Day 4 - Hemlock Campsite - mile 1675

Today I was a bit creaky when I rolled out of the hammock at 6:30 am. It was the kind of day where, were I at home, I’d be hot tubbing and hanging in my hammock all day, napping. The hammock part I got, just not the other stuff. Oh well. As someone said to me “You can sleep when you are dead.”

This means it took a bit to warm up so I walked to a spring nearby to fill my water bottles, thinking 2.5 liters would get me to the next water source. The first two miles were climbing, climbing, climbing. Did I mention climbing? All that effort was rewarded when I got up top as the views were extraordinary. 

Anyway the hiking for the rest of the day was varied. Some up, some down but mostly trending down where tonight I am at 6,013’. That’s quite a drop from my height point of...

There were odd things seen...

And snow to cross... though not much 🤪
But the best part were the flowers and trees. 

It got hot today so I was sweating quite a bit. By the time I got to the first on-trail water source, 10 or so miles into my day, I probably had 4 ounces of water left. That was cutting it close. To avoid a repeat of that I gathered 4 liters of water at Bear Dog Spring to carry with me to camp. Hummmm...9+ pounds of water be heavy. 

I made it another couple of miles to a spot 12.5 miles from last nights campsite. I wanted to go a little further today since I think tomorrow I may be walking through a big burn area. I can see it ahead but don’t have any idea how much of the trail goes though the area. It’s possible I may have to go a long way to find trees suitable for hanging. But for tonight it’s good and I am happy to be set up and to get myself ready for tomorrow.