I got here a little after 3pm. Camp is all setup, water filtered and bandana and socks washed. This was a freakishly long and tiring day. It started out cloudy and cool with some small patches of blue sky. It had been mostly clear last night before I finally crawled into the tent, with just a scattering of clouds. Today was supposed (!) to be the rainiest day according to the forecast that had posted at Indian Garden for the past couple of days. Not so much. Not a drop. I was up at 420am to start breaking down camp and packing everything up. I had granola with blueberries for breakfast and two mochas.

I left camp at 640am and was at the junction of the Tonto East Trail at 710am. By 730am I was approaching the eastern side of Horn Creek Canyon and crossed over a campsite at the back end there a little after 8am. It was 9am by the time I was out of there. There were still lots of clouds in the sky but a lot more blue sky than earlier, the clouds were breaking up.

Around 10am I was approaching the east side of Salt Creek Canyon and my feet were really starting to bother me. It was the joints in my toes and any time I had to bend them it hurt. I took a short break to rest them and then they were fine for a while longer but then they eventually started to hurt again. I took the boots and socks off and massaged the toes and nothing felt sore. The socks were already very damp, especially the liners, and I wondered if that was the problem. I had only gone 5 miles and still had 5 more to go and it was going to be very hard if I had to keep stopping. Finally I decided to try going without the liners. I had some spare socks and liners but figured once they got damp I would be back in the same situation.

Going without the liners seemed to solve the problem. I crossed the trail leading to the Salt Creek camping area at 1120am and started thinking about lunch and a long rest break. I was hoping to have lunch at Monument Creek but that seemed too far away yet. It was starting to get hot and I really needed a long rest break.

On my way out of Salt Creek I found a nice spot of hard shade and decided that would be my lunch break. I hid out there and had my lunch, tuna roll-ups with chips again, and did not start moving again until after 1pm. It was a nice rest break.

Now it was very warm and I was somewhat distressed that the GPS told me I had already walked 9.5 miles. I knew that I still had a good distance to go to get to Monument Creek. The distance between Indian Garden and Monument Creek was only supposed to be 10 miles so the GPS was obviously wrong about how far I walked. It probably got messed up by some of the cliffs in these side canyons. I trudged along.

I passed Cedar Spring at 210pm and finally got my first view of The Monument in Monument Creek at 230pm. It was a very welcomed sight. The descent down into Monument Creek took longer than expected and was making my feet feel very hot. When I finally got to camp the GPS had 11.5 miles on it so I don't know what was going on.

It's time to make some dinner, the last night for mac & cheese with hot dogs. I will be experimenting with a couple of new meals for the last two nights. No more beer. Peanut M&Ms for dessert.