Author: kaulua26

Saturday, Feb 15th 2025, 0700-0800End of Section 4, mm50 hitch into Salome1 mile. I had a restful sleep, despite the highway noise, which was pretty minimal. Pulling a massive day before will do that to a person. I was on the highway bright and early, trying to get a ride. There was a sketchy car parked right where I started, so I walked a ways down the road to get away from it. On the one hand, drivers might think I’d broken down. But on the other hand, the car looked so sketch that it also would reflect poorly on me. Besides, people are leery of the broken down vehicle act, a fraud to get people to stop and then[…]

Friday, Feb 14th 2025, 0720-1820North Big Horn Mtns mm25 to End of Section 4, mm5025 miles. The rain started just as I was finishing dinner in my tent the night before…yes I eat in my tent cause it’s not like there’s anything out here that will go for my food. Water maybe, but not the food. I barely want my food. It rained all night, off and on, but was only ever a mere drizzle. It was probably the most peaceful night I ever spent in my tent while getting rained on. I just loved it, especially the sound of  the soft pitter patter on my tent walls. Bliss! It was still raining in the morning, so I delayed my[…]

Thursday, Feb 13th 2025, 0700-1745Beginning section 4 to North Big Horn Mtns, mm2525 miles. My campsite was relatively peaceful, considering my proximity to the interstate. I actually slept just fine without my earplugs in. The traffic was just white noise. I did wake up to an unusual sound in the middle of the night: raindrops on my tent! It was a brief event, not amounting to anything measurable, but I did enjoy it. Sometimes the sound of rain beginning to hit my tent can be very ominous and threatening, but this was actually comforting. From reading Buck30’s journal, I was also lucky that the wind was blowing from the west and keeping the smell of the giant chicken farm away.[…]

Tuesday, Feb 11th 2025, 0710-1800Gila river tonorth boundary of Signal Prak Wilderness, mm40, section 3.25 miles. I heard some sniffing, then a dog was grabbing at the foot of my quilt, trying to drag me out of my tent. I kicked at it and screamed…my worst fears coming true. Then I woke up, thrashing about but there was no dog. It was all just a dream! But immediately I heard a dog barking in the distance and occasionally a second one would chime in. The dog was barking pretty much incessantly, which was so damned annoying. But anytime it would stop, I’d get worried that it was coming over to try to eat me. I preferred hearing it and knowing[…]

Monday, Feb 10th 2025, 1130-1800Buckeye, beginning of Sec 3 to Gila river, Gillespie dam area, mm15, section 3.15 miles. I dragged my feet getting out of town. As usual, the day before had slipped away from me and I still had many chores left to do… especially this blog! I left the hotel reasonably early…or at least well before check-out (poor form for a hiker), but I needed to pick up a small box from the post office, which opened at 8:30. I didn’t recall what all was in the box, so until I got it, I couldn’t go food shopping. Along the way, I looked for a cafe but Google maps didn’t show that anything was open. Go figure[…]

Sunday, Feb 9th 2025, 0700-1100Mm100.5 to outside of Buckeye, hitch into town, end section 2.12.5 miles. I was looking forward to getting into town early, walking across a creosote playa while the sun rose. A massive solar project had just been built to the east…Buck30 unexpectedly got caught up in it when he hiked in fall 2022, that’s how quickly it had gone up. So now the route had to go around it. Things can change fast in the desert. All these wilderness and National Monument areas that I walked through are probably already under threat of getting axed and sold to the highest bidder. Billionaires selling off OUR public lands to other billionaires, because corporate greed and corruption know no[…]

Friday, Feb 7th 2025, 0700-1800Vekol Valley Rd. to just past Maricopa AZ238 rd., section 2 mm7424 miles. My water supply would be refreshed this day no matter what, so that was a comforting thought as I set out in the morning. But I woke with a sore throat, so I realized my body was probably fighting off a virus. I hoped I wouldn’t get sick in the next few days, before I could make it to town for some rest. I’ve been fortunate to never have gotten a cold while hiking. I think it’s all the vitamin D I get from the sun. So I felt pretty confident I’d be ok. On the other hand, it sure would suck to be[…]

Thursday, Feb 6th 2025, 0630-1830Sonoran Desert National Monument Boundary to near Vekol Valley Rd.,  section 2 mm50.29 miles, but probably only 25 miles actually hiked due to some shortcuts. This was a big day but a good one! I was up early, trying to wring as much out of the pleasantly cool morning as I could. A 10 by 10 goal seemed plausible, despite the large chunk of cross country I needed to do. I followed a power line road for a bit, anxious to get away from it. I camped not directly under but pretty near to the lines and could hear the weird static noises all night. Table Top Mountain grew ever closer… I’d be circling it all[…]