Wednesday June 7, 27.8mi/44.8km

Upper Hack Canyon (739.2/4600ft) to Highway 389 (766.6/5160ft) (AZ) + 0.4mi water reservoir

I thought it might get hot in the afternoon, so I started hiking early at 6:15am. The next 30 or so miles are called the Arizona Strip, and is known for being a shadeless plateau and often getting hot. I love morning miles and watching the sunrise creep down the canyon walls.

Even the moon was out! Although it was about to set.

In less than an hour I came to my first water source for the day called Hack “reservoir”. That was such an optimistic description of this water feature.

I checked it out pretty thoroughly and I couldn’t find anywhere that wasn’t a sludgy muddy mess, and also it was filled with old tires. There was even a dead cow nearby! Gross. (Cows ruin everything).

So I kept hiking all morning on a dirt two track road, and the nice cool temperatures of the morning sun.

Occasionally I would see small herds of cows just roaming around freely, and this group had a cute little calf with it.

The miles flew by on all these flat easy dirt roads. And so far, it wasn’t hot…my lucky day!

For maybe half an hour the route detoured off into Yellowstone wash.

Hiking in the wash seemed kind of pointless since there was a nice dirt road that ran parallel to it, but I didn’t know that until I had finished hiking the wash. Next time I would stick to the road! There was a small climb, and at the top was this very nice water source that was fenced off and protected from cows. Amazing!

I took off my pack, drank a ton of water, and had my lunch break there. Some small clouds even came in to provide a little bit of shade, and there was a breeze which made the temperature perfect.

From this spot I was only 11 miles from the highway and the town of Colorado City. I decided to try to make it to town and I hiked all afternoon on more lovely dirt roads.

It was great scenery, I was hiking North towards these next set of mountains in the distance.

I arrived to the big paved highway 389 just after 4pm. It’s amazing what’s possible with perfect temperatures and nice dirt roads, I hiked 27 miles by 4pm! I spent 45 minutes standing by the road hitching, and eventually an oil worker picked me up on his way to his next job (13 hours away!). I was in the little town of Hurricane UT.

It looked like a lovely little place, they even had a little heritage House museum, just like the one in Kanab.

There was a big city park that was two blocks long and it even had a little splash park, so of course I had to walk through it and feel the nice cold water spray everywhere. It reminded me of many of the small towns in New Zealand on the Te Araroa.

After a quick Google search I determined that the Rodeway Inn was the best deal, and they even had a free breakfast.

I checked into my room dropped off all my stuff and probably went across the street to the Rooster Run cafe, and got dinner. And a milkshake, of course.

After dinner I went back to my room and showered and did some planning for my next upcoming hikes. The hotel has a nice laundry room but apparently it closed at 8pm, so I’ll have to do that in the morning along with a few other minor chores. Only a few more days on the Hayduke, and then I’m finished!