Sprout CDT Day 4 (March 22, 2018)

We got on the trail a little bit earlier than the other days this week but the heat was still an issue for us. Part of the problem is that we went from intense winter to a hot desert real quick! The heat is really pounding on us around 11:00 to 12:00. It almost feels unbearable! It’s a different heat too, a dry heat, which makes it easy to get dehydrated. You don’t even realize you are losing as much water as you are until it’s a little too late.

Right now we’re at 45.4 miles! That’s a little over 11 miles a day average and I’m totally fine with that!

We got to the water cache early and decided to stay there for the day, drink a lot of water, and get up around 3:30-4:00 a.m. Our plan is to get miles in tomorrow before the heat hits us. It was way too hot to set up the tent right away and even when we did it was way too hot to sit inside the tent.

We ended up opening the doors to the cache box and duct taping our umbrellas to the doors to sit under the shade. We kept rearranging positions and eventually ended up laying in the ground with our legs under the cache box holding our umbrellas haha! I bet we looked like a couple of weirdos, good thing no one was around. It was really cool under the box and so was the little space where we were laying in front of the box.

We saw one day hiker pass us throughout the day, other than that there is only a little bit of traffic on Highway 9 right in front of us.

We hope we get enough rest and can get up really early tomorrow. I don’t want to hike in the heat and the next water is 12.9 miles ahead.

Miles hiked: 6
Total miles hiked: 46

Animals seen:
Cows
Jackrabbits

Bubbles CDT Day 4 (March 22, 2018)

We woke up today and walked the rest of the way to the water cache. It was about 6 miles away. It was so hot that we decided that we are going to change our sleeping schedule and do something different.

We stayed at the cache, set up our tent, then went by the water cache box and put our legs under the shadow from the box and our sun umbrellas up over our faces. We covered our mid section with tie back and just laid there.

It was a little breezy so it was nice even though it was so hot. We hadn’t eaten much over the past few days so we made a couple meals, relaxed, and I took care of my blisters. They were hurting me so bad that when I was hiking I was limping and whimpering like a sad puppy. Sometimes I was almost in tears, not because I wanted to cry but because my eyes were welling up with tears because it was so painful. I popped some of them, put neosporin on them, and let them sit out of my socks all day so that they could breathe. I need different shoes and need to figure out something different for my desert hike. These New Balance shoes are just ripping to shreds.

We are in bed now (early) because we will be getting up in the morning early.

Miles hiked: 6
Total miles hiked: 46

Sprout CDT Day 2 (March 20, 2018)

It’s only our second day on the CDT and we have to cowboy camp! Haha what a way to start the trail. I actually don’t mind it right now because the stars are really bright and we heard coyotes about 20 minutes ago. I thought a lot today about Native Americans. It’s not even 9:00 and I’m already ready to fall asleep.

The CDT is hard! We got to the second water cache and ran into army guy. He was so happy to see us. I was surprised the other hikers weren’t with him. He hasn’t seen them since yesterday but we thought they were ahead of us with him. We chatted while we tried to set up our tent. However, the ground is nothing but sand and the stakes are not able to get a good enough grip to stay in while we put up the tent. After struggling and trying to get the tent to stay up we eventually accepted the fact that we were going to have to cowboy camp. We left our tent laying flat and put our air pads and sleeping bags down like we would if we were sleeping in the tent. Right now it’s not windy and the sky’s are clear ... let’s hope it stays that way!

Today was a brutal hike. The terrain was rough and it was hot. At the beginning of the day the direction of the trail was really hard to see and there were a bunch of little ups and downs over ankle twisting rocks. We kept reminding each other to drink plenty of water because it’s easy to forget in a dry heat. We can dehydrate without even realizing it.

I really hope the other hikers are ok. They are a little bit older but they seemed like they were ready to move down the trail. Right now there are five other people on trail and we have no idea where they are. I’ve heard that happens on the CDT. It’s really easy to get separated from other people.

This water cache is close to highway 81. We’ve already seen border patrol drive three or four times down the highway. The army guy said he was getting up at 5:00 and I told him we were trying to do the same thing. I really want to get up early and try to get 10 miles by noon like we were doing on the AT, especially being that we are in the desert. I wanna get miles in before it gets hot.

It’s supposed to start getting hot tomorrow (and I already thought today was bad!) At one point I thought my water was leaking but it was just sweat, lol. Bubbles just saw a shooting star so I think I better put the phone away and star gaze.

It’s absolutely beautiful in the desert. Beautiful but brutal. We did another 13 miles today, got a late start and got even more pushed back because we decided to put our sleeping pads inside our backpacks instead of the usual outside on the side strap. There are too many pointy cacti everywhere. Tomorrow is going to be tough with more ups and downs and 20 miles to the next water cache. There will be an opportunity in 13 miles to get water but the water quality it supposed to be pretty horrible. We might pack extra water out and dry camp.

Miles Hiked: 13
Total Miles Hiked: 26

Animals seen:
Cows
Rabbits

Good Morning!

Looking good with my sun umbrella

Bubbles CDT Day 2 (March 20, 2018)

We got up this morning super slowly. It took us a few hours to get up and out of camp. We made coffee and were a little tired from all of the traveling and excitement of getting on the trail.

We thought it was going to be an easy day to our first water cache (the CDCT has water caches for the first 85 miles if you get a shuttle through them, or pay $10 if you have your own ride to the southern trail head).

We thought it would be easy because we sort of flew through the first day. Although it was kind of rocky it was still easy. Today the trail was extreme, not hilly, but there were divots and humps from washouts where the water travelled when it rained really hard. You had to walk down in the crevices in the earth and then back up over and over. It was exhausting.

It was also hard to find the trail because there are just wooden posts. Some of the posts were over a few humps so it was difficult to find them. When we got to camp I was exhausted and my feet were torn up from the day. Despite this, it was beautiful. Everything in New Mexico is beautiful.

We met up with a man we first met on the Greyhound. He’s a nice older gentleman who is retired from the military. We talked to him for a little bit about our milage on the trail and how we felt. We were excited to see him (and he was excited to see us).

After we talked we realized we couldn’t set up our tent. The last mile we hiked, to the water cache (where we were camping), was through ankle deep sand. We have a Z Pack tent which requires our trekking poles to hold it up. The stakes would also not hold the tent. We ended up cowboy camping (which is when you sleep under the stars). It was crazy and reminded me of Porterhouse (Johnny Lip). Everytime he came out onto the AT, which was a lot, he would spend the night cowboy camping on the trail.

While we were cowboy camping crazy stuff was going on. Border Patrol was near us. Robby did wake up and noticed more than I did. I was a little bit spooked so when I woke up I just rolled over and went back to sleep. It was a long, long night. I could not stop thinking about tarantulas, bugs, spiders, and snakes but I finally passed out. It was a cool experience and the stars were amazing. I felt like I was in a different universe. I could see galaxies and it was crazy because they were so bright (not like Akron, Ohio city life!)

Miles Hiked: 13
Total Miles Hiked: 26