Day 36

Horse trail camp to cottonwood creek and faucet - 26.8 miles

Total - 534.9 miles

I for the life of me could not sleep last night . Maybe a total of 4 hours which was brutal as we had the La Aquaduct coming later today which we were planning on doing more at night. I had left some trail mix in my shoulder pocket and around 10 pm I heard some crunching noises which at first was confusing and then I put two and two together and figured it was a rodent trying to get at my snack mix. So then it was a whole ordeal to put everything in my bag and bring my bag into my tent. Then I thought every little sound was a rodent trying to chew through my tent to get to my previous snacks. So I didn’t sleep. I got up around 4:45ish and started to pack up to just get into hiker town. While the hike was gorgeous, it sucked ass. I was not doing the bushwhacking but being bushwacked. My heels were giving me so much pain and the trail made no sense. You could see the town but we kept going up and town and around. I did 9.5 miles by 8:30 and walked into hiker town to see lil oozy and civilized. The owner of hiker town was screaming around for her dogs. No dogs to be found. Walked up to gourmet and kit who were also lounging around. I grabbed my package that my mother so kindly sent. It was fucking heavy especially for only a max three day carry. I think I’m carrying 7 days worth of food now but I ain’t giving up the food just bc we are reaching Tehachapi in 2. I did end up giving some away to the bars, Marc, and Caleb but not much. Very thankful for the help back home but I think I need to be more specific day wise next time. I love you mom, you did so well. We went to the market with the owner to grab breakfast and lunch. God forbid there’s a good driver in this town. People we drifting into others lanes constantly. Still happy and grateful for the drive tho but I’m wait in f for the day we get into a head on collision because of a trail angel. We met Marc at the cafe as he was working on his PhD. We all ordered breakfast burritos but I’m the only one that got profiled goddamit. Caleb’s and the bards had HUGE burritos and they came out with the smallest one just for me. I’m a lil lady that can put it DOWN, give me a bigger burrito. I got a burger as well though and that was dank so I’m mad but not too mad. After hanging out we headed back to the oasis we call Hikertown and figured out our plan which was to leave around 4pm to hopefully arrive at camp around 10. This is was after having a tramily miscommunication and squabble. We were up for anything either 17.7 more or 24 more. Clearly we chose 17 at the end of the day as we had already done 9.5 miles earlier in the day. We also got to hang with Ella on her birthday!!! Super exciting! Not to again try to air out others dirty laundry on here but she’s been going through a hard patch so it was fun to celebrate her and show her she’s got a good group of people around her. We had a little gossip sesh where I could also air out my dirty laundry lol. After, we lounged all day. I booked a massage in Tehachapi (I hate spelling this goddamn town name), which I am so excited for. Imma be moaning and groaning for 90 minutes. Then it was time to the safe haven called Hikertown (thank god). Started with high spirits and a group of 5 practically running as the guys strides are fucking huge. It was windy but not the worst we have ever felt. It was hot but not the worst we have ever felt either. It was just right;). We came across the LA Aquaduct pretty early on where it looks exactly how your picturing it…an Aquaduct. Still super cool to see tho. We walked along it for awhile before we hit the Aquaduct pipe where people famously walk on top of the pipe as long as they can. I personally didn’t want to be blown off the pipe so I walked on the road majority of the time. We then hit just dirt road and concrete Aquaduct pavement. This is where things start to feel delusional. Everyone is starting to hurt from the slapping of our joints against a concrete surface, the wind is still making us cold when we stop, my fucking shoulders are being personally vicitimized from the weight I’m carrying on my back, the guys are chirping me as always. Moral wasn’t the lowest the entire LA Aquaduct but none of us wanted to be there anymore and was hoping by some miracle of god a hitch would spawn out of the middle of no where and drive us to Tehachapi. It didn’t. I had been bitchin and complaining about not having enough flat sections and it’s always up or down and then I finally get the flattest section of all and I am still not happy. Everything hurts. The cloud formations were gorgeous though as clouds had formed on both sides of the valley covering the tops of the mountain ranges. The sun started to set as we were walking and playing games and it looked like the gays of heaven had opened up in the distance with the sun beam shining down on the Aquaduct. No fucking hitch tho. We pushed on, hurting, and watched as the last light left the horizon and our eyes. This is maybe the 6th time I’ve used my flashlight on this trip. 10/10 would recommend the nitecore, only chargeable one in 400? Lumens. We got more delusional as now every bone and muscle in my feet were throbbing, my joints were calling me slurs, and I was laughing at everything. Everything was not funny. We started doing some running which actually felt amazing as my heels weren’t fucking slapping the concrete. The bard was hilarious as he would sprint get 50 feet ahead and then hobble. I did the same at some points. I think the only conversations we had in that last 4 miles were asking how many more miles we had and declaring how much pain we were in. Plus a couple of moans if you count that as a conversation. I have a girl backpacking math thing where the last 0.7 miles don’t count as it’s basically nothing so everytime we would say how many miles left we would subtract .7. That helped I can’t lie. Finally by the grace of god we arrived. Nobody got water or did any other chore besides setting up their tent and getting immediately in it. It was probably one of the most glorious feelings I have ever felt. It wasn’t that windy when we set up but it quickly did get windy which at that point I didn’t give two flying fucks if my tent poles snapped or not so I put in ear plugs and hit the hay. I woke up a couple of times to people walking through which idk how far they went but all power to them as I had no more steps in me. We camped basically in the middle of a wind mill farm which was cool walking through it yesterday as you could only see a slight outline of the windmill in the dark with its little red light at the top but when you stopped you heard the giant whooshing of the blades. This morning as I am writing this as again to reiterate I couldn’t give to flying fucks last night as I was so tired, I woke up to actually seeing the scenery around where we had walked and camped in the dark. Truly so cool to see how many windmills there are. I can confidently say though this morning I am in the worst pain I have ever been in after a long day. Truly awful. Would not recommend. Everything hurts, and I want to have a zero day but that is not possible as we still have 30 miles to Tehachapi. Might cry just thinking about it. Anyway, that’s it. Signing off