Tuesday December 12, 33.0km/20.5mi
Mojave Wilderness (589.4/3400ft) to Hole-in-the-Wall Campground (609.5/4300ft) (CA) +0.4mi to campground
We packed up in the dark, and had our usual 5:45am start. After a mile of hiking, I could see the sunrise creep down the mountains across the valley.
It was a pretty cold day, and we hiked with most of our layers on all morning. There was some pretty enjoyable travel through a wash, which I always like because I don’t have to pay much attention to navigation.
After awhile, we left the wash and hiked cross-country over a small pass. Usually these little segments are short and fun, but this one was a little longer and it was full of grass that would leave sharp things in our socks and shoes. Ouch!
It was easy travel, but we would have to stop every once in awhile to remove an especially sharp piece of grass.
There was a pretty nice view from the top of the pass, the hills are so much greener here in the Mojave preserve.
Fortunately for much of the afternoon, we had some nice clean walking on dirt roads. No grass here!
Late in the afternoon we approached Hole-in-the-Rock State Park. The mountainside and cliffs were full of little holes, presumably from volcanic action.
When we entered the park, we actually hiked on a singletrack trail for a couple miles. It felt like such a treat!
We hadn’t hiked on a human-built singletrack trail for a long time, probably at least a week. The trail went right by one of the cliffs, so we got to see some of the little holes up close.
More beautiful singletrack trail.
This state park also had a campground, which we took advantage of. It was only 4:30pm, and we were a couple of miles short of our usual distance, but it was such a nice and welcoming place to camp.
It had been a very long time since I was able to take a photo of our campsite, since we are almost always setting up camp in the dark.
It was a pretty cold day, and it felt like it was warm for only a couple of hours in the afternoon. As soon as the sun went behind the mountain, it was very cold again. This campground is well over 4,000 ft in elevation, so I expect it will get quite cold tonight…maybe almost freezing.