We woke up this morning pretty late for our standards and didn’t get moving until around 8AM. It was nice to have a slow start but we still planned on hiking 24 miles. We new it was fairly flat with no crazy elevation gain or loss.

It was a fairly uneventful day today. The terrain shifted subtly from pine trees to a more desert shrub biome as we slowly walked down hill towards the main water source in the area - Holcomb Creek. Spoons and I walked by Big Bear Lake and I’d be lying if didn’t admit that part of me would have enjoyed a detour to go for a swim but we kept walking. We didn’t break for lunch until around 4PM but passed by a couple cowboys riding through. We noticed their tent set up and given their extra help for hauling things, they seemed to have a pretty nice set up. Pots, pans, the works.

We got to camp around 7:30 which is situated right by Holcomb Creek. It didn’t take but 30 seconds to notice the incredible amount of mosquitoes that swarmed us immediately. I quickly rinsed off my feet in the creek, heated up some water for dinner, and crawled in my tent. We all had dinner in our own tents and chatted some distance away from each other. Aside from about 3 other evenings, we’ve mostly cowboy camped. Sleeping in a tent every now and then definitely feels nice. I was lucky enough to get inside the tent without letting a mosquito in.

Tomorrow, we’ll get to bath in the hot springs for some R&R, yet our goal is still 20+ miles. We’re hoping to reach the McDonalds that sits just .1 miles off the trail in about two days. Wish us luck.

Happy trails…