Calm Seas and Correct Miles

Day 5
Miles 9
The seas were calm in this hammock of mine. I slipped away and away I slipped. I woke up once, from dreams that my hands were horribly bruised, only to find out in the light of my headlamp that it was truly only a dream. I woke again at 2:34, surprised that I was alive and unsure why.
But here came 4am and the pressure of not making The Correct Amount of Miles dragged my hungry ass from my swinging bed and into the halfway dream world of dawn.
We hurried through the morning light, stopping only long enough to let the boys forage here and there. We passed by some tents with backpackers opening their rainflys to see what the commotion was, coming down the trail. I smiled as they rubbed their eyes a second time when Bosco stared them down and said, Baaaa.
But when the call came from the California Highway Patrol at 8:30, we were only a quarter of a mile from Hwy 267, and the cops were on their way to stop traffic so we could cross. So we raced the final bit, and the cops chirped their sirens when they arrived, just as they said they would.
They put on their lights and stopped traffic as we emerged from the trees. The goats got themselves all worked up and the cop took a video and everyone started running while I was yelling Don’t Run, and no one listened, and I almost fell on my face tripping over someone’s lead.
But we made it.
Ungracefully.
And then there was 6 gallons of glorious fresh water which Joshua hid for us and Sophie brought up from the bushes.
Bosco drank a whole gallon all to himself and then everyone else did pretty much the same except Jon Snow who was still all worked up. Plus, a bunch of little kids wanted to pet him and he wasn’t so sure about all that, so drinking water wasn’t the first thing on his mind. We poured the rest of the water into one liter bottles and some kind passer-by took the empties for recycling for us. We carefully packed one bottle here and another there to make sure everyone’s bags were still even and no one carried too much weight.
The dust got in our noses and sifted into our socks and worked its way into the deep dry cracks forming in our hands. It was hot. We took breaks every half an hour to let the boys have some shade.
And then there was a glorious meadow. So full of shades of green and deep black shadows and open spaces and evergreens and my eyes hurt from the gratefulness of it all.
The boys ate and ate and ate as we set up the highline. Jon Snow drank four liters of water. We drank some water and cooked dinner and then our water was gone and it was time to give my hammock another shot.
And hope once again for calm seas.