CDT mile 247 miles hiked 11
This water cache was a life saver
I awoke at 1 am with that old familiar wet mouth the sure sign of what was to come. Seconds later I was on my hands and knees puking up my dinner. After a couple of violent outbursts, I lay in my bag shivering. I put on my down coat and wind shirt and still I shivered. Hours later I would be peeling these off as I fought the fever sweats.
At 5 am after not sleeping at all I knew I had to relieve myself quickly. I got out of my bag and started to some nearby trees to dig a cat hole. Before I knew it I was projectile vomiting and at the same time, it was all I could do to get my pants down. I sat there alone in the dark squatting with a full-bore exorcism coming out of both ends. When I finished I stood up to only ask myself, what is the leave no trace method to clean this up? I dug holes and buried why I could.
I started back to my bag only to realize I had no idea where it was. I called out and finally from the dark Zorro said over here. I apologized for waking him and crawled back into my bag. As the sun rose and so did my partners it was clear I wasn’t going anywhere for a while.
Sweet Potato said he would stay back with me to make sure I was ok. He got everyone to donate whatever water they could because there was none for miles. At 10 am I woke up and the two of us started on our way slowly. Eventually, Bambi caught us on the road walk, he is a nurse and gave me a once over-reassuring me it was most likely a stomach bug. We walked some miles and then took a break, I passed out for a couple of hours. When I awoke we continued knowing water was far away still and required a big climb I was sure I couldn’t make it.
We walked by an old tank and decided to see if it did have water, indeed it did. We filled up our max capacity and agreed to go a few miles to the trees and camp.
We made the trees and set up my tarp and laid out my bag. In minutes I passed out only to wake a few hours later to chat with Sweet Potato as he ate his dinner and I nibbled on a bar. Right before falling back asleep sweet potato saw a headlamp close by and went to explore lo and behold it was Big John so the three of us will hike to Pie Town hopefully still making it by Friday.
