What a day. 

We only did 18 miles and yet we both decided to stop hiking early.  

I should have known the day was going to be a struggle when I had issues rinsing out my socks this morning.  It was very cold and my hands were already showing signs of Ranauds, so you think I would have stayed away from the cold water.   But no.   I somehow convinced myself that I could handle it.  

I could not.

I shed a few tears as I attempted to wring out the socks (I was washing Nick’s, too, since he was taking down the tent).  My hands felt like someone had been holding them in a pile of snow for several hours.   It was so extremely painful that tears of pain pooled in my eyes without my knowing it.  Let’s not do that again.

Another way I should have known the day was going to be a struggle was when it took me way too long to find the trail to Mt. Taylor when  it diverted from the road.  Even with GPS, I found myself walking in circles for a bit until I figured it out.  I felt very silly.  

Once I was sure I was on the trail, an earbud on my one of my headphones popped off when I accidentally ripped them out of my ears (the cord got caught on my hiking pole if you must know). I spent quite a bit of time looking for the little sucker but had no luck finding it.  Resolved to make do with just one headphone, I reached up to brush some hair out of my face and found the earbud still in my ear - it was so cold out that I barely felt there.  One again, I felt silly.

Despite feeling silly, I was happy to have use of both headphones as I summited Mt. Taylor.  I loved the hike to the top - it was great to get my heart pumping on such a chilly morning and the views were fantastic.  

I felt strong as I hiked to the top.  Don’t get me wrong, I cursed under my breath a few times on the way up like a normal person, but overall it was fun and exhilarating.  Once at the summit, I was pleased to see Google, Blaze, and Kathryn among the many hikers who arrived before me.  (Before Nick and I finished breakfast, everyone we were camping with was already gone.   I figured I wouldn’t see them for most of the day, if at all, so it was good to see their smiling faces.)  

At the top, I ate a snack while I contemplated my future.  Going up was easy for me but now I had to go down. 

I probably should have had three snacks instead of just one. While at first the downhill was fine, after several hours of it my right IT band/outer knee started to complain.  A few more miles later it started to really protest.  By the time I made it to water/lunch, it was screaming.  

While my ankle annoyance and my blisters (yep, that’s right, plural. I have a blister on my inner right heel now, too - at least I’m symmetrical) had been the loudest things in my Pain Cave, once my IT band started to scream, that’s all I heard.  What an incredible miracle cure for blister pain it was, though!  I didn’t notice the blisters at all.

We had to walk off-trail about a quarter of a mile for water.  To make matters worse, it was downhill.  I do not know how I made it there - my hips and knee and IT band were raging.  For the second time today, there were tears.  

Taking off the pack and sitting down for lunch was glorious. Plus, Nick and I ate together, which always makes me happy.  Nick asked what he could do to make my day better and his hug was exactly what I needed.  Well, that and sitting down - when I stopped moving, my issues went utterly silent.

Since nothing bothered me while I was sitting down for lunch, I hoped that I would be able to hike the rest of the day without issue.  

HAHAHAHAHA

This is the last picture I took (except for when we were in camp), looking back at where we had lunch.  After this, photography was the last thing on my mind.

Rather than backtrack and hike another extra quarter of a mile, after lunch we decided to bushwhack back to the trail.  The bushwhacking part was easy and we found the trail just fine.  However, my IT band woke up shortly after I snapped the above picture; I was so focused on putting one foot in front of the other that taking pictures was the furthest thing on my mind for the rest of the day. 

Whenever there was a downhill, I had to stop to stretch every few steps.  (There was a lot of downhill.  Actually, it  was pretty much all downhill.) At one point, when we were walking through a previously burned area, I didn’t think I’d be able to go on.  I plopped myself right down on the ashy ground next to a scorched tree.  I sat there, eating a snack and trying to figure out how to fix myself. 

I ended up just massaging and stretching the heck out of my leg, and when I got up it felt ok.  For a while at least. 

Suddenly, out of nowhere, my right hip flexor decided to make noise, probably because of the weird way I was walking.  Again, this turned out to be a miracle cure for my IT band/knee issue because all I felt for the last 3 miles was my hip flexor that didn’t want to work.

Maybe it was a blessing in disguise that my hip flexor started to hurt.  It hurt so much that I stopped to check the FarOut app to see how far away I was from the water source where Nick and I planned to meet.  

Which is how I realized I had walked 0.5 miles off-trail.  

Come to think of it, I should have trusted myself when I thought I saw footprints going in the opposite direction.   (Obviously, I wasn’t the first hiker today to miss the turnoff to the trail.). But no, instead my hip flexor ended up doing the job for me.  

So, just when I needed to have a short day, I went ahead and made it longer.  Sigh.  At least there were no more tears.  Instead, I resigned myself to my fate and admitted defeat- there was no way we’d be doing any additional miles today.  I texted Nick via the Bivy and told him to go ahead and set up the tent because I was on the struggle bus and would be getting to camp late.  I didn’t take any Ibuprofen/Vitamin I because by the time I thought of it I was almost to camp.  Just as well, I’d like to keep my use of it to a minimum. 

When I finally made it and saw Nick (he hadn’t read my message), he told me he was having a rough go, too, and that he didn’t want to hike any more miles, either. So at least we are having a bad day together.  That helps.

Blink, Master Chef, and Fuego were at the water, too.  I hadn’t seen Master Chef and Fuego since the Toaster House and it was great catching up with them.  Blink told me he had a rough day, too, and said he was also going to forgo more miles and camp here as well; this also made me feel better.  (Of course, a little while later he changed his mind and hiked on.  This is why I’m glad I have Nick to keep me in check- otherwise, I’d be just like Blink and keep hiking just because it feels wrong to stop)

Nick set up the tent while I was talking to Blink et al and getting water, so there was no changing our minds about staying.  Learning from this morning’s incident, I rinsed our socks while it was still warm outside.  Then we had dinner, purified water that massively clogged our filters, and brushed our teeth. I was happy for the rough day to be over.

As I was flossing, I heard Dictionary calling my name.  Apparently, she found some hiking poles by a tree closer to the water and Shredder said they might be mine.  They were, of course.  I had dropped them there when I saw Nick and never went back to get them after Nick set up the tent.  Oops.  How many times can one feel silly in one day?

The good thing about me forgetting my poles is that it gave me a chance to talk to Dictionary a little.  She’s from Germany, by the way.  It’s also her German hiking partner’s birthday, so I was sure to tell her “Alles Gute Zum Geburtstag”.  By the look on her face, my pronunciation was awful but the effort was appreciated. :)

Let’s hope a good night’s rest is all we need - we have 73 miles left to hike and 3 days left to hike them in. 

Along the trail:

Camp: