​Sometime during the night, the nausea passed, my body successfully caught up on fluids, and I recharged.  I woke up completely refreshed and pumped to up at Manning Cabin again.  Chris was up and out early, trailed close behind by Peanut (Nora), a backpacker who was section hiking the AZT and then building her own route to hike the surrounding peaks of the Rincons and the Santa Catalinas.  We took our time to enjoy the cool pine forest with frost crisping everything while snow piles slumped on hillsides.

​Today was my toughest day physically so far on the trail.  Knowing we had a 5000 ft. ascent from the low Sonoran desert in Rincon Valley to Manning Camp in the snow at 8000 ft. meant we planned to get up at the first crack of light - to flee the rising heat with the coming exertion.  We had previously done a backpack trip to Manning Camp two years prior and knew this climb was exposed, REALLY hot, waterless for long stretches, and rocky.  The route just climbs a ton of elevation ceaselessly before you round a corner into a thick old growth ponderosa forest stretching for miles along the top.

​After the previous evening’s gunshots and eyes-open-night, I slept incredibly well.  My mind seemed smooth easy.  With waking, my head was back in the game.  I breathed in knowing that I wanted to approach the rest of the trail enjoying everyday instead of worrying about whether we were going to be able to complete the whole thing or not given my knee.  Also, I felt really aware of desiring a true balance between my desire to adventure in the wild/loving biodiversity and professionally making a difference.  Physically, my ankle felt perfectly good following the previous day’s pains.

​A night to hopefully never repeat.  Remember that Janna and I decided to sleep near that Twin Tanks shitwater pool?  We were a quarter mile up a wash with a nice flat area away from the bulls at the dirt tank.  Well, part of the reason we went up the wash was because we had read on Guthook the night prior that a hiker had experienced some harassment from some drunk people revving up next to their tent with ATVs in the middle of the night.  Seeking to avoid similar close encounters, we had moved up the wash.  Night closing in, and not even 10 minutes after turning off our headlamps, we heard a number of quads roll into the area.  The ATVs turned silent.  I turned and looked Janna, hoping they had left.

​Today was epic as we reached the 100 mile mark in early evening!  The theme being the background hum of worry about my knee, the hundred mile mark felt like we really accomplished something with it.

​The morning rose incredibly cold.  Two thru-hikers passing us at dawn (Starboard and Portside), let us know that temperatures had dropped to 26 degrees F.  We got moving to get to Kentucky Camp.  Crossing Cave Creek in the morning, we ran into a group of 4 hikers, all in their 70s or 80s.  Two groups of friends that had met on the Appalachian Trail decades earlier, and now in these upper years, spent their time hiking sections of long trails; one couple hikes ahead for the day while the other couple meets them with a car and supplies at the other end.  They had hiked the PCT, AT (2 times even), FT, North Country Trail, and even bike toured.  It was invigorating to see age having no boundary here.  We said goodbye, took one last look at the Santa Rita Ridgeline as a sinking waning gibbous moon sat along the crest.

​We woke up early today to take on the longest day of our hike so far –> 13 miles.  Getting up at 6 am, we unknowingly began a 2000 ft. ascent up the Santa Rita mountains near Mt. Wrightson.  We have maps which provide plenty of elevation and topographic information, but I have grown to love the excitement of tackling terrain as it comes on, especially on a well-marked trail.

​Waking up late the next morning, (always a luxury to enjoy in town), we had a few last chores to do.  Namely, two that annoyed me deeply.  First, my feet were still throbbing in my arch from my insoles (the same ones I had worn extensively before, including my NOLS trip).  In addition, I had began to get some inner thigh chafe as sweat accumulated on my thighs in the desert heat and the crystals therein brought friction with every rub.  I had ordered a different pair of insoles and better boxer briefs (Saxx for some pouch protection for my genitals and thighs).  We ran one last time to the post office to send home the insoles and former pair of boxers before we headed back to Gathering Grounds cafe for one last epic vegetarian breakfast burrito.

​It felt particularly monumental to arrive in Patagonia because, honestly, this was the place I was unsure we would reach given the state of my knee.  We love this town and decided we would take a zero day to allow my knee to rest/recover.  Janna got us a room at the Stage Stop Inn.  The historic hotel was followed by a morning at Gathering Grounds restaurant, where I honestly got the best breakfast burrito I’ve ever eaten.

​Loving the campsite near Red Bank Well, we got up early the next day to make the last little push into Patagonia, AZ.  This was big to use for several reasons: (1) I had so much doubt prior to the trip about my knee that Patagonia seemed proof of my ability to hike and (2) we always loved taking trips down to Patagonia when visiting southern AZ.

​The day started with a wet triplex from the night before.  Knowing we only had 10ish miles to go today made the mornings relaxed and long.  The slow pace meant that we didn’t have to shove miles in before rest, and therefore, we could take longer to enjoy breakfast and dry out the shelter.  We went back down to the metal cattle tank and filled up what we needed for the day.

The lightning storm continued dryly through the night, during which, I climbed out of the triplex to watch.  The sky overhead was a smack of Milky Way starlight while a silhouette of cumulus hung over the Huachucas.  I freaking love desert night skies.  

In the morning, after packing up, we casually ascended the rock-studded double track and found the nearby trailhead.  The dirt parking lot proved just high enough to receive full LTE reception despite the distant location.  Janna and I both called home to check-in with the fam.  Finishing a long talk with my parents about the winter conditions on the peaks, I contacted REI and ordered some boxer briefs and insoles to be sent to Patagonia, AZ.  I had been wearing Ex-Officio boxer briefs for years and brought along a heavily-used pair which now began to disintegrate on Day 3.  Damn.  The insoles were more annoying to me as I had been wearing Saucony Xodus Iso shoes for years, using them both for my ultrarunning in the desert and on a previous thru-hike of the John Muir Trail.  Yet the arch on my right foot seized with pain in spikes after few minutes.  Purchases made, we saw the trail stretch ahead over the Canelo Hills. 

​The decision not to summit the official route was reinforced by a night in the upper 20s.  Later, after running into several of the AZTers we saw the first day, we learned that the temperature on top had been 10-15 degrees during the night.  The first hiker we met said that it was pretty sketchy, but he seemed pleased to have gone up and over.  The next two hikers had the wide-eyed disillusionment of a child opening a gift only to receive shit.  They were pretty shaken by the experience and said that snow was knee-deep at least, there was a complete lack of visible trail, that descending was steep and slick, and that all the hikers seemed to be following each other out of sheer desperation to not get lost in the winter conditions on top.  Asked whether they would go back on top they firmly reiterated NO.

Although we planned to start the Arizona Trail on March 12, winter storm Ulmar slammed into Arizona for three solid days beginning March 11.  Sitting at home with gear collected and plans unfurled, we decided to forgo our original start and move it to Wednesday, March 13.  Ulmar continued to cover most of the state in snow from north to south along every mountain spine, even making the rare appearance of ground-fluff in parts of Phoenix.

One of the things I most love about life is its spontaneity.  Give an inch of time and watch life fold in on you and make creases you could have never dreamed.  Give life a foot and you feel what the oldest trees do - that growth is tenuous but pushing.  

It’s been six years since the New Years that brought 2013.  2013 entered while I lay in a hotel room outside of the Sierra Nevada.  The morning was spent falling in love with Death Valley National Park, a place I had no expectations for.  But that evening was all about my inner world.  I lay in bed and thought about what I wanted from life.  Complacency and convenience had clouded my life with the threat of that goal: comfort.  I had put on considerable weight, the trip represented my first earnest foray outside in some time, and the strength of my integrity to live purposefully had waned with the cold season.  Stock blocks of unease lay crumpled in my mind.