Day 36 : Section E

26th May 2013
Mile 478 to mile 496 : Green Valley to Cougar Crossing
Mileage : 18

We managed to escape the vortex surrounding he Andersons relatively early today, and set about covering the18 miles set for the day. In response to a  blog comment about mileage per day i thought id give a quick explanation.

Mileage in these first 6 sections is mostly governed by water, or the arrival into a trail town etc. Today we are doing 18 miles.as this is where there is a guaranteed water source, and given he next day will be a dry 21 miles it seems sensible. It is always preferable to camp by water as usually it means washing and cleaning is possible. If the weather were different, it would be not only the distance that would feature when determining day distances, but also time of day and terrain. Bu thankfully for the moment it is cool enough that we don't have to think about that just yet.

As we finished our day we ended up as planned at the water tank. As we sat there eating a pickup truck pulled up next to us and started asking us about mountain lions. Oh dear. The only thing i knew up to this point is that i am an unlikely target given my size and gender. Cheddar and Roo have already had an encounter and given their reaction I'm not sure i want to bump into one. Joggers one trail runners are, more often than not, the victims of mountain lion attacks due to the fact that the running triggers an instinctive chase response in the animal. Thankfully hikers, with slow speeds and large packs are less of a target. It turns out though that he saddle where we intended to camp was q heavily used mountain lion junction. The guy in the truck was checking on his camera traps and had seen at 2 already this year. Lets hope they take the night off tonight. An encounter in the middle of he night answering the call of nature would be less than ideal.