May 29th
True had arranged with a “trail angel” to get a ride to the vet for Timber. Nothing serious, just a few small ailments. When 2 people showed up to help her out, we were able to get a ride back to the trailhead with one of them, Terry. What a nice, kind gesture; it sure beat trying to hitch a ride.
The Carrot was missing her purple long sleeved hiking shirt. Couldn’t find it anywhere and assumed that she had left on the trail somewhere on the trail. So, in hopes that maybe someone had found it. We walked back the quarter mile to check a trail register. No sign of her shirt.
Leaving Willow Pass the trail weaves through several wind farms that line the ridge top t take advantage of the constant breeze. The BLM, getting the most they can, also leases the same land for grazing, so there are cows amongst the windmills. Something less than a wilderness walk in this stretch. But we do see a small deer grazing on the ridge despite all the competition.
After about 8 miles the trail crossed very busy highway 58 and then parallels it, a very uninspiring couple miles. Eventually it starts to climb, very steadily, a couple thousand feet to the top of the crest. The winds whips over the ridge and each time a switchback crosses one the top the gust nearly knocks us over. It’s a good thing the Carrot has a pack on or she might just be blown away.
Fortunately the cooler weather still prevails and the wind helps to keep things even cooler. The Carrot is convinced that the wind will die down of the power company turns off the fans on the windmills.
We make it the 25, very dry, miles to the first water source by dark. It’s a very slowly seeping spring taking about several minutes to fill a quart bottle. “Ride and Hike,” the horse people, are already asleep, at the spring. Its muddy and there is no room to crash, so we fill the water bottles and walk on another half mile in the gathering darkness to find a make shift campsite beneath some windmills and amongst a field of cow patties. It’s late, we have just finished 25.5 difficult miles and we’re tired, so we camp there anyway.
