When she returns, there’s a change of heart and she offers to hide it in a cupboard on the terrace. She asks me to hold while she checks things out and I hear ‘70s funk in the desert. I throw myself at her mercy.ĩ:00 will have me hiking in the heat of the day, isn’t there somewhere to leave it? I’ll pay! I turn airplane mode off and call the park.Ĭhantal answers and tells me that if I can’t arrive in time, there’s nothing that can be done and I’ll simply have to pick it up in the morning when they open at 9:00. I realize my goal is to get to Colossal Cave Mountain Park and pick up my resupply of food for the coming section, but they close at 4:00 and there’s no way I’ll walk that fast. I briefly duck into a wee bit of shade and sit on a rock to sip some of that liter. Oh dear, four or five miles, and it’s hot with positively no shade. One liter for how many miles until a definite water source. Fewer birds here away from water, only a little action as I plod forward. I march on as the day heats up and the flora goes on repeat. All of them happy taking these twists and turns. I wave to another backpacker headed south but see no one else all morning – until about twelve bicyclists show up from behind seemingly out of thin air. But I don’t know that now, blithely moving forward on this fresh morn into the Sonoran Desert. I swig a liter and pack one, and make my first mistake of the day. He swoops down to the water’s surface to catch a bug, himself and his partner on the surface coming together as one. A bright red bird lands on a limb, his reflection equally as bright and sharp in the water. I walk down a ways on a rock-filled road and park myself under a tree to filter water. It’s surprisingly lovely in this scorching desert and don’t the birds know it, singing a chorus on this lovely morning. My first water source is ‘the lake,’ man-made I’m sure and like a tank out of its bounds. I plod along as the sun comes out and is already hot by 8:00. A black cow huddles in a thicket of mesquite watching me as I circle around him on this winding path. I see a few yellow flowers, but spring has not sprung as of yet.ĭown and around I go through cactus on sandy trail. Prickly pear are everywhere in big, disorganized clumps of flat faces. Still, it’s lovely as I leave the sky island for full on desert. Maybe not so much a hikers, who might prefer a straight line in the right direction. The AZT can be biked too – except for wilderness areas – and the trail conforms to their needs. I soon realize the winding around is because this is a mountain bike trail. I pack before the sun comes up and set off on the long descent, the trail winding around itself. Not too dark with a waxing gibbous moon so bright I don’t need light. All night, birds and crickets hum in the dark.
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