Day 50 - Kennedy Meadows

Wow. What a day. Nineteen miles to KM and I got here at 3:30 pm having started at 5:30 am. Don't know why I couldn't sleep last night but I kept worrying about this and that. The big that being bears. Why I would choose last night to worry is a puzzle, but there you have it. I guess this was part of my motivation since I wasn't sleeping anyway, I might as well hike. Plus at 4 am it looked like it could rain and it isn't pretty to pack up when the water is coming down from above. 

Open pit mine

Kern River

A fixer upper

Most of the hard hiking today was first thing, climbing for a couple of hours. But then it was downhill or rolling hills all the way here. A nice way to start the day since I'm not awake enough to notice the difficulty. Having said that I was plenty glad to arrive and I promptly ordered a cheese burger for lunch/dinner. Lots of hikers here and it was fun hanging out on the deck, even if I was mostly catatonic. 

There is a women who is an MD from Germany who is hiking the trail with her partner and when she saw me this afternoon she said she thinks I have herpes on my nose/lip, not a poodle dog bush reaction. This would make sense as the meds have only stopped the itching but the blisters remain. And they are painful. Why I would have contracted herpes like this is beyond my understanding but if so, it'll require a doc visit and different meds. Plus I am definitely to stay out of the sun for a while. I guess this is the problem with self diagnosing. More will be revealed in time. 

Didn't work...

I've been without Internet/phone service for four days and last I heard my friend Stacey was thinking of coming out this way with another friend Donna to visit another friend Sharma. Lots of friends there in that sentence. Anyhow I emailed Stacey this afternoon on the rickety internet service here and she is coming tomorrow, but I don't know what else she has planned. Hopefully what the original plan was as that sounds fun and I have to hide from the sun for a while. 

Guess what?

Ok. I'm in my tent and waiting till it's dark so I can go to sleep. I do live an exciting life. 

Later... Apparently the neighbors next door to KM think it is fun to ride their quads, shout yahoo (appropriate) and shoot guns right as hikers are trying to sleep. An interesting kind of hostility.