Day 121, August 2, 2012

  I woke up at about sunrise. I laid there a little while and it was really pretty. By the time I finally got up the sun was out and it was warm. I packed my stuff and was feeling ready and rested. I hit the road around 7:30am.
       I had about 20 miles to go to get to Santa Rosa NM. I headed west on the frontage road and it was very peaceful. About a mile up there was a little town that I didn't know was there. It was Cuervo NM. I passed through there and it was pretty much a ghost town. At the west end of town the frontage ended and it forced you to get onto the 40. So I crossed over and hopped onto the shoulder against traffic.
         I was ready to get to a town and rest my body for a day. My knees were hurting and my body needed a break. So I got onto a roll and was really walking a fast pace. I was on a roll and knocked out the first ten miles no problem. The second half of the day was where things got tough.
       My knees starting feeling a little more pain around miles 13-14. I could feel a very deep and on and off sharp pain. It felt like my knee would twist a little each step because it was tired, and in the slight twist or shift, it would strain something. Possibly a tendon.

        I got about 6 miles east of Santa rosa when the little pain starting feeling worse. It was becoming a steep uphill slope also, and I wanted to get to town so I could rest them. Finally the last few miles were downhill. I thought that was gonna be easier, but because I have to pull my cart back from rolling down fast, it put an even more akward pressure on my knees.
        I walked the last miles or so very slowly. I was really not happy about this pain and it worried me quite a bit. I was hoping a day off would help them out. So I finally got to a McDonald's there in town and it was nice to have things around after being in bare desert so much. I went to the McDonalds and sat down. Usually once I sit down it feels good, but sitting was almost worse as the pain in my knees was still there and now all I was thinking about. And I couldn't get comfortable. This was the fist time I had this problem. Again I was worrying.
       I sat in McDonald and ate a Mcchicken and had a drink. I arrived there around 2:30 and sat in there until about 11pm. When I was ready to go to bed I walked out behind McDonalds and found a spot behind some desert bushes on a rock. It was not landscape but natural terrain. I made my bed on this huge rock where me and my stuff were hidden. I stayed up until about 12 when I fell asleep there. There were some little thin needle type things poking me through my sleeping bag. They must have been whatever grew on the bush next to me. Those would poke me whenever I would roll around through the night. That was a little annoying, but other than that I slept decent. And decent out here means about 4-5 hours waking up every 30 minutes or so from bugs or noise.