Day 43 – 6/4/13 – 19.6 mi (748.7)

First posthole of the day, 7:32am. I should clarify: There isn’t actually all that much snow, certainly much less than the PCT in 2011, but the character of the snow here is entirely different. This is mashed potatoes snow. It’s all melting quickly and not resolidyfing, so when you do hit a patch, you’re going to posthole.

The weather couldn’t make up its mind today, alternating between warm and sunny and snowing on us. This cycle repeated at least 5 times over the day. We’ve learned to use our plastic groundsheets as a greenhouse to keep warm at lunch break when we’re wet and cold from the snow.

We did hit some good sections of dry trail. The uphills are still slow going even on good trail due to the high elevation. There are times where it is hard to take a sip of water because that 2 seconds where I’m swallowing and not breathing leave me gasping.

We passed Wired, Rockin’ and Silly Chili this morning and leapfrogged with them throughout the day. Sweetfish didn’t leave town until 4pm yesterday but caught up to us just after lunch. The day ended with a great ridge walk for several miles.

Our evening dinner entertainment was reading aloud selections from a trashy romance novel Ninja found at the motel in town.

The Daily Ninjup Report
Done in the morning.