CT 7.6.15 Day 4

Miles today: 15.4
Miles from Denver: 58.5
Days on the trail: 4
Approximate elevation gain: 3000 feet

This tree (Jefferson Pine?) smelled exactly like butterscotch.

As all days do, today started out pleasant. No foot pain, sun shining, and a wonderful day ahead. At some point, the trail started going uphill and seemed to never stop until eventually, the world flattened out for the longest 7 miles of my life. A very pretty 7 miles, but long. We had entered "Long View Gulch" which was full of the prettiest wildflowers and literally, beautiful long views.

Oh, hello! I'm oblivious to the fact that the next 3 miles are all uphill.

WOW!

It kind of looked like it was about to end, but no. It kept going forever.

 We encountered rain that started out gentle, got more aggressive and really never let up until 7pm. Our feet got wet and soon the hike for the day went from stunning and beautiful to no-fun-at-all.We ended up hiking three to four miles more than anticipated and ended up very wet and miserable at a pretty cool campsite that was a little bit off the trail, flat and had a fire pit. The rain gave us a two hour break where we tried to start a fire to no avail. Me, thinking the rain was done for the night, put my pack under a tree where I thought it might just stay dry and left my rain jacket out to dry because, even if it had rained all night, it couldn't possibly get any wetter. I was very, very wrong, and very, very sorry the next morning.

Wildflower city

People we have met so far:
On Day 1 we met a man who had never hiked the whole CT, but did a lot of web development for the CT website named Richard. He had hiked a lot of it and was full of a lot of useful information. We also came across a father/son group whose names we did not get. On Day 3 we met another father/son group named Steven and Dorian. We met three other thru hikers on Day 4: Gerry, Leslie and Mckenna (or as David remembers, Mackenzie), all solo hiking. On day 5 we met two more: Ray and Gene, also solo hiking. Gene had done the Appalachian Trail previously and some (most?) of the Continental Divide Trail. We heard a story about a group of 4 from Texas but had yet to meet them. They seemed like really nice people who, unfortunately, brought way too much in the way of gear (cast iron skillets, pistols, etc.). What I learned is, it doesn't seem to matter if you're small, large, in shape, not in shape, prepared, or not prepared; anyone can do this trail if you put your mind to it. You may have to adjust a little, get rid of some extra weight/gear, but its possible. We are not rock stars, we are average in the world of fitness. This is physically hard, but also emotionally and mentally challenging, too.

Mckenna/Mackenzie took our picture for us. We hiked with her .7 miles. She is a really really fast hiker.