July 25 - Sierra City

End: on a ridge outside of Sierra City
Daily: 23.8
Total: 1200.5

I wrote the greatest haiku about butter last night as I was falling asleep. When I woke up, I couldn't remember it. So this isn't the greatest haiku about butter, this is just a tribute.

Delicious butter
My tastebuds explode with flavor
Very worth the weight

Anyway, this is the biggest day since before Kennedy Meadows south. It helped that all but the first 3 or 4 miles were completely snow free. We walked so fast! It feels so good to walk!

We also got down to about 4500 feet in elevation and started seeing plants I haven't seen since last year - Doug firs for example, and that pathfinder plant that turns its arrow shaped leaves upside down when you swipe it.

The best part of today was getting into Sierra City before the PO closed and getting 3 care packages! One from my mom (once again thanks for being our support, Mom!) with my maps, which we were worried about having to wait for. It also had homemade cookies which are DELICIOUS. Another from Chris's mom, which had homemade bread and brownies and dried fruits and vegetables and spaghetti sauce (we ate it for dinner that night, it was also DELICIOUS). And a package from our friend Kevin Farron in Bend. He went all out too! Fancy chocolates, rice-a-roni, Velveeta mac 'n' cheese, Starbucks VIA (which will be especially needed now that we'll be trying to push bigger days) and best of all - homemade cookies and dried morels! And the nicest card ever.

So all of these packages were really nice too because everything at the store was really, really expensive. So we were able to use a lot of the cookies and brownies as snacks so we didn't have to pay $2 for a granola bar. We're slowly catching back up to our budget.

Speaking of budget, after a couple hours rest, eating chocolates and delicious cookies, we pushed a few more miles to just get them done and not spend more money and time in town. I'm glad we did. We cut our huge climb into two parts and it was way cooler at night. Today was hot.

Now sleep after some Velveeta shells and cous cous. I love bedtime.