once again, really sorry...

Well, I am home. I made it 1078 miles from the border of Mexico/Cali and literally walked all the way home. It was probably the most emotional moment of the entire hike when I climbed up over Carson Pass and could hear the traffic on HW88. I started crying like a little baby. Thankfully, no one was hiking with me for the past 3 days and I was all alone, I was able to literally slap myself back into reality. I am once again sorry for not posting more often. For the last month or so I have been in places far from cell service, hiking some difficult trail, and loving every moment of it. Unfortunately, I have had very little time to sit and reflect electronically. I wish I was more diligent in keeping up with my blog posts, but this last month was one of the best of my life, and honestly, typing about it on my tiny iPhone keyboard at night when I was going to sleep was about the last thing I wanted to do. I am much more content trying to find and recognize new constellations, watching for shooting stars, checking out the Milky Way and enjoying the natural state of things when I am so far away from the grind of the modern society. This last three months has been trying, I have went through so many life changes, and I feel stronger, healthier, and more balanced than ever. I have a new confidence about me, I no longer feel as dependent on others to find happiness, I am finally back to being 100% comfortable with being completely alone, which is something I somehow got so far away from. Not that I am 'alone' out there, I have been hiking with a pretty solid group of people for several hundred miles now, but at the same time, I am alone in this. I have lots of support, and those of you who follow and inspire me to keep going are truly some amazing people. As far as hike details go, I am not quite half way with the mileage, but in the amount of time on the trail, I'd say I am very close to half way done. I need to do some major resupply and gear change/exchange this coming week. I rolled in to town with everything breaking: my bank account(ouch) my backpack, shoes (2nd pair), digital camera and other random gear stuff is all pretty much done for and needs to be replaced or replenished is one way or another. I haven't been able to take pictures for about a week now due to the digi-cam breaking and the battery levels of my cell phone and battery pack being at critical lows... It took me 77 days to hike from the border back home. I took 8 'zero' days in that time where I did not hike any miles at all. I hiked numerous 'nearos' where I hiked, but not a full day's worth of miles, usually somewhere between 1-12 miles. I also have substantially picked up my pace. I was doing 15 miles a day or so at the beginning, but now I can easily hike 25+ miles a day, and get up and do it again the next day if need be. I have lost 50 lbs and am sitting right around 200 now, a weight in which I have never been since I was in high school and started getting bigger, filling out, and gaining a substantial gut. Being healthy has been the most rewarding part of this whole experience. My heart is stronger than ever, my muscles are more toned, I look better, and feel better, both mentally and physically. I weigh less now with my backpack on and full of 5 days worth of food, than I did naked before I left. I am super excited to get my travel guitar back now that I am in shape, do not need to carry along a heavy and bulky bear canister, and have crossed most of the rivers that may have needed to be forded, which may have proved difficult to manage with a wooden guitar in tow. I have been writing some stuff out there that I hope I can translate to some quality music here really soon, and I am excited to be able to play around the campfire on those nights where we can have one. I am more comfortable in my own skin than ever before, and I can only hope that I can use that as a starting point for being myself as a musician, and creating my own style or niche that is refreshing and most of all gets good response from those who I share it with. Once again, thanks for all the support, and thanks for following along. Sometimes I forget how many of you are checking this page out on a daily basis sometimes just hoping I have posted something new. I am going to try and do a better job at keeping it up now that the toughest part of the hike may be behind me. If anyone of you ever have questions or want to know more stuff, or specific stuff I fail to touch on, please email me or leave a comment and I will be more than glad to do what I can to give you the information you are looking for.... thanks again. Kristo