Woke up to the sound of a few hikers talking near the spring. It was 6am and they had the metaphorical coffee made, metaphorical dog walked, and the metaphorical morning paper already read...now they were hiking.

Walked with Yard Sale for part of the morning. His mom was picking him up at 3pm around the Highway 138 crossing, so he wasn't in a huge hurry.

At the Highway 173 crossing I texted my friend Chris to have pizza and beer delivered to Cora for dinner. Ms. Freddie (our dog) had been having body issues and um, made the house a mess. (hello Mr. Steam Cleaner!)

Met a hiker named Pac Man as I was taking photos, he liked my tripod setup.

I hiked by myself most of the day. Stopped at Silverwood Lake picnic area and ate lunch. Silverwood Lake is this reservoir that just kind of appears out of nowhere when you are hiking the trail. Well, you walk below the dam for a bit, but the trail climbs and "poof!" there it is.

Met a hiker named Rabbit as I was heading out. When I reached Highway 138 a few miles later I saw Yard Sale waiting for his mom. She showed up a while later and soon he was gone.

A motorist stopped and asked me about the trail and the travel website. [Hello if you are reading this]. Rabbit and I hiked for a bit. Ran into Turtle and Willow at the spring. From here it was about 10 miles to Interstate 15, hence I only really needed to go a few more miles and I would be set up good for tomorrow. (eg, walk five miles and then check into the motel in the morning).

I ended up by myself again since other hikers stopped to camp. I rounded a corner and saw a woman who had just made camp. I started talking to her and she told me there was plenty of room if I wanted to set up.

Her name was Carolyn and she is from the Pacific Northwest. She was headed southbound down to Interstate 10. I had seen a picture of her with Rabbit a few days ago on Facebook. She was actually at the Messenger Flat fire that happened a couple weeks ago.

About two weeks ago a fire had started near the PCT at a campground called Messenger Flats. The wind had come up and flared up ashes from a campfire. The FD was on 24 hour fire watch so they had the fire out within about 45 minutes. Anyways, Carolyn said she was asleep in her tent and woke up to a car camper telling her to get up since there was a fire burning. She made it out of there in time.

Carolyn had a lot of stories, she had hiked the PCT in 1976. She was also on the Washington PCT in 1994 with her daughter at the same time Curtiss and I were. I don't remember meeting her but she might be mentioned in my journal.

There were a bunch of ants around so I set up my tent as minimal as possible. Just poles and the main tent, no stakes or anything. I hate having to pack up the tent each morning. Sleeping under the stars is so much nicer.