good progress quickly dissolved, because now I realized I’d hardly gotten any closer to catching the others. Also I had wasted about another half hour going to the wrong lake…
Sadly the winds had driven new shrouds of smoke into the valleys the latter part of the afternoon, and my feet were still hurting. And thus began a long and painful 5-mile grind to finally get me to the lake where I indeed found the others chilling out. Glad to give my feet a rest though, I lay down on my tyvek and prepared my dinner for later that evening. It would be another 6 miles to camp, but now that I was hiking in company again I found some renewed energy and the last stretch was not too bad. All of us are cowboy-camping (again) inside a forest, next to a trickling stream and it is a little after 2100. A nice early evening. Tomorrow we’re aiming to do some big miles to get us closer to the town of Mt. Etna.
Sometimes I still see myself
in that lonesome bedroom,
playing my guitar
and singing songs of hope
for a better future
Life is
Only,
as good as the memories we make
And i’m taking back what belongs to me
Polaroids of classrooms unattended
These relics of remembrance
are just like shipwrecks
Only theyre gone faster
than the smell after it rains
So Long Astoria – The Ataris
