I had a late start this morning.  After waking up I had the Holiday Inn breakfast and took a while to sort my food and repack everything.  I checked out at 10:00 and went out to the front to try Ubering a car to take me back to the trailhead.  It said it would be here in 20 min, then 5 min later it was 30 min. I kept watching the little car on the map and it just kept getting further away and I was getting frustrated when the nice lady at the front desk walked by.  She asked what I was up to and when I told her she said “Hey, Brandon is here.  Let’s see if we can get him to take you!”.  Brandon turns out to be the hotel manager, and he did indeed take me. What a nice guy – he has a lot of other more important things to do, but he was willing to drop everything and spend an hour to take me.  I gave him $20 because it was further than he thought it would be and he was making noises about the time.

I started walking Hwy 40 for two miles, then Hwy 14 for another 9 miles.  These are fairly busy highways and while the surrounding country is beautiful, it really wears me out walking on the sloped shoulder that far with carts whizzing by at 70 mph.

During the road walk I caught up with a friend named Wallace.  We had lunch together behind some trees along the side of the highway.  Wallace is from Mississippi and very likable.  We passed each other all day. 

I arrived at the Indian Creek dirt road around 3:00, where I discovered some awesome Powerade trail magic by the cattle crossing.  Woohoo! Shortly after that I caught up with Moosh and Sunshine on Indian Creek road, and soon overtook a new guy named Leto.  Leto doesn’t talk much. We hike at about the same speed, so we were usually within sight of each other along the dirt roads here.

The hiking here is pleasant along a well paved dirt road that follows the creek through large meadows and forested areas. There were a couple of hunter camps that I passed by – one was rather large with some semi-permanent looking buildings and several motorhomes parked nearby.

I felt pretty good today, and did 21 miles and gained a couple thousand feet.  And that was with a start time of 11:00! I’m currently camped near Chimney Rock under some trees not far from a very rough two-track road that is the CDT through here. Shortly after dark I think I heard Moosh and Sunshine walk past my tent.