Day 3: Drinking from Dead Cow Pond
May 18, 2023
Mather Campground to Watson Tank
16.0 miles
Man I had a great fucking sleep last night. By the time we got to bed and the one guy finally got taken away by the rangers, I passed out hard. Normally went camping I toss and turn throughout hlthe night, waking up periodically. But I think I only woke up once or twice that I recall. The original plan was to get up at 5:00 just to give us enough time to make our planned average of 16 miles from here on out, but with how tired we were last night we changed our minds at the last minute to get up at 6:00 to get some more rest after arguably the hardeyday of our trip. That extra hour was well worth it.
The Arizona Trail through the park is all paved. That might sound nice to most folks but with a heavy pack, it can be brutal to walk on. Besides, we came here to hike in the wilderness so the vibe just isn't the same. We hiked along the paved path until we reached the park entrance, diverting briefly to get a photo of the national park sign.
As an aside, getting our photo at the entrance sign to a national park is a common tradition among families at national parks. But the Hart family took it to another level. From the 60s on, my Grandpa Hart would take a big family photo at every national park sign. And I mean every single sign. In my grandparents basement, my Grandpa made an enormous collage of all of the national park sign photos they have. Like a 10 foot by 5 foot frame featuring dozens upon dozens of photos of the family at different, sometimes multiple of the same, park signs from the 60s through the 90s. It's goofy in every way, but also a family treasure. All that to say, I always make a point to get our photo by a national park sign, even the lackluster green ones Parks Canada has.
After our sign excursion we stopped for breakfast and exploded our packs to dry out our wet tent and sleeping bags due to rain late yesterday and in the night. We pressed on until the trail turned off the paved path, through a cool tunnel under the the highway filled with fun and weird art and graffiti. From there the trail was on beautiful smooth and flat dirt forest roads pretty much the rest of the day with the odd section of single track.
The scenery was gorgeous dusty Ponderosa pine forests with desert scrub like California sage brush and other bushes. The sage brush smelled incredible. I frequently would snag a few leaves, crumple them up and smell them as I walked. The scent was a cross between menthol and the sage you'd cook with. So pleasant and refreshing.
While the Grand Canyon is truly incredible to behold and an amazing challenge, nothing quite beats a dusty high desert first trail. Even with unchanging scenery, there's something so wonderful about letting yourself get lost in your thoughts; it's therapeutic. With the Grand Canyon having so many people on it, it's hard to ever feel that your in the backcountry. It's days like today that I regularly long for. This reminds me so much of the PCT, particularly in Northern California. Hilariously, a section like this would have been boring to us when we were on the PCT, but now I'm nostolgic for those moments. It was a blissful hike.
Now for the bit related to the title. There's not a ton of water in this section of trail. It is Arizona after all. Most of the sources in these parts are cattle ponds and cisterns. It looks disgusting but it is drinkable once filtered or treated. The lone water source for today was a cattle pond which they call "tanks" for some reason. It's literally just a wide depression they dug with an excavator that fills up with seasonal rain. Sacttered around the pond was cow plops, horse poop, and elk shit in addition to a smattering of bleached cow bones. The pond was a lovely brown colour with the occasional bubbles rising to the surface from whatever was living or decomposing in there. We used a scoop to pour the piss warm water into our water bladders to then filter into our bottles. I had to flush my filter halfway through each bottle because it kept getting clogged with sediment. To be fair though, the filter to a good job of at least making the water look a lot better. Instead of curdled chocolate milk, it was a nice off-clear colour. And honestly it didn't taste bad at all. Not quite Halifax city tapwater, but nothing gross about it.
We hiked the last three miles to where we're staying tonight, in a cluster of Ponderosa pines next to a grassy meadow. Dark clouds rolled in as they have most late afternoons/early evenings just after we set up camp and as we were getting dinner started (which is literally boiling water). The rain dumped for about 15 minutes and like it has the other days we've been here, didn't last long.
We're now in our tent writing our blogs and finishing miscellaneous camp chores before bed. I'm really looking forward to the days ahead on trail.
