ODT 6 – September 22 – Leaving Rome

Daily Miles: 19

Total Miles: 108

We have been struggling with the time zone for the past few days. We seem to have been close to the line which delineates Mountain Time and Pacific Time for the past two days. The other night, Qball’s phone automatically reset the time zone and so his alarm went off an hour early. He was up and wondering why no one else was getting up.

Well, a similar thing happened this morning. We planned to meet at the convenience store at 7am when they opened and then head out shortly after. At 7:20am, we hadn’t seen Qball or JJ, so we knocked on their door and woke them up…turned out their phones reset to the wrong time zone, so they were an hour behind. Needless to say, we got a bit later of a start than we had planned.

It was quite chilly and foggy as we started out. We had a quick and steep climb back onto the rim of the canyon, where we stayed for the rest of the day. The walking was mostly primitive road walking (for awhile we were walking near the edge of the rim with nice views of the river below), with a bit of cross country travel added in.

It felt quite hot today, even though it probably didn’t get above the high 70’s today. The sun felt quite intense, and with no trees around, there is no escaping the sun. We put on sunscreen several times today. Qball and JJ are both using umbrellas on this trail and have really been liking them for the shade. Luckily it hasn’t been windy, so they’ve been able to use them regularly.

As we walked down the dirt roads the past few days, it seem like the horny toads like to hang out in the roads sunning themselves. We have seen many horny roads (though all of them have been really small). As soon a we get close, they run off the road, and we always have to be careful not to step on them.

We came across a lot more water sources today than we had expected. A lot of full cow tanks with pretty good water. We ended up downing a liter of water at each water source just to help us stay hydrated in the sun.

It seems like on days which feel a bit monotonous with the scenery (endless golden hills), you need to find other things to appreciate. The immense vastness of this landscape. The wide blue sky. The red sunset. The conversations with friends. It is another reminder that this experience is about the journey, which is made up of a thousand different moments.