The Sun Also Sets at Palomar

This was the last hike of the Challenge and I decided to finish it on this day. Although I didn’t get to the trailhead till noon I was confident I could bag the peak by sunset and make it back down on a night hike. The hike was uneventful and other than a few hikers I met coming down, I mostly had the trail to myself. I met a challenger who had just completed it by summitting earlier in the day and I congratulated her and she congratulated me expressing optimism that I would be able to summit and complete the challenge. I got to the summit at sunset and took the photos. After an hour I headed down. There was daylight but I already took out my headlight to use once daylight ended. I met a couple on the way to the summit, Brian and Molly who were also doing the challenge and had one or two more peaks to go in addition to High Point. I headed down. While I could have speed-hiked on the way back I decided to conserve my energy and just do a slow paced hike down. Molly and Brian overtook me on the switchbacks after the fire road and I encouraged them to go ahead. The only tricky part was when I got back to the area close to the trailhead and I had to make sure I stayed on the trail and not stray into private property. I made it back to my car around 8:20 and the Challenge was complete. Until next year.