Day 112 – 8/12/13 – 26.9 mi (2034.4)

Sweetfish took off this morning, hellbent on getting to town tonight. Ninja and I took a less strenuous approach, aiming to get less than 10 miles from town.

The morning was a nice walk through some forest past streams and green things on 4wd roads. We met a real cowboy, out to round up his cattle, by a lake. Then it was back up to walk the ridge of the divide again, where we went from sweating in the sun to getting sleeted on and back again in a matter of minutes. Up on the divide you can see the weather coming for miles.

Late afternoon we stopped at a spring to tank up for the rest of the way to town. We actually had real hiking trail for the climb up to Elk Mountain. It was great to be on tread graded for walking.

Just as we reached the saddle we planned to camp on, the wind picked up and the storm clouds moved over us. I somehow got my tent set up in the strong winds before the worst of the rain came. Ninja took a different approach and hunkered down with her unstaked tent just wrapped around her, like a turtle in its shell. I wish it hadn’t been raining so hard or I’d have taken a photo!