Day 41 : Kennedy Meadows Zero

0 miles today

1961 miles to go

A zero day at Kennedy Meadows. It promises to be a day of work as opposed to a day of rest. I get up way too early. I'm awake before dawn. I walk down to the store and sit on the deck. I stretch a bit. I sit and write some. Before I know it, I'm freezing. I go back to my tent and wrap myself in my sleeping bag. It takes about twenty minutes before I stop shivering, then I sleep some more. I wake up as the sun slowly warms my tent. As it does I find enough energy to get up. Kennedy Meadows General Store really does a lot to improve the lot of thru-hikers. For one thing they have a pancake breakfast for six dollars. I'll do that. Then they ‘rent’ you a towel for three dollars and you can take a hot shower with soap provided in their outdoor shower stalls. I do that too. I also get my resupply box and carry it back to my tent. I open it and dig through the contents looking for more Aqua Mira. There isn't any. Without it I cannot clean my water. Braveheart graciously offers to share her water filter with me. This will allow me to continue my trip without waiting for Aqua Mira to arrive here. I hope that Kelli finds it and gets it into the Independence box. I do find white chocolate macadamia nut cookies that are wonderful. I share them with Braveheart. 

There are so many things I need to get done today and I feel so inefficient in getting them done. I walk back and forth from my tent to the store doing things as I remember to do them. I buy more fuel for my stove. I eat. I walk back to my tent to sort my food, it's too hot, I give up and go sit in the shade on the deck. I buy a cheeseburger and eat it. I shop for additional food for climbing Mount Whitney. I go back to my tent to sort food, it's still too hot. I drink water. I buy a Coke and drink that. I rummage through the hiker box for stuff, decide I don't want to carry it and put the stuff back. As the day progresses the obvious thing that needs to be done is to sort and pack my food. Late in the day my tent is finally in the shade. I go and make a half-hearted attempt. It's all packed, just not sort very well. I'll need to dig around to put together a dinner. Same with breakfast. Oh well, so be it. Braveheart suggests that we split a pint of ice cream. That's more fun than sorting food, so we go to get ice cream. Then we find that they are serving chips and salsa, then they serve chili, vegetables, more chips, and hotdogs. Free to Thru-hikers, I don't want to miss that. Eventually I make it back to my tent, full of food and feeling like I could have been more organized.

So I get a lot of stuff done. I loaf a lot. I visit with other Thru-hikers, we all cheer as each additional thru-hiker arrives from the trail. I eat. All day seems hurried and hectic. I am disorganized and scattered. I get to bed after dinner. Tomorrow the hiking begins again.