PCT Day 11: Funky Town

Day 11 5-29-2015  Sleep 2200-400
Miles 494-536.7

Today was all about strategy.  I was coming into the low elevation desert crossing before returning back up into the mountains.  The plan was to get to Hikertown mile 518, get my resupply box, nap for a bit then tackle the flat hot aquaduct portion at night.  Well things went to plan, sort of.  I got my hustle on and got the 24 miles to Hikertown done by about 1130.  It was already brutally hot and I was glad to reach the oasis of Hikertown. Kind of a funky place, I dig it.  It was like a fake western town as you might see at an amusement park for kids.  Different little buildings named “town store” “post office” “jail”  each was about the size of a bed room and about half of them were exactly that.  I posted up at one off by myself.  I opened my resupply box and repacked my pack.  Then I napped in the shade the best I could.  When my alarm went off at 1800, I felt rested and ready to tackle the aquaduct.  I looked at the thermometer tucked in under the roof in the shade, 92 degrees.  Well it should only be getting cooler. 
Gotta make a move to a town that is right for me
Town to keep me movin'
Keep me groovin'
with some energy - Funkytown
(Don't worry, I had to look the lyrics up)

As I got up I felt a breeze I hadn’t felt in awhile.  Sure I had a hole in compression tights on my butt.  But as I reached and felt, hmm what is going on?  Oh, the tights had ripped along the whole seam.  Each butt cheek was still covered, but my crack was full on out there.  At first I thought, I kind of like this.  Nice built in aeration system.  Butt, in the 200 feet I had to walk to get to the garage where the big group of hikers was hanging out; I already got comments from two people about the view.  Damn, butt why were they checking out my ass anyway?  So I grabbed some pants from the hiker box, as there were no shorts.  I cut the wind breaker pants and made some skimpy shorts to wear.  I changed and located a sewing kit.  Oh yea, you know how you have sewn maybe once or twice in your life.  Well time to sew a stretched out seam shut…haha yeah right.  Well I tried, failed miserable and decided I would stick to my day job.  Well in the desert, it was going to become my night job.  So I took off around 2000 instead of 1830, with my 185 miles worth of food and three liters of water.  My pack felt heavy.  Good thing the entire thing was flat and I was able to shuffle stride a good amount of it.  By about 200 I was doing the head bob and decided I should get a nap in.  Still being 80 or so degrees out, I just laid on my stuff sack for padding and let my feet hang up on a rock.  You know like a hammock, only made of rock and hard dirt.  Didn’t matter I was so tired, I would have slept standing if possible.
Heading out into the aquaduct

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