Day 28-30

Aquaduct, emergency room, Tehachapi No photos of interest.

Ok, Chris really is sick. Hiking with acute bronchitis. Not good. We were both bummed, but could not leave with others in our group at 3:00 AM to hike desert when cool along Aguaduct because Chris had a bad night of coughing fits and woke with a low grade fever. We have been vaccinated, but wanted to make sure it wasn’t something serious, so we called a trail angel in AM who was kind enough to drive us from Hiker Town to the Tehachapi Hospital.

Great hospital!! Chris given IV fluids, water in a cup (with ice!), X-rays, blood work. Not Covid. Prescribed cough suppressant, rest, lots of fluids and warm moist air (not very common in desert).

We spent two more days in a hotel in Tehachapi while Chris slept and Rick ran errands. After much discussion and review of weather, we decided to rejoin trail at Willow Springs trail along Aquaduct (miss 46 miles to hike before end of 2021) and head into Mojave because of unseasonably cool weather. Rick was happy!

Update:

• later learned that water cache along the Aquaduct may have been source of Norovirus - see future posts. Perhaps it’s good we decided to delay that 46 mile hike until the end.