There’s a book I’m supposed to be writing… Instead, I stealth camp outside of town after riding the dog into Flagstaff. The deal was that I’d take time off-trail to finish writing the second book in my hiker trash romance series. Sit still. Write. Pay for the future. But to my body, writing felt like […]
The transition between trails is the hardest part of life, where dips into society are the fading norm, and life outside is becoming the foundation. Forty days. Forty nights. Done. The Catalina Highway unspooling below me, down into Tucson, and with it the slow return of everything I’d left behind… the noise of traffic, the […]
The end is important in all things. I took the shuttle to the bottom of Sabino Canyon, spending way too much time charging my phone and drinking milk at the closest supermarket. I packed out another half gallon like it was the source of life, and climbed Sabino Canyon on foot. Cyclists lined up at […]
Mileage that took three hours to run in, took four days to retrace on the way out of Oro Valley. The first night I’d slipped behind the glow of In-N-Out and disappeared into Big Wash, cowboy camped in the quiet of a place not meant for staying. Then somewhere above Catalina State Park, I stopped […]
Having fasted for the last 24 hours, I descended from the mountains, through Romero Pass, down into Catalina State Park and into In-N-Out. Three weeks, 400 miles, and in the end all that remained was a three hour run. My empty water bottles collapsed from the pressure change of the descent and I had salt […]
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 […]
There are mistakes you make without realizing it. And then there are the ones you carry 30 miles in a Ziploc bag. The pizza was good. In town. Yesterday. Pizza doesn’t belong in a Ziploc bag in the Arizona sun for 12 hours. I knew that. I did it anyway. It deserved better than what […]
I didn’t expect the hardest part of this section to be what was missing. I walked out of town on the Legends of Superior Trail, chasing an alternative route I hadn’t taken before. Lost miles on the way to the rain collector, the only reliable water out here if you’re trying to avoid drinking from […]
Sometimes the stop matters more than progress. I took the Cemetery Trail out of the Roosevelt Lake marina, climbing 2,500 feet into the Superstitions, stepping over my first rattlesnake. The wind out there carries something with it, ghost whispers, barely audible. Agave and prickly pear, bull thistle catching my arms as I hike past. Rock […]
You make the plan. The plan doesn’t care. Cowboy camped off trail on the run to Tonto Basin, a hike I’d already lived once in my head. Moonlit miles. A mountain view of the town lights below. Chorizo and egg burritos in the morning. Only, the moon never showed. Clouds hid it. Google said the […]