Woke at 4:00
They say it is coldest just before the dawn; darn right. It got below freezing. I had a damp towel that froze. Andy had a water bottle freeze.
I started as the sun just rose. Pretty easy hiking until some rocky ground, ankle busting and trip hazard stuff.
Got to 4th water cache, saw Pyramid Peak. I found it to be an optical illusion; the closer I got, the farther away it seemed.
Since it was getting windy late in the day, I thought I wanted to get to the peak by dark for dinner so that I could find a canyon and be buffeted from wind.
I encountered lots of barbed fire fences that I had to crawl under. I lost the trail markers for a while
I finally got up near the peak and sat down in a wash around 8:30 pm. It was still pretty windy where I was, but I made dinner. I then discovered my side Platypus water container was open and leaking. Fortunately I was carrying a lot of water in my pack.
A thought popped into my head. It’s Friday. Tomorrow is Saturday. The post office will probably close tomorrow at noon. I have a huge box of stuff at the Econolodge I need to send somewhere. If I don’t handle this Saturday morning I will be stuck until Monday before I can get back on the trail. Heck!
Looking at my maps, it looked like I would be walking on road. I would not encounter rocky, thorny stuff. I was comfortable putting on a headlamp in the dark and walking on a road. Therefore, I decided to try to make it into Lordsburg that night.
That was a fine plan until the trail went offroad. As I kept going along the road I noticed that I had not seen a CDT sign in a while, and I seemed to be going away from where I saw lights and heard traffic. Heck! Now what?
I opened my CDT hiker app on my iPhone to see where I was. I noticed it indicated some kind of road nearby, connecting to another road, connecting to a road (Anistas St) that went right into town. In order to get to this road, I would have to get off the road I was on and do some cross country navigating in the dark.
I treaded carefully to not stumble over unseen objects. The problem is that it is hard enough to tell the difference between a dirt road and a wash, much less in the dark. I had quite a few hunt and peck sessions in my state of late night delirium until I came to yet another barbed wire fence and gate. CDT Hiker confirmed I had found Anistas St. HeHo!
All I had to do was climb under what I hoped was the last fence and mindlessly walk 7 miles. After I slid my pack under I got down on my back and immediately felt my left shoulder burst into flame. I had just put my shoulder on top of a cholla, a prevalent plant covered in thorns.
After I got under the fence, putting my pack back on felt great (not) when it pressed the cholla needles further into my shoulder. From about midnight to 2:30 am I drifted down the road, occasionally swerving toward the ditch. I was rehearsing my line “Room for 2 nights please” because in my state of incoherence I might blurt “night room 2 need please” or some other nonsensical derivative. When I got to the Econolodge I delivered my line eloquently and showered, brushed my teeth, popped some ibuprofen, and put on some clean clothes. It was at this point that I discovered my enjoyment of fresh chopped onion in my ramen made everything in my pack smell like onions, including my clothes. I got to bed at 3:00 am.
Though I really didn’t have any physical pains other than being really sleepy, I vowed not to try another 40 mile day again.