Today was fortunately not as hard as the last few days. With 13 miles to the camp before Mission Creek, I decided I could afford to spend a bit of time at camp. The windfarm office was kind enough to allow hikers to use the bathrooms and charge devices, so I packed up and made breakfast while my powerbank charged.

The trail started by climbing out of the valley, and gave me a great view past the wind turbines towards Palm Springs. The wind was strong today, and down in the valley, I could see huge dust clouds whipping up.

I then sidled around some pretty exposed hillside, having to be careful not to get blown off the path. As I got closer to the Whitewater Preserve, huge cliffs appeared. I then got a view into the deep valley below.

I decided to make the extra 0.5 mile trip to the Whitewater Preserve to see what’s there. The preserve was quiet, and not many hikers were around, so I just had a quick lunch here and returned to trail.

The trail followed the Whitewater River upstream for a couple of miles before crossing the river and heading up a ridge separating Whitewater River and Mission Creek. Along this stretch I caught up with Ninja, one of the three hikers who shared my cam spot at the wind farm last night. The climb out of Whitewater was steep, but short, with very soft, grey rock alongside the trail.

From the ridge, the views up both mountain valleys were impressive, and we traveled along the top for an hour or so. Finally, we descended into Mission Creek.

I found a good spot, close to the river, with shelter from the wind. The notorious Mission Creek washout section starts from here. A 12 mile section of route finding through riverbed awaits. I made sure to get an early night, and plenty of sleep for tomorrow.