As Cold as ice

Miles: 11.01
Start time: 10:02am
End time: 4:25pm
High / Avg / Low temp: 84.5F / 68.3F / 53.9F
Relative Humidity Avg: 32.5%
Injuries: none to report

Today started off much as yesterday was, so cold, it was 35F in our tent at 6am, but it got warmer quickly thankfully and turned into another lovely day.  We camped last night at a day use only area, we didn't really plan it though, fighting off hypothermia led to our choice, but we weren't alone...

We woke up to about five tents in this area, and a truck load of hikers were delivered, by truck, before we headed out, though we didn't see much of them along the day, cept Gandalf, staff with a quartz crystal and all, he's camped in the area with us tonight, and a British guy, and a guy from California we played leap frog with during the day.

We started the day out with chores, and drying our stuff which attracted condensation and frost the previous night, the condensation was largely increased due to our batoning down the hatches the night before due to high winds and such, and we were successful in keeping the wind at bay, and our choice of camp site also included a bit of brush to act as a wind buffer, so we had a better night, cept for the enduring cold... shiver...

Chores included anything with water, given that for the next 25miles at least water would be at a premium (none too be found cept what we carry), so washing clothes, filtering gallons of water, eating oatmeal, blah blah

We left camp with about 8 liters each, knowing that we wouldn't see a water source till the end of tomorrow, and that is even sketchy as it is a cache maintained by amazing trail angels, but has no promises of any water, despite them dropping about 300 gallons a week there, so if we dip out tomorrow afternoon our only choice is to hitch at that highway overpass to the nearby town of Julian. Apparently its not a tricky hitch..time will tell

Today was full of panoramas, and fairly flat or down hill for the most part, blazing sun with zero shade was the other theme, lunch time break included hiding under our sun umbrellas for some respite of the midday sun. 

At a lil over half way I took a half mile round trip to use a bathroom on the highway, life is about small comforts and I found data connection so I could post last night's blog, so win win really,

Tonight we are camped in an old river bed, sore feet and a lil burnt but otherwise in great spirits and looking forward to finding water at the end of tomorrow's 14ish miles.