Day 41: Joshua Tree ⛺ - ⛺ @ mile 587.2

Day: 18.05.2018 Miles hiked today: 17.5 miles Total Mileage: Mile 587

I don't think I did get much sleep this night with these heavy winds. So i am actually glad to move on - out of that wind please! It looked like a beautiful day and we packed up fast to keep moving. Also the wind didn't really invite for packing up slowly! It's steep uphill again for the first 4 miles today. Uphill + heavy winds + heavy backpack = very very bad combination --> I don't like it at all! And it was very though for the first 2 miles. I could have screamed and cried,  throwing pack and poles away, not walking on anymore, not one single step and waiting for the wind to stop. But this is not how it works here. So I told myself to make a break after two miles then I have done half of the uphill. The wind sometimes made it hard to walk or pushed me from one side to the other, I felt like a person must feel walking on the moon. Every step is hard work. After exactly two miles i stopped, thankfully behind a tree which provided some shelter. Kermit came along and stopped with me. The next two miles were better. The wind was still here but not all the times and little less strong. We had breakfast at a sheltered spot and moved on down the other side of the hill with no more wind but down a dirt road. Still better than the wind. Today, none of us seemed to be very motivated so we stopped again a couple of miles later and had a nap next to the dirt road. It's only 6 miles to the next water source so after an hour or so we moved on again and stopped for lunch at the water source. And of course we had another afternoon nap. We decided to camp 3 miles further down the trail and called it a day around 4:30pm already. Even so it felt we were napping and breaking all day we still hiked 17.5 miles today. Setting camp early was also nice. I had time to take care omf my blisters (I have several and very day I get a new one. This only started with my new shoes I bought in Idyllwild but it's really annoying because the first 2 weeks I did not had any blister at all with my shoes. But because the sole of these shoes ripped off I had to get new ones), strech, clean and loads of other things I am nornally either too tired or it's too late and all I want is food and sleep. Thanks the wind stopped and we had a calm evening!