Day 6 (7 April) - Mile 47.21 - 59.47

Mt Laguna Campground to Sunrise Trailhead, CA

Today we woke up at 6:45, which should be early enough, but it took us 2.5 hours until we were ready to leave. What the heck is our problem. Maybe the issue is we woke to a campsite with a picnic bench and a bathroom so we weren't in a hurry to leave, especially knowing that the next time we get to stay at an established campground will be at mile 100.

We finally got going on what will be a long mile day (13 miles for Tim and 13.6 miles for me...explanation to come later) and the hottest day yet. I already feel like a broken record, but what an awesome day. The terrain was perfect with nice easy ups and not too steep downs. Here are some great pictures from today:

Other hikers on the trail ahead.

After lunch we came across this monument that people seem to have turned into a memorial for people that have died. It was pretty high up, so we figured people probably throw the ashes over the edge.

Memorial Monument.

There where lots of plaques for motorcycle riders (maybe because the road we came to just past the monument looks like an awesome road to ride).  The best plaques had to be this one:

"I told them I was sick!"

Around. 3:30 we came across this boulder field. It was the first time we saw this kind of scenery.

Boulders...nice!

And then, around the corner there are 3 women making camp amongst these boulders.

They invited us to stay the night, but we needed to get in some miles to make up for yesterday's 5 mile day. So off we went.

We were getting pretty tired when we had about 2 miles to go, but onward we pushed until we got to the turnoff for where we were camping. Right at the turn was a water cache. Tim said we should fill a couple of our liters, but the hiking notes said there was water available where we were planning on camping, so I said, "No, let the hikers passing by use that water so they don't have to walk the 0.3 miles to the other water source."  "Fine," said Tim. So off we went 0.3 miles to our campsite.

Nice, clean bottled water that we passed up.

We finally get to the camp area and find the water source that is really a horse trough and it looked disgusting. Yes we could filter it, but do we really need to when just 0.3 miles back there is that yummy bottled water. Tim says, "I told you we should have filled a couple of our bottles."  So...I think you all know where this is headed...off I go, back 0.3 miles to get the water we never should have passed up.

Oy! Tim was right and I was wrong, so off I go.

The only nice part of all this is that I got back to a tent set up and looking quite inviting.

Tomorrow we should be back to 10 miles so we don't have to rush in the morning...not that we could even if we wanted to!