11 days to go!

My time here in Carmel is flying by and my nerves are waking up to the reality that I'll be hiking for the next 6 months. I'm basically a mixture of excited and nervous, and I'm having trouble sleeping which is nothing new, I have insomnia, but this feels like when I was in college and had finals coming up, except the penalty for failing this test is dehydration, or exposure. I'm even having vivid dreams of backpacking each night. It's crazy and my mind struggles to make sure I've made all my preparations. I need to just get my ass on that trail and start walking North.

Since I've been back, it has been so great to see all my friends and family again. I tend to disappear at times, and my life along with me; I didn't think anyone would be reading this blog, and maybe very few people will, but a lot of people have asked to read it, so who knows. 

Long Ridge

I've been spending most of my time in Big Sur, my most favorite place on Earth, and I will be so sad to leave it, even for a few months. I've been spending some time at my family's place up on top of the mountain watching epic sunsets and it's so beautiful that it hurts. I have just been reminding myself that adventure awaits with beauty that I can't even imagine along the PCT.

Me and the mini-version of my brother

In the mean time, I mailed my first resupply package today to Mt. Laguna, and I bought my second pair of shoes at REI along with gloves. I need to wear those shoes in before I send them to Kennedy Meadows for use beginning in the Sierra Nevada. My training continues, but I've backed off a bit, because my legs are good to go and I'm losing too much weight. I'm trying to eat more so I can actually start the hike with a few pounds. Other than training, I'm constantly working on lowering my pack base weight, (I lowered it from 20 to 17 pounds so far) and I will start hiking with a 20 pound pack tomorrow. 

Everywhere I go I take pics with my Iphone and mess around with the effects, cropping etc. I love taking pictures, and I recently decided to use my phone as my only camera so I can save weight. I already use my phone pics to blog, and once I found out how to crop photos on the phone it was a done deal. 

Carmel Beach sunset

Long Ridge sunset

Finally, I'm binge reading trail blogs to let all that trail wisdom from past thru-hikers seep into my brain; I constantly feel like such a naive backpacker, which I am, but expect to do something about that, in 11 days!