CDT - Day 17 - Govina Alternate
This morning was one of the coldest mornings so faron the CDT. I measured the temperature of my flip flops outside my tent and it was 27°F, getting out of my tent was a chore. I noticed that Angler woke up early and took off already, so I had the campsite to myself while I ate breakfast and got ready.
The hike today was wonderful compared to the brutality of yesterday's hike, with the excessive wind. About two miles into my hike I caught up to Zack and Molly, they were still getting up, apparently they tend to sleep in a bit and take their time. I waved and spoke to them for a minute before carrying on.
A couple miles later I caught up to MK, who is an early riser. She doesn't cook breakfast and just takes off in the mornings. I passed her on the trail and then she caught up to me a couple of times. We eventually ended up hiking together for the rest of the day and really hit it off. We stopped at the most disgusting cow pond and filtered the very algae infested water. A few cows showed up for a drink, they seemed annoyed by our presence, but we really needed the water. Many of the ponds, streams, and other sources were dry, so we took what we could fine. By the end of the day we had hiked about 20 miles, and found a nice site to camp along the Govina Alternate trail (green line). The goal for tomorrow will be to make it to the Pie Town Alternate (blue line). I told MK about Davila Ranch and she was excited to make that on the camp spots before getting to Pie Town. While we both started the CDT hike solo, we agreed that hiking with a friend is actually a lot of fun. Hopefully we can hike together again tomorrow, but there are guarantees. Everyone on the CDT hikes their own hike.