Jack Jackson was his name (JJ for short). We had called another angel who was on his way. JJ knew him and told us to call him back and cancel. I got my first ride in an old 4 cylinder jeep.
Priority after Motel 6 room check in would be...yes, FOOD! I wanted green vegetables and lots of them. We settled on a Nepalese/Indian place because they had spinach with garlic. We went with Topo and 2 other hikers. TC and I surprised everyone by ordering about 4 plates of food while everyone else ordered one. What?
We have met many hikers on the trail. Some we will probably never see again and some we will keep crossing paths with. Some people walk at roughly the same speed as you do but if they start an hour earlier or two hours earlier than you, you may not meet them until they take a day off somewhere. It's best to walk your own pace and not try to keep up with somebody faster than you. (HYOH) Hiking your own hike is really important. There are people behind us who we have met who we may not meet again and there are people ahead of us we have met that we may not meet again. So far all our relationships have been transient. For some reason because we are all doing the same thing, sharing something in common, it's easy to become friends quickly; quicker than going to camp or being on a basketball team. We are all in this together and we all want to make it to Canada. It definitely does not feel like a competition, more like a shared vision quest where everybody's vision is slightly different and everybody's motivation is different but the goal is the same... Friendly Canada.
We do get to keep an eye on each other because all along the trail are sign in books. You can see who is ahead of you and by how many days. As for the people behind you, you do think about them but don't really know where they are. There are some people I've met who I wish I could travel with the whole way or at least get to know a lot better but inevitably people hike their own hike. If you're coming on this hike to meet people you will meet people but from what I have seen so far the hike is the thing.
Here is a typical day for us: TC's bowels wake her up at about 4:30.am. It is still dark. The birds are still sleeping. She has created a hole for this offering because her bowels wait for no one. It takes time to dress and get out of the tent so this must be taken into consideration, hence, the pre-dig. DG remains unmoving and silent until tidy camper leaves the tent. Normally her tendency would be to whine and complain about the earliness and the coldness but having spent years assiduously training her mind she remain silent and lets her thoughts bang about inside her head. She puts her clothes on and folds up the air mattresses puts away the sleeping bags and gets ready to depart while tidy camper is outside boiling water. Breakfast is eaten and camp is broken apart. This takes about one hour. We are usually hiking by 6 o'clock in the mornings. First break is about two hours later. We begin eating our various snacks which comprise of nuts dried fruit, raw coconut balls, cookies and the occasional bar. If we're walking uphill we usually need to take a break every hour and a half to drink water and eat, all other terrain we usually break every two hours. Lunch happens about 4 to 5 hours after breakfast and is usually rehydrated dehydrated food. We found about five companies who produce dehydrated food and so we have quite a variety. So far we have not had to repeat a meal but, that won't last for too much longer. Later in the day we have more snacks usually nut butters and crackers or meat sticks and turkey jerky. We are actually eating our way to Canada. Food is an absolute necessity. No food means no energy. Eating back home in Santa Cruz is all about pleasure and more pleasure. Food is keeping us alive in Santa Cruz but we're not aware of that as much as out here where we're burning it up like a wood burning stove. It is all about food. TC's favorite foods are nuts. Not so with DG. Her favorite foods are fresh fruit and veggies. TC is in heaven. All the nuts she can eat all day. Not so with dirty girl. She often gives her nuts to tidy camper. Once again her mind training helps her not to hurl those nuts up. You can see why coming to a town is of utmost importance to dirty girl. She goes to the grocery store and buys pounds of apples and grapes and carrots and sits around eating all day like a rabbit.
Tidy camper and dirty girl have both lost weight. One week ago they had both lost 4 pounds each. By now they have probably lost another 2 pounds. That's a safe amount. Pretty soon they'll stop losing weight and gradually start to lose their minds.
Dirty Girl thinks she may be getting sick. Her tongue is a bit black.what do you think?
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