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Day 41 – The Donner Party?

In 2016 while hiking through countless areas of my 8,000 mile hike, I tried to educate myself on events and famous situations largely caused by nature. I couldn’t think of a good title for this post, so I thought I would commemorate the Donner party that tried to take their wagon train over Donner Summit (where I started today), but was only met with obstacles and snow higher than you can imagine.

It was a day that started perfectly, with a wonderful meal from Ric and Val. I rarely have food cravings anymore after over 16,000 Miles in the backwoods, but bacon had been sounding so good recently that when they had it, I was thoroughly impressed. After breakfast, it was chores. I put out another video (Freeoutside on YouTube) and then hit the grocery store and hardware store before it was time to get back on trail. From Donner Summit the trail was largely snow free, but in the higher sections, snow for 100 yards was not uncommon. I salvaged a 24 mile day starting at 11. The late start is due to my philosophy on rest days while hiking. I think it is more beneficial to have an easy evening and a casual morning, but get back to hiking than a full day off. The body is all about patterns and mine has adapted to hiking every day. I wouldn’t want to let it down.

Miles hiked 24

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