July 4: No Fireworks for 30 miles

Waking up at the hut we got another early start influenced by our hiker friends and early bedtime. We were up at 5:15 and walking by 6am. The Solar lights and outhouses were such luxeries it felt like leaving town.
The morning light is beautiful and the air is cool for smooth walking. We had a handful of hikers all leave around the same time and not too far down the trail we had as many as 8 hikers all walking within sight of each other! This almost never happens.

After a windy cold break we let most of the group get ahead. It stayed quite cool with the strong winds as we were often on a ridge. The smell of smoke reminded us of the fires and we knew the strong winds could not be good.

We took usual breaks but they were rather quick for our norm, but much longer than others. By 3:30 we had already done over 23 miles when we took a longer break by a stream next to a road. A few people drove by us to a campground and a couple chatted with us, but we didn't have any 4th of July picnic-ers with leftovers come by.

We ended up walking on, smoothly doing our first 30 mile day and making camp again with a group of hikers by 7:30. I (Mark) enjoyed some instant mashed potatos in my little ziploc bowl along with a shake before heading to bed. We didn't have any mosquitos, but we had little no-see-ums that are super tiny and bite, keeping you slapping arms and your face. We were laying down to sleep at our usual 9pm as the darkness came with no fireworks. We were thankful for our freedoms and independence to enjoy our land and it's natural resources.

Total Miles: 1193.7
Miles today: 30.7
Camp 68: Gravel road with group

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