Birthday Mistake – The Trek

It’s Bug’s birthday! This morning I made a 10/10 breakfast.

My friend brought me some amazing instant coffee from one of our local coffee roasters. Combined with the GFB instant oatmeal bowls, I was in heaven. Breakfast in the lobby is always the trend.

While we were packing, I gave Bug a small carrot cake I bought at Wrightwood. Her brother is in town for a music festival and decided to extend the trip to visit her and bring us some magic. We had about 7.5 miles from the ranger station to Soledad Canyon Road, where cold beer, fresh water, and watermelon awaited us. He also made us a very generous offer to pack our bags this afternoon. With the heat rising, I grabbed it and emptied the heaviest parts of my pack.

Without the weight on our backs we flew towards Vasquez Rocks. We reached the tunnel that leads to the park and, to our surprise, we saw a horse! Stitches has finished riding with his horses. He let us pet his horse Finley and even let Bug ride him for a minute before walking on.

Vasquez Rocks is a popular park with interesting rock formations formed by the San Andreas Fault. Rocks are the backdrop for many movies and television shows such as Twilight Zone and Star Trek. It looked very spacey with the wild rock formations and dry desert landscape.

Right next to Vasquez Rocks is the small town of Agua Dulce. Agua Dulce consists of approximately 3 restaurants (two of which close at 3 pm), a market, and most importantly, Serenity’s Oasis. The oasis is a hiker’s paradise run by farmer John. Farmer John has the setup. They have been open for about 4 years and have built the property just for hikers. There’s laundry, loading, showers, a nice little resupply market, plenty of camping ground, grills… basically everything a hiker could dream of.

I got a small resupply for the next few days, enjoyed a few beers courtesy of Bug’s brother, ordered some dinner prepared by Spirit, and completed a handful of tasks. To celebrate Bug’s birthday, I cut his hair short and he dyed his top bleached blonde. Although it was a little orange. We ate cake and as soon as the sun set we retired to our tents. Or I guess the lack thereof because we decided to give cowboy camp another chance. I’m excited to fall asleep looking at the stars tonight. This place is truly an oasis.

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