What do you do with a finish line when you’re not sure you want to cross it?
I rehydrated with a Polar Pop in Oracle, keeping my cheeks tight, then followed the Cody Ridge Trail back to the AZT, back to the desert. Gentle miles. Sunset at my feet. Biosphere 2 below, sealed off from everything, while I was out in it.
FarOut said less than twenty-five miles to the Romero Valley turnoff. The turnoff that ends this adventure.
I slept under the stars and woke up feeling refreshed in the cool mountain air, and decided to fast. To arrive empty. No food until the double-double. It felt right, to elevate something arbitrary toward the sacred.
Then I ran.
Only there was a race on Oracle Ridge with trail runners going in the opposite direction, we were dodging each other like it was a game. Then the aid station handed me a rice krispie treat before I could say anything. I was halfway through it before I remembered the fast.
I’d lost the trail too. I could fight back through the runner traffic, or I could take the old route over the top of Mount Lemmon. The rice krispie treat had reset the clock, might as well take the long way.
At noon, I sat outside the Summerhaven General Store charging my phone and power bank, watching the afternoon slide south. Eight miles to the turnoff. I kept thinking about running. I could be there tonight. Sleep behind In-N-Out, fat and full.
Then I laughed at myself for the first time all day.
There was no reason to rush toward the end of the thing I didn’t want to end.
I wandered out on the Mint Spring Trail, across Marshall Saddle, to a rock outcrop where I could watch the last of the light disappear behind Oro Valley. Somewhere down there, a double-double was waiting in the dark. Available. Patient. Not going anywhere.
Neither was I.
As long as I didn’t roll the wrong way in my sleep.
#ArizonaTrail #AZT #sobo #innout