I left dallas at 7 this morning and I have been waiting for this day for months now! I cant believe that it finally came. The drive was interesting, I have never been through west Texas before. There is lot of flat open land. I came to a wind farm and had to stop. I found a road that led to them, they were in the middle of freshly planted crops. I walked through the crops to get up close. The windmills are so beautiful to me for some reason. They feel so futuristic although I know they aren't. The sound that comes from them is so timely- like the ticks of a clock that never end. Whoosh...whoosh...whoosh- it could put me to sleep.
As I kept driving there was more and more dessert and rocky terrain, all of a sudden oil derricks popped up and there were hundreds as far as the eye could see. I had never seen that many before! I tried to get photos, but they were so small that it just didn't do them justice. After the derricks, I slowly moved into the piney woods- gigantic trees started popping up and mountains came out of nowhere. It was really beautiful.
Around 6 o'clock, I came to my destination, Cloud Croft, NM. The ranger station was closed but they had the trail maps out front. I looked at them and decided which one to go to. Since it was getting late, I wanted to go to one that was close. I went to the gas station and filled up on water and headed towards the trail. I parked at the trail head and hiked in from there. I didn't do a long hike, again for sun's sake. I wanted to get set up eat and get the bear bag hung before it was dark. I hiked the 511 trail for a while and came to a clearing, I walked around the clearing to find a good spot. It's really rocky here so I looked for a place that was fairly smooth. Setting up was easy and got my tent up in a few minutes, time for food. I went to cook some food and got everything out and ready, went to light my little propane stove and reached for my lighter- shit! I had just changed into pants right before I got on the trail bbecause it was getting chilly. My lighter was in my shorts pocket. Fml. I had brought plenty of trail mix and cliff bars so I had something to hold me over, that will not be happening again. Lighter stays in my cooking bag! These are the little things that make a huge difference, right?! I thought I was taking my time getting everything packed up, checking and double checking. But there is no room for small mistakes. I ate my snack for dinner, which filled me up pretty well (thanks Cliff Bar), and then it was time to hang my bear bag. That was the ultimate test, I have never camped in a place where I had to do that. I watched some YouTube videos and made it happen. Where I'm at, there are really tall pines so the branches are way high. I got a rock, tied a rope around it and tried throwing it over a branch that looked good. It was definitely testing me! I tried different size rocks- still couldn't get it over the freaking branch. I gave up on that one after about 15 minutes. I found another one further away from my tent, it was not quite far enough out from the trunk of the tree for regulation, but it was about 15 ft in the air. It took me a couple of throws, finally!
Im back in my tent now and it's about 9:40pm. I feel like I should be more tired, it is going to be hard to go to sleep. I can hear every branch snap and crack and I swear to gawd if a bear comes...all I have is a knife- please no bears. Please No bears. I saw a pile of crap near my tent - I'm hoping it's cow shit--- I don't think there are cows out here, but I'm just going to tell myself that, okay?
Good night let's hope for the best:)
