June 15th – Past Golden Oaks Spring to Near Kelso Valley Road

Spent the night cowboy camping near cow manure. Mmmmmm…not ideal, but it was a flat place to camp. The cows seem to roam wherever they please around these parts, so cow manure goes along with the deal.

The sun was out most of the day with blue skies. Luckily, much of the day was spent in trees, so we did have some shade. The terrain was rolling, so we made good miles. We spied another bear a few hundred feet off the trail in the trees. Tom did his best hollering job and the bear quickly moved away. Wow! 3rd bear sighting in Southern California – pretty cool!

We saw lots of cows the rest of the day – wonder how the bears mingle with the cows? We passed the 600 mile point – marked with sticks. Tom enhanced the sign with cow pies for the zeros. The things we do for fun on the trail.

Eventually we headed up on Piute Mountain. There were a lot of dirt bike trails, but we only saw one group of dirt bikers. The forest was particularly quiet. We enjoyed hiking through the open woods – much different than the Washington forests with thick underbrush. Once again, the terrain was gentle and the trail was smooth.

Although my quad started to give me trouble again, some ibuprofen and massage did the trick. We managed to get 28 miles in for the day. Eventually stopping for some cowboy camping right on trail due to lack of flat spaces for a tent. Although the least likely of camp spots, we both agreed the soft trail made for an excellent night of sleeping.