Hello black bears. 🐻
How are you? I will be covering the Mazzies (Mazatzals) heading south from Pine.
Day 13:
We left Pine today and walked with Aquarius all day! Aspen left yesterday, so we’re not going to walk with her. Aquarius kept me active all day, so if you’re reading this Aquarius…thank you. The ground level no longer exists. ☹️ We are heading towards the Mazatzal mountain range and there is much more elevation. This morning we saw a lot of bear tracks. We took a break at 10 as usual and I had a De La Rosa and chips for a snack and LSL had some bar. Aquarius ate apple sauce!
Aquarius thought about my challenge for the day: find 7 different types of flowers! And I did it. 🌺🌻🌹🌸🌷🌼🪻
We also had lunch together! I got some bagels at Walmart that are good! (We had to go to Paysen to buy a new power bank for my mom’s phone on our day zero in Pine and visit Walmart to buy some supplies.)
Now I’m doing Oh Dear, Gear!!! My Kula cloth! I bought it over a year ago and it has been great so far, the clasp is starting to break. At the end of this walk I will receive a new one. Trucks met the mother of the owner of Kula Cloth! I think it’s great!
Ok…we drove over 20 miles today and camped next to a small spring next to Nominal and Aquarius. Nominal was reciting poetry as I fell asleep. That was great. That’s all I have to say about day 13. So I love you. 😘
Day 14!
Well…we are two weeks into our AZT hike! Now we are preparing for a big day, by big I mean a big day. So let’s get walking! I had a bagel for breakfast and then packed up. We walked with Aquarius and had a snack with him. We had to ford the East Verde River early in the morning. I went out to the river with Aquarius and my mom followed us! There is a deep channel at the beginning and I was lucky to get to the high ground. I got my shorts wet. To be more honest, I got the bottom of my shorts wet. Landslide got wet up to his waist because he crossed in a deeper part of the river and Aquarius also got the bottom of his shorts wet and he’s very tall!
We met a girl named Tiny Tabasco on the other side of the river. I was making pancakes on the stove! How wonderful! 😎 Then we got going. 🆙 Today we went up a lot! Like more than 5600′ of elevation gain. The Mazatzals are much steeper than we have been for the last two weeks.
Challenge of the day:
Not getting my shoes wet all day. 🎇I think I can handle it.
OMG, the De La Rosa’s are so good on the road. The best. Tomorrow I’ll get a big one with chocolate. 😋 😋😋
Yes, it’s time to get to work! Today it is my pillow. I used to have a Big Agnes pillow, but it had a hole in it, so I changed it and now I have a Sea to Summit pillow. I really like it. A: It’s an amazing color (aqua) B: It has a soft texture! C: fits in my sleeping bag mummy, great! YD: It has a little rise for my neck.
Challenge of the day: ✅
– People.
Day 15:
I packed my bags at 6am as usual! I had a bagel for breakfast, my mom had oatmeal, and Aquarius also had oatmeal. Then we embark on quite an adventure! 🥾🌳🍂 We climbed a little bit on the slope between the campsite where we stayed last night and had a snack at 10:00 am.
The break was near a creek, where Landslide leaked the water. (And Aquarius…he was filtering too. He loves water and drinks a lot!) I had a De La Rosa and a BetterGoods for my meal.
We went up, up, up some and the views were epic. I was thinking about the cats as we walked; my kitten, my mom and my kitten, a black and white kitten (which I love), my friends’ kittens and my grandmother’s cats! So many kittens to think about! We also saw puma tracks. Another kitten to think about! Great kitty!
Challenge of the day:
Doing ten yoga poses during your lunch break! 🔥
When we arrived at the lunch spot, I ate a bagel while waiting for Landslide Lizard to bring me a package of tuna. When he finally did, I felt like eating something sweet, so I had a sweet lunch. I did my yoga ✅and then we moved on.
Near the end of the day’s hike, it started to get dark, but we still wanted to go further, so we continued a little further. Then the sun set and it got dark…somehow we got off the trail and onto a side trail that FarOut said would connect to the trail again, but it connected to a river bed! But the strange thing is that the map said we were on the right path. So who knows? But there were logs on the trail (dry stream). After some searching in the dark, we found the trail and a campsite. We had to cowboy camp because there wasn’t enough room to set up our tents. The starry night sky was amazing!
Oh dear, Gear is backpack. I have the 30 liter Durston Wapta. Frameless but super comfortable! I think it’s about my pack. So see you in the future. 😜
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