We heard lots of coyotes last night and two owls kept hooting back and forth. I love all the night creature sounds!  We are next to a highway and the trucks woke me up several times.  Only about one every hour, but you can hear them coming from a long way off.

We were up and hiking by 8:30 or so.  It was pretty hot right away and the trail went uphill and through some hills on a dirt road. The Little Hachet Mountains and Hachita Peak are to our left.  The sun was relentless and there is almost no shade.  Eventually we found a cow pond and a tank and took a break from the sun there.

I’m still trying to figure out how much water to carry. I don’t want to run out, but water is heavy at over 2 pounds per liter, and you can definitely feel the extra weight when you are carrying 3 liters or so. Some people say to bring 6 liters in the desert, but that seems totally unnecessary – especially if you aren’t too particular about the quality of the water in the cow ponds. For now I’m sticking with 2 to 3 liters depending on how far the next water source is.

At around 2:00 I saw a big green tree all by itself in a wash about a mile away. I made a beeline to it with renewed energy.  Anything to get out of the sun for a while!  Pat was there when I reached it and I took out my ground sheet to lay down.  AngelFeet and Rick soon joined us.  The 4 of us are just hanging out here in the shade waiting for the sun to get lower before walking the remaining 3 miles to camp.  There is a nice breeze blowing right now and this spot is very pleasant.

I played some music on the way to camp by myself.  It was a good song and the wind was blowing and I felt so good and happy at this particular moment. 😊

I arrived at the well and Rick was there.  He felt really bad – tired and cramping.  I felt sorry for him and asked if he wanted to come with us to Lordsburg tomorrow and he jumped at the chance. We will be crossing the highway tomorrow and Judy will take us all back to Lordsburg for the night. Pat and I will return to the trail the next day, but I think Rick is done. I feel bad for Rick and find it curious how fast I can go from extreme happiness to sadness out here.