Fred's Canyon

I don't know who Fred was but they sure named a sweet creek and campsite after him. Today's hiking was a very hot traverse of a bunch of mountains with full sun exposure.
Youza. Twelve miles of hiking to get to this oasis in the middle of scrub brush, sage and a few left over wild flowers. I got here around fivish after many hours and lots of breaks in whatever patch of shade I could find.

I am traveling with a loose group of folks. A guy named Hono (Japanese for fire boy) from Ohio, Shannon from Canada, BC, a couple on their very first backpacking trip... (their packs must weigh a million pounds) and just before dark Neil and Tanya from Yorkshire England staggered in, after a 16 mile day.

Speaking of packs, I don't think my latest pack is going to go the distance. I think it is much more suited to weights that don't include four to six liters of water. I'm doing ok with it but I think I'll be buying a pack at the kick off. I like to think of Thomas Edison who said, for every success I've had a thousand failures. At this rate I may never get the pack right!

Tonight I get to sleep in my hammock for the very first time on this trip. Yes! It will be interesting to see how it goes. More will be revealed...

Day four.
Cold, cold, cold was my night last night. The thing about pretty canyons is that cold air settles in them at night. A good thing on a hot summer day, not so much in early spring. Looks like I'm going to have to tweak my sleeping system as well.

I'm in Mt Laguna tonight, in a motel room, with a shower and heater. Wow! The simple things. My dogs were barking a bit too much today so I decided to take a day off tomorrow to let my old body rest and recuperate. The old R&R as it were. It's a long way to Canada and it won't due to injure myself so soon. I am sad to know my hiking buddies will be going off without me but hopefully we will meet again this summer.

They had 16 inches of snow here last Friday. What you see is the leftovers.