A Blog About my life
Yesterday evening I passed the hundred mile mark. Generally a hundred mile backpacking trip is a long trip, but for me, passing this marker only made me realize how long of a trail this is. That may seem pessimistic but it’s the opposite. This first stretch has been incredible and I can’t wait to tackle the next twenty five hundred mile stretch.
After camping in “the Boulders”, a beautiful campsite on top of a peak, the trail slowly descended 3,000 into a hot, dry desert floor. The long walk seemed to never end and water was nowhere to be found. After almost running out, I finally reached highway 78 and I was able to do my first hitch. In about 5 minutes of sticking my thumb out a girl stopped to pick up my new hiking partner Will and me. We were driven into the town of Julian and punished a burger. After taking a shower at an RV park it was back on the trail, covering a 10 mile dry stretch during sunset. Tomorrow I will pass mile 100. Even though I’ve only been out here a few days, it feels like months (in a good way). -Noel Nelson
I originally planned to make it to Mt Laguna (mile 43) on the end of my fourth day, but I have been going faster than expected. I strolled in this morning around 8:45 am. Even though it is a small town, there is an outdoors store here that is famous for their “shakedown”. For most people this is necessary and they lose lots of pack weight. For me, it was only annoying and they tried to sell me on every single thing they had in stock. I plan to spend some time here and take off this afternoon for some cooler hiking. All in all, the trail is great so far.