I was so tired. But I had to get up. There was condensation in my tent – well to be expected considering where it was pitched on a low grassy area. I started off by 6-ish. By late morning I was already dying of the heat. I found some shade and stopped a while. I kept going and by around 3pm I came to Kitchen Creek – 9.8 miles from Lake Morena. I hadn’t read the trail guide thoroughly so you can imagine my surprise and horror when I saw the very steep and very sketchy way to get down to the creek. But through the hassle I saw some hope. Not only was I gonna refill my water I was going to get into that creek to thoroughly cool off. So I did. I then hid in a rock formation to wait out the sun. After drying out and getting hot once more I again dunked myself in the creek. I pitched my tent and stayed there that night. I was startled and a tad surprised when I heard a couple of people down near me in the night but I think that they just came to get water. I had heard later that some people hiked only at night to avoid the heat.
