We had all agreed to wake up sometime around 7:00 a.m. John below me woke up first around quarter to 7:00 and that woke me up. I tried to cover my face with the arm of my fleece to stay asleep a little longer, but the fleece fell on the floor. A design flaw of the bunks in this place – things keep falling off the edges because there’s no border. It was nice to have hot coffee for a change – the previous two mornings I had just mixed cold water with instant coffee to save on gas. I managed to get out early around 8:00 a.m. but Chase had left probably 20 minutes before me. It was quite foggy out and a little rainy. I had my umbrella handy I tried to attach it to one of the holders on my backpack strap so that I could hike hands-free and keep my hands on the poles, but this really didn’t work. So I either head to hike without the umbrella in areas where it was too slippery or dangerous to hike with just one pole, or I had to hike with one pole and hold the umbrella with the other. In the end I just put the umbrella away because it really wasn’t raining very hard and I was drying off almost as soon as the raindrops fell on me. Unfortunately there wasn’t much in terms of a view because of the fog. Around 11:00 I came down to a gap which is a to say a road at a lower level and there were Trail Angels parked there there were three tents and they had a huge selection of food and drink. There was beef stew and when I asked about vegetarian they even had a vegetarian soup which they got out for me. They had tons of fruits and vegetables, they had granola bars, and all kinds of other things one might need on trail. I had a delicious bowl of soup, a banana, and some grapes. I took with me a clementine and an apple and a cylinder of electrolyte tablets. I continued on my way I passed probably four or five through hikers and quite a few day hikers since it is the weekend. Even though the weather was not great, people seem to be enjoying being out in it. By about 1:00 the rain had stopped and it stayed foggy for another 2 or 3 hours. I continued on past a shelter that was only 12 miles from my starting point, thinking I could make one that was 18 miles from my starting point by 5:00 p.m. however at 6:00 p.m. I was still not there. At 6:10 p.m. I found the Water Source near Blue Mountain shelter and filled up 3 l of water. Another 100 m up the trail was the shelter it’s a small shelter that probably only sleeps five and there were already three people in it so I decided to put up my tent. I cooked a meal of quinoa and black beans which I had made up at home and I have to say it was pretty gross. My tent unfortunately is not going up very well and it is raining now hopefully I will stay dry. I have to do a shorter day tomorrow so that I have an hour or two to practice putting up my tent so that I can figure out what I’m doing wrong. Had a brief call with Sheila in the evening but the connection was pretty poor so we weren’t able to chat very long. Overall a good day, but maybe 18 miles was a Touch Too Much might have been better to stick to 15 or 16. It’s 8:00
