Another night of clear skies, billions of stars, cold temperatures, and periodic blasts of heavy wind blowing across the desert; that was our experience last night. The wind changed direction sometime in the middle of the night. I was cowboy camping and unfortunately when it changed direction, I became the target for wind blowing in from the side directly into the side of my sleeping bag. To escape the blast in my face, I slept on my side with my face on the lee side, but the heavy wind kept waking me anyway as it ruffled the sleeping bag time and again.
We were up early and hiking again as a group down the LA aqueduct around 7am. Eventually Bono and I got ahead of the gals, who were busy chatting as they hiked three abreast. After 5 miles we stopped for a break and waited for the ladies to catch up. After several more miles along the aqueduct in what was turning out to be a perfect day for a desert hike, we stopped at a spigot attached to the aqueduct near Cottonwood Creek bridge. After filtering water Bono, Nightingale and I walked down to the normally dry creek and washed our feet and legs of the buildup of dirt and grime which makes our legs look darkly tanned each day. I washed my shirt and would have gotten completely in the creek except that it was still cool and very windy.
From the creek I hiked out ahead of the group and began the gradual climb to higher elevations as we turned toward the Tehachapi Mountains and out of the Mojave. After 2000 feet of climbing and 5 miles of treeless desert, I was looking for a bush large enough to provide both a wind break and some shade. I finally found what I was looking for in Tylerhorse Canyon, so I stopped for a mid-afternoon lunch. The rest of the crew joined me in short order. Bono, Nitro and Nightingale had done a little cheating, by walking straight up and over a steep hill and down into the canyon. I was shocked to see them coming straight down the canyon, doing a bushwhack. They were successful in cutting some mileage and catching up to me quicker than I had anticipated.
After lunch we hiked to a creek in Tylerhorse Canyon where we again loaded up on water for the next 16 mile waterless stretch of trail. The trail next took us up, down, and around 4 or 5 large ravines, finally dumping us down into Ganible Spring Canyon. I was ahead of the group, and having sized up the terrain and significant 1600 foot late day climb ahead, decided to stop, cook dinner and see if my compatriots would agree to stop for the evening, short of our agreed upon goal. We all mutually agreed that we would get up early tomorrow morning to tackle the climb and 13 miles to the road crossing where Nitro’s dad, Heinz, will meet us at tomorrow morning at 11am. After dinner I set up the tarptent and by 7:30pm was inside writing this journal entry. It’s now 8:30pm, very, very quiet as everyone else is asleep or journaling. After two days and a night of high winds, all is calm in our canyon floor, completely surrounded by hills and canyon walls. It feels great to be in early and going to bed early.
Today’s weather: WINDY and sunny. Low 40 high 75. Today’s mileage: 16.3; cumulative miles 544.9.
