A Very Blustery Day

May 18, 2012
Day 48
Miles: 14.8

I grew up watching Winne the Pooh and all I could think about today was the "blustery day" episode. It was so windy! I was up a lot of the night because of the howling wind, but we set out this morning and enjoyed another beautiful desert sunrise.

About this time we figured we were in for a very blustery day!

Tailgate braving the wind.

I guess the hundreds of windmills are a clue of how windy it is around here. We made it to a faucet next to a bridge over a dry creek bed and hid from the wind for a little break. The faucet was turned on surprisingly, but we hear that it has already been shut off again.

We had a six mile climb to get to the next water source and MAN it was a long six miles. We were fighting the wind the entire time. The wind was blowing around 40-50 mph sustained with gusts up to 60-70. It was absolutely insane. I was leaning all of my body and pack weight into the wind and I was still struggling to stay upright.

Here I am "being a windmill". I think the wind was getting to my head.

The lovely scenery...

We arrived at Tylerhorse Canyon around mid-day and decided to camp there since that was the only water until we hit Tehachapi.  We enjoyed an afternoon nap. However, we woke up to a camp invasion! We jumped out of the tent to protect ourselves from the invaders.

There were about 5 cows that meandered up the creak. They were keeping an eye on us, but didn't seem too interested.

This evening Bone Lady, Bucket, and Swiss Cheese showed up to camp. They had been beaten up by the wind as well and were anxious to set up some shelter for the night. We all cooked some dinner and hit the sack.

We have a short day into Tehachapi tomorrow. Hopefully we won't wake up to a big cow tongue licking our tent tonight.

-Twist