Deer Park Mtn Shelter (4-23-10)

Today was a tough day, but not because of distance or climbing or anything like that. It was all going pretty smoothly until I stopped for a break about two hrs into my day. When I got back up to start hiking, I noticed that my left Achilles tendon (??) had stiffened quite a bit.

This wasn't too bad going downhill, but once I started climbing Bluff Mtn (roughly a 1000 ft climb), I was in a good deal of pain. When I got to the top, I figured I was done for the day since it would mostly be downhill from the rest of the day. Instead, my Achilles slowed me quite a bit and forced me to do the "Hiker Hobble" the rest of the way to the shelter (~7 miles). To make matters worse, it had gotten hot again. A few times during the day, I wondered to myself: "why am I doing this again?"

I got to the shelter quicker than I thought and found that I was the first one there. I guess everyone ahead of me went on to Hot Springs for the night (another easy 3 miles). Before getting water or doing any other chores, I set up my hammock and rested for a good hr. Trog came in to camp while I was napping - I think tonight will be pretty quiet.

During the day, I got to talk to a number of trail maintainers with the local trail club. They were out doing their first trail maintenance for the year. I've been curious about how trail maintenance works, so it was cool to see them in action.