Captain's Log: Day 32

May 14, 2016

Our morning began with another home cooked meal courtesy of Amber and Joshua. Packing always seems take longer in town than it does on the trail and we weren't actually ready to go until closer to 8:00am. We said goodbye to Amber, Joshua, and Odyssey and loaded into the car to head back up to Walker Pass.

We started with a nice big climb up out of the pass. After an early lunch there we continued along the ridge for a bit before dropping back down to Joshua Tree Spring, known for its high uranium content. We skipped refilling there and continued on another mile to a campsite we hoped would have shade for a longer break. We got lucky and were able to hang out for 2 hours underneath a big pine tree. Chris, who had been taking it slower due to shin trouble of his own passed us with headphones in and head down and kept right on going, oblivious to our shouts.

The break was uneventful aside from a brief scorpion encounter but it disappeared back under its rock immediately after being disturbed. We set out again back up to the ridge and hopefully to non-contaminated water. We made it to the next water source, a river in name but not much more than a small stream, without seeing Chris and still hadn't caught up to him by the time we made it to camp. Perhaps Russian Ketchup was a fitting trail name after all given how intent he seemed to keep up with the group, even with the shin injury.

Along the way we crossed a pass where the wind was strong enough that you had to walk sideways to keep from being blown off the trail. Our campsite was grassy and sheltered from the wind, however, and the four of us opted to cowboy camp.