Bad Romance and I Hear Goats

Miles 15.7

Camped at mm 403.7

I woke up and couldn’t breathe. Slow hypoxia. I think whenever I go into REM sleep, I can’t get enough oxygen, and I wake up. I thrashed around like a little fish. I grabbed my oxygen and took three breaths off of it. Then I gagged for a while and almost threw up on my sleeping bag. I heaved and heaved and my eyes watered and I felt helpless but eventually it all settled down and I lay back down until I calmed down. I went back to sleep.

I woke up exhausted. Again.

I heard from my friend Kathleen and her husband Jeremy, who are goatpackers, that they wanted to come into the area and meet up with us, and have their goats carry some of our gear to the top of a very difficult pass for us. They were headed to a spot 15.7 miles away, so we got up at 4:30 am to try to make it to them today.

The views were beyond spectacular. Every turn and every corner, and every crest of every hill revealed a new level of beauty I could never have imagined, and it blew up my little brain. Deep valleys filled with bright green at the bottom with slate, rocky cliffs and stern tabletops way up there. Massive rounded bald grey mounds with shocks of blue stone rubble piles below. It was all so magnificent, I didn’t want to blink.

Then we crossed the 400 mile mark. 400 miles on this rugged, beautiful, crazy, shitty, wonderful, Rage-Filled, magnificent trail. This trail with whom I have such a loving and hateful relationship. We definitely have a Bad Romance.

Tired as we were, we rolled into the beaver pond about half an hour before Stone jumped out of her tent and yelled, “I HEAR GOATS!”

I jumped out of my tent too.

“I HEAR GOATS!” I echoed.

HI I’M JODIE, I basically yelled at Jeremy, who was three feet from me. Because I was so excited. He laughed and said, Hi I’m Jeremy.

Kathleen gave me a huge hug and I got to meet all their goats.

We went up to the beaver pond where we all ate dinner and watched the goats eat their dinner too.

I went to sleep listening to the twinkling of the goat’s bells and feeling like the world had shifted in my favor.