Another hot day expected so another early start. After making such good time yesterday we decided to do another 28 mile day and camp at a bar that let's you stay in their back yard. The first 10 miles was nice trail through wooded forest. That's when we hit the Anaconda cut off. The cutoff is an alternative that saves 80 miles of hiking along the divide through Butte. The trail through Butte is brand new and supposedly nice with great views but does a long loop to the south east before heading straight back west. The cutoff follows some roads and heads south west and rejoins the divide after the town of Anaconda. The deciding factor for me was the 4th of July. Our schedule had us in town on the 4th. I had a great time celebrating the 4th on the AT in a small town and wanted to do that again. I'm sure Butte's celebration would be great but it wouldn't have that small town feel.
The hike was along some nice forest service road for the first 17 miles before following asphalt into town. At the asphalt was where the car was supposed to be. The initial 10 miles was great. We were going downhill next to a creek with trees everywhere. The remaining 6 miles was not. The creek dried up and the trees were replaced by alfalfa farms. We got there at the worst time of day. It was over 90 and beads was out of water since we thought we'd grab some from where the nice creek crossed the road. Somehow in the mile between our last crossing and that point it completely dried up. I had only a liter and a left for that 6 mile stretch. There was no place for us to hide from the heat until we had done 5 miles and drunk all the water. We took a nice break under some trees and let the heat break. There was a river crossing in a mile and half so we pushed on. After a half mile we see a whole bunch of other hikers sitting in someone's front yard that flag us down. The tell us the bar is closed but the guy who owns the house, Eddie Murphy(not the comedian), said we could stay there for the night and use his water.
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