Jammin' with Jameson

24.7 miles. A race to beat the heat. Today the weekend heat wave started so everyone was looking for the all mighty mid day shade and water source. Luckily there was one place that could provide both at once – Mike’s Place. I woke up at 5:15 with Tuna to start as early as we could and took it slow in the morning. The trail followed the Sandy river for a while and then rose into a valley as the sun was starting to rise. It was definitely the most beautiful sunrise I’ve seen so far. The trail continued to be shaded from the sun due to the ridgeline so I was heat free until about 9. My feet were feeling good and I was making good pace. I finished the 12 miles to Mikes Place around 11:15 and finished my top 100 songs from 2018 playlist at the exact moment I pulled up to the trail offshoot. I ran into Prophet and Josh who were going to get a few more miles in with Tuna and Swell before their siesta but I decided to stay with the Germans. This was basically a repeat of Boulder Oaks siesta but way more janky. Slowly, more and more people were coming in to escape from the heat. I scarfed down around 1000 calories of peanut butter and had a terrific nap between 1 and 4. We met a hiker named Too Hot who had bailed from the PCT in 2020 that was an absolute tank. He had just finished the AZT, was 3 days faster than us, and wanted to finish the last portion of the CDT after he finished the PCT. Oh, also his pack was only 7 pounds total. We decided to push back our afternoon start time to 5:30 because the sun was so hot. Thus commenced our first night hike. The sunset was gorgeous as it started going down behind the line of mountains in the distance. We timed our dinner for a perfect view of the red glow over the mountain ridges and all agreed it was our favorite so far. Unfortunately after dinner we still had to do 8 more miles in the dark to have a 12 mile morning hike to Paradise Valley Cafe. I heard more about Ricardo’s workaway on Greece and decided to dub him the name Shepherd for all his experience there and shepherding calls he could utilize on the trail. During the siesta, I received the trail name Stretch for my daily routines. The final hour of hiking was absolutely brutal. I was so exhausted and my feet were killing me. I kept checking the distance remaining and prayed itd be over soon. We finally made it to our campground in a Sandy valley and found the other four hikers fast asleep in their own cowboy camp group. A good meal ahead tomorrow!