A rainbow of colour

June 6 - A rainbow of colour

Squished insect in shoe. Lesson learned: check shoes before inserting feet!

I usually fall asleep right away but last night I lay awake, thoughts racing, until midnight. It may have been thinking about bears and having that bacon cheese burger hanging in my pack at the end of my hammock, lol. 

I  just couldn't find a place to hang my food bag, so I quadruple wrapped the burger and hoped for the best.  It's 12:30am as I write this. 

Woke up to rain hitting the tarp with a nice sort of rat-a-tat-tat sound. It didn't stop so I got up and packed up and then headed out. I rather enjoyed the rain at first.  But as the day wore on and the shoes got soaked and my feet began moving in them, the pleasantness wore off. 

VERY tough day for me. Blisters and sore feet were a problem. And my pack was hurting my left shoulder again. I have to figure that one out as it makes no sense. But I did notice the left shoulder strap is twisted a bit as it lies on my shoulder. The right one is perfectly flat. Manufacturing error?  

As I hiked along, water soaked trails going squish, squish, squish, I thought of my bacon cheese burger and how good it would taste later on, sitting in my hammock munching away waiting for the coffee to heat up. Then another thought struck me. Would it be safe to eat?! But I had wrapped it tightly. Surely no bacteria could breed? Damn. 

There was one big 2.5 mile climb up an unnamed mountain which had a view but my only view the entire day was misty fog. There was also a fire tower view three miles along the ridge of this mountain but I didn't even bother walking up to it. 

But what there was today was plenty of was colour!  All along for a week now, there have been these six to ten foot high bushes with bright orange flowers but they've been off the trail and I couldn't get a picture. Today, they were right up alongside the trail and not only were there orange blossoms but there also were hot pink blossoms and two-tone pink and white ones. They were all along the edge of the trail going up and down and they had the most wonderful scent.

Finally I arrived at my destination, Doc's Knob shelter. I backed up a hundred yards to a nice looking wooded area that I had passed and set up my hammock, in the rain of course. But I was home for the night. I was dry and I was warm. 

And the burger was great.  :)

Home right on the trail.