Got off to a late start and was not sure if I could go after all the caches on my list. Was in a foul mood too. Deer guts, possum carcass and piles of garbage at my parking spot. Yuck. Kept Patches on a leash until we were clear of all the yucky stuff.
Could not find the first cache on my list. Dropped my map and had to go back for it. Maybe this was a bad day to be in the woods. Things got better but I was so tired and grumpy.
Lunch and coffee on the shore of Lake Forbes cheered me up. A home owner came out and looked around. So I figured it was not a real hike and I whipped out my brand new first ever smart phone and tried to figure out how to send a text message.
After lunch I had to cross a creek in some dark woods to go look for more caches. Maybe there was not enough light left for this? The light faded, my planned brush crashing route was too brushy so I had to back track instead of making loop.
Back in the dark canyon at the creek crossing and I was clearly not in the right spot. This was not where I crossed the creek. The light was fading my GPS(r) battery was going dead, I cussed a bunch. Then I got out my nifty battery / hand warmer / flashlight and plugged in my GPS and turned on the light and found my way out of the woods. It was almost dark so I phoned home.
Back near the car I put Patches back on a leash. The smell of the gut piles almost made me vomit.
9.5 miles with about 200 feet elevation gain.
Newts were marching across the road and frogs were croaking.
