Pct day 47

July 7

Mile 626-644

Kangaroo rat attack! Something ate the straps and grips of my hiking poles. One strap is completely gone! And worse, that little shit took a bite out of my 3 liter water bag. I lost a liter in the sand. We’ll see if the tenacious tape works.

I came to another cache of hot lava water. I thought about just taking one of the small three liter bottles to replace the one with the hamster bite. But I couldn’t get it to fit inside my bag. Anyways, it’s not that far now. I can do it.

Gaz the English chef told me about the North Sea bike route where you can ride from France to Norway. There are ferry boats involved and I imagine lots of sea views. Probably some luscious French baked goods as well. I was thinking about berry cobbler with vanilla ice cream and had a little burst of laugh crying because the thought was so delicious. I am really missing my bike and nice food.

I have two lights left on my anker battery. Enough to charge my headlamp battery and phone one more time.

There was a cabin with a spring that I headed towards. It sounded nicer than it turned out to be. It’s down a Jeep road, in a parking lot of dusty dirt and bugs. Lots of bugs. The spring is meager. Maybe I’d use the cabin if there was a blizzard. The floor felt ready to collapse under the weight of all the trash and mouse poop. I filtered two liters of water and set up my tent under some trees. My cloud of bugs was so persistent that there was nothing to do but get inside the tent and zip the door.