March 22-March 25

Patagonia to Colossal Cave

Miles hiked in 3.5 days: 65

Total miles hiked 117.5

One of my hiking partners. Assassin, had 2 of her young friends join us to hike out of Patagonia a day and night and then head back to their car the next morning. They were a ton of fun and were very competent hikers.

We trudged ahead out of Patagonia doing 18.8 miles the first day, 16.1 (+3 that don’t count due to a trail re-route) , 19.1 Tuesday and 11 today into Colossal Cave. We didn’t want to do that much mileage each day in the heat, but there want a choice because we had to get to water. Most things are dried up. We had to depend on what’s called water cache’s which is a box near a trailhead or forest service road that people (trail angels) have put water in for hikers. Thank goodness for these amazing, kind people. The only problem with the water caches are that they are few and far between and you can’t count on them being stocked.

There is absolutely no way I can tell you how hot and dry it is out here. The weather was suppose to cool off but apparently the heat wave made a U-turn and came right back supposedly as a “heat dome “?? Even the rattlesnakes are hiding somewhere in the shade that only they know about. I’m not gonna bore you with the woes of the heat though. 🤦‍♀️

We’ve made a new plan.

We’re going to jump up to Pine, AZ (further north) and hike the last 400ish miles and then flip back to Pine and hike back to Colossal Cave. Gotta be flexible, but most importantly safe.