It was another gorgeous day. The sun gleamed through our campsite and spurred us to get up. With no reason not to, we began hiking. The morning went by quickly, only small hills filled in the contours of the terrain. We were fast. Maggie powered ahead spurred by another 12 hours of sleep and I brought up the rear. Mid morning I came across a man clad in blaze orange and his dog had an orange jacket on. Upon closer inspection they were definitely hiking, just hoping to alert hunters. I chatted with him for a bit before learning he had been following our journey on the Ouachita Trail! We said our goodbyes and hiked our separate ways. A couple of miles later something began to smell. There was a leaf stuck to the bottom of my shoe, so I flicked it off, but found the reason for the stuck lead. Dog poop splattered onto my leg and covered the bottom of my shoe. I had stepped on a land mine. I scraped it on some moss the best I could and then continued with my day. Phantom whiffs of the smell hit my nostrils for the next two hours. At a small creek we stopped to make coffee and I walked into the water up to my knees and did a full sponge bath to clean up from my odorous morning. We crossed Maumelle River on the highway 10 bridge and then began our last section along the shores of Lake Maumelle. But first I wanted to run, and run fast. Maggie took her shoes off and I took off down the shoulder of the road on a 40 minute run. It was nice to not have to watch for footing or leaves like my trail runs. I ran out 2.5 miles and then turned around. As I was running by a small store I decided to get Maggie a surprise and I ran the remaining 2 miles with my purchases. When I met back up with her, I handed over a small bag. Inside was her favorite treat: orange soda. Possibly spurred by tens of hours of excess sleep, Maggie kept leading us on deep into the night. By deep in the night, I mean 7:15pm. Maggie still needs at least 10 hours of beauty sleep. We have 11 miles left tomorrow and it is supposed to rain. So we are set up perfectly to eek out the end of this trail before the next big cold front moves in!
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