Or is that good news good news? The good news is that from what I can tell the federal shutdown won’t be having a huge effect on my trip. I know that there’s at least one place I definitely won’t be able to visit. Whether other places will be open to hikers remains to be seen, but I have high hopes. So the good news is that I didn’t cancel my trip. The bad news is that the ten day forecast is almost entirely sunny! I imagine that the majority of people up there consider that good news. If you know me, that’s just about the worst news I can imagine. At this time of year I was expecting just a few sunny days with the majority of my hikes under overcast skies. This doesn’t bode well for my kind of photos I was planning on shooting. I may end up spending much more time just hiking and enjoying the sights than actually shooting them. I can’t really imagine anyone feeling very sorry for me. Okay, so I guess I better start feeling sorry for myself. I did have one problem today. I was doing just fine until the last mile when my knee started hurting. I must have looked very strange walking like a pirate with a peg leg. It hurt so bad to lift my left leg that I was pivoting to the right in order to reduce the amount my left knee had to bend. So naturally my right hip is now killing me as well. I guess I just wasn’t cut out to be a pirate.