Colorado Trail Thru Hike, Summer 2015

Day 1

11.8mi (mile 11.8)
Lola and I are picked up at our house by ColoradoRob (his trail name) at 6 a.m. Lola made him cookies as thanks.
ColoradoRob takes some pictures of us with my phone at the official Colorado Trail northern terminus sign at 6:45 am.

Aaaaaaaaaaaand they're off!
Four young Big Horn sheep holding their ground in Waterton Canyon make us wait to pass. In the canyon, the trail is a wide dirt road for six miles. They let us go by in a minute or two.
We chat with two solo thru hikers while tanking up on water at Bear Creek.
Get to camp right as rain starts. Set up tent quickly. Pool of water begins form under the tent, so when the rain lets us we move the tent across the trail to higher ground.
Met a mom and two daughters hiking to Bailey.

Day 2

11.6 miles (mile 23.4)

Up at 5:00 a.m., leave at 6:45 a.m.
Pass by the mom and two daughters’ campsite.
Make it to segment 2, the mom and two daughters decide to call it quits. No cell coverage, though, so they can’t call anyone to pick them up. Douglas County employee drives by, says he’ll call their family to pick them when he reaches Deckers.
We tank up on water at the South Platte River after crossing the Gudy Gaskill bridge. Almost a gallon each. Very heavy packs (heaviest of trip, probably) for dry segment 2.
Hailed and rained on. We don’t put on rain pants because we think it will be quick and light. We are wrong.
Dry out at campsite.

Day 3

16.8 miles (mile 40.2)

Hiked four miles beyond itinerary camp site because we have the energy and tomorrow is a mostly uphill bitch.
Lola’s next invention: “The Gefilter Fish: The Chosen Filter.”

Day 4

14.8 miles (mile 55.0)

Climbed Bitch Mtn in Lost Creek Wilderness, 2200 vertical feet
We passed many thru hikers, so I guess our speed is okay.
Out of the woods into a six mile meadow. Lola’s feet are looking pretty beat up, like they’ve been pulsed in a food processor. Mine are fine. Just lucky, I guess.
Lola’s contact lens has been given her grief but it’s finally okay today.
Camp at what we call Poop Mountain, a popular and pine-sheltered site for backcountry campers and cattle.
Lola has renamed our convertible pants that zip off at the knees “Shlongs”: short/long pants=shlong pants.
My Sawyer Squeeze filter has been named “Diane. Diane Sawyer.”
Unsung heroes: Sawyer water reservoir scoop, freezer bag cooking (no cleaning!), Keebler Peanut Butter cracker sandwiches, Body Glide and sport tape (tape takes the place of blister protection and Band-Aids and does it so much better).

Day 5

16.7 miles (mile 71.7)

Pass TarpTent City—3 older guys all using TarpTents--in the morning.
Animal sightings: horses, ptarmigan (or grouse).
Lola’s last day on trail ☹.
We pass a family on horseback. The father is carrying a pistol on his hip and two Corgis run alongside. We give them the trail.
First hitchhike (from Sherrie, who will hike the CT northbound soon. She drives us to Jefferson to pick up Toshi (Lola's Honda) and my resupply of food and a good book to read for the next few weeks: A Clockwork Orange. We buy beer s from owner of Pony Espresso—Jill, who let us park Toshi (Lola’s Honda) behind the business).
We’re a day ahead in mileage, so we drive to Fairplay, get hotel, eat a bad dinner at restaurant that has 86ed most of its menu.

Day 6

6.0 mi (77.7)

Watch Dog the Bounty Hunter on hotel TV in the morning. Get depressed looking at these people.
Lola drops me off at Kenosha Pass Trailhead. We say our goodbyes and she returns to Denver. I sign in at a logbook. There is a missing person poster. A young man was reported as having come here not too long ago and nobody knows where he is now.
Meet Stephanie and Denean, who are thru hiking, and Claire, who is with them for a few segments. We all camp at the bottom of the mountain leading to Georgia Pass for an early ascent in the morning. We have an enjoyable dinner together, all of us observing everyone else’s dinner methods. They tell me the missing person from the poster was found. He walked back into the woods and killed himself not far from the trail. Police closed the trail down behind us and some people had to detour.
Thunderstorms tonight. Tarptent Notch stays dry. I love this tent. It is bombproof. My pack is about a pound lighter since this is my one-person tent that I switched out for the two-person Stratospire while hiking with Lola. I also have commandeered back from her my ZPacks sleeping bag, which Lola was using because it is so light and ridiculously warm.
I miss Lola already.
TarpTent City guys are camped below. They did not stay the night in Fairplay so either I am hiking fast or they are hiking slowly.

Day 7

13.7 miles (mile 91.4)
Wake up at 5 am, eat breakfast, have coffee, break camp and start hiking by 6 am. This is the routine I would follow most of the time. Sometimes I would move this routine up a half hour earlier if I had to be over a high pass by noon, before the thunderclouds move in. On the way out of camp I see that Stephanie is up and that I’ll see them on the other side in 13.7 miles.
Georgia Pass is lovely. First time above tree line. Views for a million miles. Pulled over and made a cup coffee on the descent once back in the forest. The CT collocates with the Continental Divide Trail (CDT) for the next 314 miles.

Georgia Pass. Mount Guyot to the left.
This is the most ghetto camp on the trail: next to a dirt road with lots of fire rings, pickup trucks and low-quality beer can empties. Introduced myself to the TarpTent City guys. They are Cliff (TarpTent=Rainbow), Buck (TarpTent=ProTrail) and Tim (TarpTent=Contrail). We discuss TarpTents and decide that they are wonderful tents but that they take at least ten pitches to properly figure them out. They also mention that they went over the pass with the ladies but fell behind and did not see them after that.
No sign of the ladies at camp. They must have stopped for the night farther back on the trail.
Breckenridge tomorrow! Planning to take a day off.
13.7 miles was too easy. Need to add more miles onto daily commute.

Day 8

13.0 miles (mile 104.4)
100 miles! Holy crap! That’s a lot of miles! On the trail I create the number “100” out of a small plant and some pine cones and take a picture to mark the event.

100 freakin' miles!
Meet Gavin from Nebraska while pulled over eating lunch. His trailname is Stealth, given to him one morning after camping with the Stephanie, Denean and Claire; he was observed breaking camp early and silently and received his trailname right then). We hike the rest of the way together to the end of the segment and take the free shuttle into Breckenridge, followed by a half mile walk to the Bivvy Hostel where I plan to stay. Gavin hasn’t made overnight plans so he decides to stay there, too. In retrospect, after talking to other hikers, The Fireside Inn was the place to stay because they do your laundry and it is right on the shuttle line. (I can afford to stay in a proper hotel, but this trail—any long trail—is in large part about the experience and the culture. Hostels are the norm and that’s what I want to experience.)
My resupply of food and supplies (and a disposable razor) is waiting for me there. Backpack will be back up to full weight. Ugh.
I room with Gavin, an old guy who just like to stay at hostels, a dirty hippy and Eva (trailname Zero for the amount of days off she takes. She has been here nearly a week convalescing from some illness, waiting for a new tent to arrive in the mail. Do not know what was wrong with her last one).
I was going to take the next day off but I feel great, strong, ready to keep hiking, so decide to just stay overnight and leave next morning. Gavin has no intention of taking a day off.
Gavin and I grab some food and a beer at Breck Brewery, do laundry at a laundr-o-mat in our rain gear (so we can wash everything else). We look like MTV rappers from the Eighties.

Day 9

5.7 miles (mile 110.1)
Have hearty breakfast at The Bivvy.
Meet and chat with Wendy and Mary over breakfast. They are sisters thru hiking the trail together.
Late start and short day into Segment 7 to be in place for early morning cross over some pass in the Ten Mile Range. Gavin and I missed our shuttle stop so have to backtrack on another bus.
Gavin goes off ahead. He is much faster than I am. Being 22 years old will do that.
I make a nice streamside camp at 11,000’. Lots of mosquitoes.

Mosquito Central.
This is a rainy year (at least a sprinkle almost every day) so I like to get started hiking each morning around 6 am and hike until 1 or 2 pm with some breaks thrown in for lunch and quick rests. The time spent hiking each day will surely increase.
Averaging about 2 mph, including breaks, overall everyday.
I would liked to have gone about 6.5 more today but dark skies and lightning scare the crap out of me so I don’t chance going over the exposed pass. I will camp here and wait for tomorrow morning. Skies are clear in the mornings. Storms don’t usually occur until 1 pm or later.
All my gear is holding up wonderfully. My sleeping bag is so comfy and warm—just ask Lola. Kermit 2: The Reckoning is solid, comfy…my favorite piece of gear. It fatigues my left shoulder after long days, but that is me, not the pack. Note: on the next long trip--if there is another long trip--I will switch out my Cuben fiber ZPacks drybag that I’ve been using to hold my clothing not worn during the day and as a pillow at night for a similar version that has a fleece lining on one side. This will make for a more comfortable pillow at night.

Day 10

15.1 miles (mile 125.2)
Crossed pass on Ten Mile Range. Scary straight-down parts descending into Copper Mountain.
Cross paths with “Spaceman”, a German or Austrian hipster hiking northbound on the CDT. He’s been hiking for 3 months! Started on the Arizona Trail (and eventually hooked up to the CDT) but he had to be airlifted out of the desert for lack of water and food. Once intravenously fed and released he got right back on the trail. He gave me some tips on dealing with the thunderstorms on the exposed, above-treeline parts of the trail in the San Juan Mountain Range (of which there will be plenty), namely, stay below tree line if possible between the hours of 2 and 4 pm.
Saw a crew of volunteer trail maintainers. Said thank you to each and every one of them. The work these people do to keep the trail in shape is unbelievable. Unfortunately, I just missed the French Toast breakfast they put on for the volunteers and any hikers that may have passed. I love French Toast ☹.
Pitch tent at 1:30 pm at destination, waiting for a storm to blow thru. Once storm ends I pack up and hike another two miles to camp at tree line: good because that’s two miles less for my 19+ mile day tomorrow.
Also looking for a place to pitch here are five guys. We all arrived at same time and were looking for level ground. One says to me while we introduce ourselves during the scout, “Not sure if it’s your thing or not, but we’re going to have a bible study after we set up camp. We’d be happy to have you join us if you would like to”. I waited for the punch line but it didn’t come, and then there was some uncomfortable silence. This guy was for real.

Day 11

17.4 miles (mile 142.6)
A tough day in a beautiful place. Feeling poorly overall and untidy specifically in the ass region after making Searle Pass (over a snow bank in summer for crissake). Liberal use of toilet paper concerns me since I’m running low. Had to make frequent stops above treeline (few places to demurely duck behind to take care of business—not that there are lots of people up here, but since I live in a constant, mild state of paranoia, I have to assume that someone is always about to show up unexpectedly around the next switchback).
Urination is very yellow. I pull over and start drinking water like mad (no shortage of water sources up this high due to snow melt). Within 30 minutes I feel much better/stronger. All butt issues disappear. Dehydration is the enemy. I will watch for this now. The body needs to be well-watered when the demands on it are this great day after day.
See a small family of marmots, two ptarmigans.
After Kokomo Pass (second pass of the day) I hit three miles per hour on a long downhill. Today is my fastest daily average so far--2.4 mph--which is unexpected considering the discomfort at Searle Pass. I think I’m just getting faster, is all. Or at least feeling the miles less. I think when I’m above treeline I go faster because of the exposure and exitlessness if a lightning storm should move in. Paranoia, mostly.
I pass another trail maintenance crew on the way down and thank them all individually as a walk pass. I imagine that some them have thru hiked in years past and are giving back.
I proudly receive my first blister of the trip, located on the outside of my right heel. I use sport tape to cover it and prevent further friction. Band-Aids and Moleskin are so passé.
Pull off the path, duck behind the cover of shrubbery, strip down and bath by the side of a river (too cold to jump in). Use number one million for my bandana: washcloth. I also wash the clothes I’m wearing and then put them back on wet. No cotton for me (except for bandana) so everything is dry within 30 minutes.
See some sheep.
Get sprinkled on.
Walk past Camp Hale—an abandoned WWII training camp for 10th Mountain Division. Long concrete barracks taken over by homeless weirdos. Best graffiti on it: The Cops are Evel Knievel. Yes. Yes they are.

Important trail information.
Finally make the destination at Tennessee Pass and I see the gang: Stephanie, Denean, Claire, Gavin, various spouses (who brought fruit and cookies and water).
Big lightning crash nearby sends us scattering. The ladies are taking a day off in Leadville. Bye bye! Gavin disappears. I pitch my tent next to Moe, wait out a quick rain, then use the trailhead restroom. It’s nice to sit and poop like a norm.
A young guy in his twenties named Jason walks up, takes off his pack and rain gear and dries off. He and Moe and I all chat over our dehydrated dinners. He does mostly 20 mile days and he’s going to go another two miles or so after dinner. This guy is what a thru hiker should be: he just hikes. He doesn’t camp so much or dilly dally, like I do. I’m going to make a point of hiking more and doing everything else less. Jason is a vegan. He eats lots of peanuts. I imagine that he gets sick of them. I give him an energy bar since he’s low on food and wants to bag a 14er tomorrow (aka summit a 14,000 foot or higher mountain using an established trail). The next day he will return the bar to me after having read the ingredient list and discovering there was milk in it. Sorry, Jason, but thanks for carrying my food for me, lol.

Day 12

18.4 miles (mile 161.0)
Meet up with Jason two miles down the trail as he is finishing packing up his camp. During the night a mouse or other varmint chewed the strap off his hiking pole and hid it, then came back to chew down the foam on the pole handle. Jason decides it is now more “ergonomic.” We hike together for a few hours. He is much faster than me but dumbs it down and we chat while hiking.
Drinking lots of water helps make the miles easier. This is my highest mileage day so far on the trail and I could have gone more.
Saw poop on the trail that may have been bear-based. Not sure, though. Looked different than the copious amounts of horse dung on the trail.
Easy day into Twin Lakes tomorrow for resupply and night stay at Twin Lakes Inn. Maybe dinner at their restaurant, too. I have a little phone reception at my awesome pine forest campsite on a mountain saddle in Mount Massive Wilderness area (all alone here…the perfect setting for a movie featuring spooky witches). I have forgotten to bring the phone number for the Twin Lakes Inn so I call Lola and ask her to make me a reservation there for tomorrow night.
One more mile tomorrow and I will be 1/3 finished with the trail!
All gear performing exceptionally well to this point. Shoes beginning to show their suffering but still in great shape.
A mildly wet day today. Plenty of sprinkles and lots of mud.

Day 13

14.2 miles (mile 175.2)
The widely publicized access trail into Twin Lakes from the CT is the wrong choice. Most of us take it, though, not knowing any better until after it is done. It is steep and sketchy and half of it is a dirt road. The better way is to walk to Highway 82 just beyond town and walk into town on the side of the highway—a nicely graded paved road.
Meet Kate (Russian-born) on the access trail during a brief rainstorm and walk into town with her. She will be circumnavigating the whole Collegiate Peaks loop, then hitching into Salida and continuing on. She bagged one 14er already and plans on getting several more. She is a fearless machine.
We stop in the visitor center into town since the Inn does not provide laundry service and we both need to get that done. There is no laundr-o-mat in town so Kate asks the visitor center guy (Al Dawson, formerly a department head at an Eastern college, retired now, writing local mountain fiction) if we can do laundry at his house and, after conferring with his wife, agrees. We will meet him back here at 4 pm when he closes shop and he will drive us to his house and let us do laundry. The generosity of people amazes me sometimes.
We pick up our resupplies at the Twin Lakes General Store, check into the Inn, make dinner reservations, see Jason outside looking through his resupply box (he got the last available room so I’m glad Lola made a reservation for me last night), shower, put on rain gear in preparation for laundry, stuff all my clothing and other washables into my compactor bag (which acts as a waterproof barrier inside my backpack, holding sleeping bag and clothes and things that MUST NOT ever get). Kate and I then walk back to visitor center and get a lift with Al to his house ten minutes away. We put our laundry in together as one load to save time, then Al gives us tour of his spectacular mountain-view house, introducing us to his adorable wife who writes Spanish Education books. He feeds us pistachios and an herbal digestif from Menorca while we wait. He then drives us back to the Inn. It is raining again but there is an unbelievable cloud hanging low over the valley and the lakes. Never seen anything like it. It makes for nice window scenery during dinner.
I see Gavin in the General Store. I believe he and Jason are hiking together. They are both fast so that makes sense.
I finished reading my copy of A Clockwork Orange a few days ago. The Twin Lakes has a transient library, so I switch it out for paperback copy of Beloved, by Toni Morrison.

Day 14

16.7 miles (mile 191.9)
I wake up early to take the access path back to where I broke off from the CT. I vowed to myself early on to walk every foot of the trail. Even though it would be easier to walk the highway to where it meets up with the CT, I would have missed about a mile of trail. Many in our herd do this and now, in my opinion, they have an “asterisk” after their thru hike. Others may disagree. I miss a turn heading up on the access trail and have to backtrack a quarter mile, giving myself an extra steep uphill/downhill half mile to walk in addition to the access trail. Puts me a foul mood. It’s only 6:00 a.m. and I’m already drenched in sweat.
I take minimal water with me for the first seven miles since they are flat miles, but I didn’t realize how sun drenched and deserty they were, so I am rationing water even though I am beside the lake because it smells fishy and don’t want to drink it, even filtered. I find the smallest creek to get water from in a few miles. I drink a liter right there after filtering, then filter more and carry on.
Haven’t seen any of the other thru hikers today. Probably missed them with my conscientious backtracking this morning. Plus I think most of them took the Collegiate West route, which splits away from the Collegiate east in this segment. I am taking the traditional East route. The CDT follows the western route, but will meet back up with it in 80 miles or so.

Easy enough to figure out.
Lots of rain during the last four miles of the day but miraculously my shoes stays dry.
Meet Mothership taking shelter under a tree when lightning struck less than a mile away. She successfully thru-hiked the Appalachian Trail in 2011. She is slow and looks like she has bad hips, but she goes all day, covering big miles.
Breathtaking descent into Clear Creek valley in the rain.
Break a tent stake in a crappy campsite while pitching the tent on the ascent on the other side of Clear Creek valley. Instant pudding at dinner is a disaster. The airline bottle of bourbon that Lola snuck into my Twin Lakes resupply box is a welcome delight. Three young male hikers walk past my campsite and I hear one fart loudly.
It is very lonely in the forest when there is no one to talk to. Sometimes it gets to me. Sometimes it does not. Tonight it does.
Mile 200 tomorrow!

Day 15

17.4 miles (mile 209.3)
6:00 a.m. departure time, as usual, and I pass a tent being packed up by two women about one half mile up the big ascent for the morning (2,700 feet in five miles).
One mile later I am walking quietly along the path (which you should never do—you should make noise so your presence is known) and I hear a thunderous noise about 75 feet to my right. A black bear saw me before I saw it and he runs off loudly through the trees, breaking branches as he goes. I never see his face, but I see his rear end and fur and it is unmistakably a bear. The rest of the morning I make plenty of noise as I hike, clicking my poles against rocks, and look over my shoulder for a few hours. I am not scared, exactly, but I am vigilant in keeping an eye on my surroundings.
Another mile later or so as I break for a morning snack the two women who I passed catch up. They are Kate and Autumn from California. They are here doing the Collegiate Loop (Collegiate Peaks East and West, a 160 mile loop beginning and ending in Twin Lakes).
Near mile 200 I arrange some rocks on the trail to say “200” then take pictures. Here I meet Jen and Petunia. A little bit farther Kate, Autumn, Jen, Petunia and I all tank up on water at a cool, clear stream. I lag behind, applying sunscreen and taking an afternoon break.

200 miles.
See Mothership taking a lunch break on a particularly horse dung riddled section of trail near Pine Creek. Many of us, including some day hikers eat lunch and tank up on water here, resting up before the next 1200 foot incline. Mothership and hike together for about a mile. I pitch her an idea for a book called “The Ghost Horses of the Colorado Trail.” In it, in the middle of the night, ghost horses steal the oatmeal hanging from your bear bag. They eat it all up and later poop it out on the trail. Nobody ever sees them until later. That’s as far as I get but it most certainly has Great American Novel written all over it.
This is a steep day. Everyone is tired. I catch up with Kate and Autumn toward the top of the incline and strike up a friendly conversation. They have hiked much of the John Muir Trail in California in Yosemite NP. I ask questions about it because I would like to hike that trail one day.
This is a good hiking day. I feel strong, met nice people and like I have accomplished much.
Animal sighting: Grouse and juveniles.

Day 16

15.9 miles (mile 225.2)
Breakfast today: Coffee, Carnation Instant Breakfast and Keebler Toast and Peanut Butter cracker sandwiches. That’s an awful breakfast, I know, but it’s quick and has the calories and that is what’s most important. This morning’s package of crackers only hav five in it, as opposed to the usual six, but one of them was a triple: three layers of cracker sandwiching two layers of peanut butter. I will interpret this as a good luck cracker.
Meet “Old School” (Scott Steiner) hiking with Kate and Autumn.
We have all seen sooooo much manure on the trial but few horses. Finally, though, today we see some horses (hadn’t seen any since day five with Lola).
Two more killer hills today: one 2,400’, the other 1,100’. In the shade and/or early morning, ascents like these can be rather zen, but in the midday sun it’s just mean. I finish the first one in the morning.
At the campsite tonight: Old School (Scott), David (a section hiker), Kate and Autumn. We all eat dinner around a campfire ring. None of us care about making a fire.

L to R: Autumn, Kate, me, Dave (top), Old School (bottom).
Old School is hardcore—he’s not fast but he can hike all day and he looks like it. Probably around 60 years old and puts us all to shame. He has hiked approximately 15,000 long distance miles in his life!
My right knee has been hurting on the downhills. Hope it doesn’t become a problem.

Day 17

16.9 miles (mile 242.1)
Beautiful, overcast hiking weather today. No sun beating down and relatively cool out.
I was first out of camp this morning, a full hour after two people hiked past at 5:00 a.m. wearing headlamps in the pitch dark.
5.7 miles of road hiking today. The first-ish part took me past a go-cart course and a simple open-air shack built into the Mt. Princeton mountainside (packed with teenagers) and then a rodeo type area with some bleachers. I had a little cell phone coverage so I looked up the name of the place and it’s a Jesus camp. Sorry kids but I can’t save you. Gotta keep moving.
Pull over at Mt. Princeton Hot Springs General Store and load up on Advil (which keeps the knee pain down) and slug a chocolate milk. I dump my garbage (which I have to carry with me until I can dispose of it. Thru hikers (should) pack out all garbage and food scraps (if any), and try to adhere to the Leave No Trace backcountry philosophy. I stop short of packing out my used toilet paper. The forest gets to keep those. Sorry forest).
Old School catches up as I am leaving the General Store. He is hitting up the restaurant for a big breakfast.
Have a long leisurely lunch after covering some good, easy miles in a sparsely pined, bouldery, overall lovely field. I hang my shirt on a tree limb to air out and for once the bugs do not attack.
After lunch, Old School catches up because I am dilly dallying on this beautiful trail and he is not. We hike the last six miles to camp together. It turns out he is a sailor, too. He had a small boat and lived for a few summers in various Alaskan bays. His mother-in-law lives in Bradenton, FL. He is leaving the trail tomorrow at the Salida trailhead since he has already done the next 120 miles of the trail first (he lives in Crested Butte so is hiking the entire trail…just in a different order than most of us. He will drive to Durango and hike northbound for 120 miles or so and it will be done for him).
We reach the campsite and set up camp on a narrow side shelf next to a creek. Not long after, about six girls in two groups show up and set up camp. I’m sure they’re nice, but Old School and I don’t want to have to walk right past their tents to get to the creek throughout the evening or to the trail in the mornning, so we pack up and move uphill just a bit. Soon after that, Dave shows up for the night. Then, Kate and Autumn. The gang’s all here! We make dinner and eat together. Kate pulls out a bladder of tequila (about a quart, which is 2.2#) and we all take grateful hits. She implores us to drink it with them since it is dead weight (the girls are each carrying about 50# each in their packs. For reference, my pack is is 28# after resupplying—which is the heaviest I will allow it. On average, my pack is an airy 23#). They make pancakes to eat in the morning. I suggest the trail name “Pancake” for Autumn, but I don’t think it will stick. It is a festive, happy evening and we all go to bad after twilight, as usual. If there are two things that long distance hikers are good at it’s eating and going to bed early.
0.9 miles shy of the halfway point!

Day 18

10.4 miles (mile 252.5)
Hike with Old School from campsite to HWY 50 (to Salida), where Lola will meet me in her car (Toshi) and I will take my first full day off (aka “zero day”) tomorrow since beginning the trail.
Two cows standing stubbornly on the narrow trail. Me being of city origins, I’m not quite sure what to do. Old School yells “Hyah!” and they scatter. Now I know.
Lola and Milo meet us on the trail one mile in from HWY 50. So good to see them. The four of us walk to the trailhead and Toshi is parked nearby. Lola brought beer, soda, cookies, snacks...so nice to have ice cold drinks.
We wait around until Old School’s ride shows. In the meantime, Lola gives a ride to two hapless and confused segment hikers a little ways down a dirt road. She officially became a trail angel (someone who does nice things for hikers—food, drinks, ride…whatever) earlier today. On her drive here, she gave a ride to some hikers at Kenosha Pass who needed to get to Jefferson to pick up their resupply. What a sweet, gutsy girl.
Dave shows up at the trailhead. Old School’s ride shows up and he leaves us. We give Dave a ride to the HWY 285 intersection where he will hitch into Denver/Boulder.
Lola and I pick up the resupply that I mailed to myself at The Simple Hostel. No room at the Inn, though. Lola was smart enough to make reservations at the Circle R Motel, so we are set. Jen and Petunia have done exactly the same thing, and we see them inside The Simple Hostel and give them a lift to the Circle R with us.
We check in, get some pizza downtown, do laundry, shower, pitch the tent to let it dry out, replace the broken stake, get some beers and drink them on the motel lawn, eat at a Mexican restaurant, etc.

Day 19

0 miles
In addition to seeing the sights, including a rattlesnake in town, we meet Pam and Tom—a thru hiking couple from Michigan doing the CT for the second time--who are also staying at the Circle R Motel. We chat a little while and offer to give them a ride to the trailhead with us tomorrow morning. It turns out that they were the ones who walked past camp early early in the morning dark on Day 17 wearing headlamps.

Day 20

18.4 miles (mile 270.9)
5 a.m. drive to trailhead with Lola, Milo, Pam and Tom.
This will be a week of big miles everyday (for me, at least) to get to Creede in five days. I could take longer, but I would need to carry more food weight. I prefer to hike farther each day and carry a lighter load.
Tom and Pam go off ahead on the trail.
Lola and Milo join me for the first five miles before we say our goodbyes and they turn back to head for Denver.
Later I catch up with Pam and Tom at the last place along Fooses Creek to get water where we all tank up.
It has been nine miles of uphill today and at the end of the ascent is the steepest part of the entire CT. Our speed up this part is no more than ½ mph (average trail speed is two mph). At the top is a gorgeous point where the Continental Divide Trail/Colorado Trail Collegiate West meet back up with the Collegiate East and views go on forever and ever. We take videos and pictures but don’t dilly dally too long since dark clouds are forming and we are above treeline.

Tom, Pam and me on top of the world.
Animal sighting: two bold marmots.
Right knee feels pretty good after a day off. Hopefully that and the Advil do the trick.
My pack is heavy today after the resupply in Salida. Filtered three plus liters of water (not sure why water is measured in metric terms here, but it is) for camp tonight and tomorrow morning plus the first seven miles tomorrow (average water usage while hiking is one liter of water for every five miles hiked. Sun and incline may increase that number.)
Met a dirty hippy trail-named Woobie at a gorgeous campsite that Tom, Pam and I camped at tonight. A beautiful moon tonight, then formidable/stunning dark clouds, then some wind and rain. Woobie had a fire going so we all made our dinners around it.
Paul and Chantal, from France walk in late and make camp and eat dinner with us. Their English is broken, but they are muscle because they are in the middle of nowhere with us. Anyone with us here is muscle. Turns out they also stayed at the Circle R. Paul comes off as a little standoff-ish and speaks to his wife a little harshly. It sounds harsh, but it’s French so I don’t know what he is saying. But he might be more muscle than any of us here: Several years ago he attempted to solo thru hike all 2,600+ miles of the Pacific Crest Trail. Either he or his wife got sick and had to leave the trail just 300 miles from the finish. So, the next year, he attempted the whole thing again, and that time he made it. Muscle.

Day 21

18.0 miles (mile 288.9)
We meet up with the two sisters Wendy and Mary on the trail. Met them originally at The Bivvy Hostel in Breckenridge. They took the Collegiate West route. Seems like almost everyone did.
We camp at Baldy Lake, ½ steep mile off the CT but worth it. Classic aquamarine alpine Colorado lake backed up against a near vertical mountainside. Hiked with Tom and Pam much of the day. Tom took off ahead because he doesn’t dilly dally. I caught up with Pam earlier. She was pained by the weight of her pack on this leg and was slower. They will sometimes hike at different paces but always end up at the same place. I think that’s sweet and a nice metaphor for marriage.

Lake Baldy, before the hippie goes swimming.
At camp tonight: Tom and Pam, Paul and Chantal, and me. Then Woobie shows up. He starts a campfire then jumps in the lake, dirtying it up a little. A nice guy…one of the skinniest I ever met, bad knee, chain smoker…fearless. Later, a guy trail-named Glacier shows up (real name Tom). I’m the only one who hasn’t met him already, but it turns out I saw him when I passed him early one morning a week or so back. He was just emerging from his tent as I hiked by early in the morning. I remember there was a rocking chair near his tent left there who- knows-how-long ago. He confirms that was him.
I have been on the trail for exactly three weeks now.

Day 22

(20.3 miles) 309.2 miles
First 20+ mile day!
Hike with Tom and Pam all day; leap frog with Paul and Chantal; hike a few miles with Wendy and Mary.
At one point I stop to tank up on water. We are in the heart of cow country here and, while there aren’t any cows around at the moment, you can see their hoof prints in the creek and cow patties everywhere. I filter my water, as I always do, but Paul just dips his bottle right into the creek and starts guzzling it down, no purification tablets or anything. “Are you crazy?” I ask. “You should filter that.” Paul looks around and says, “Zare are no cows ere. Ze water ees clean.” I’m telling you: The guy is muscle!

Medium rare ribeye steaks in training.
A trail angel named Apple has for years stationed himself all CT season long at the 300 mile mark. He sets up a big canopy along a forest road that the trail crosses and grills food and has tons of drinks and snacks, known as trail magic, for the hikers. We had heard that he wasn’t there this year but we were hoping the rumors were wrong. They weren’t. We didn’t count on him being there and had plenty of food of our own but were really looking forward to him being there. Lots of people were. Tom speculated that he did it as a purely altruistic act, but over the years people were coming to expect him to be there and it wasn’t magic to him anymore, so he quit setting up shop. Maybe. I don’t know. We do know that he spends some of the year performing trail magic somewhere along the Appalachian Trail, so maybe criss-crossing the country was just becoming too much for him and has now streamlined his efforts.
On the trail Pam and I create the number “300” out of flowers and take pictures to mark the event.

300 miles.
After many sunny miles Tom, Pam and I came across what we hoped was some trail magic between segments 17 and 18. It was a lidded five gallon bucket that had single-use mustard packets lying on top. This looks like it could be some high quality trail magic, with iced down cold cuts and fresh tomatoes inside (well, that’s what I imagine), but when we open it it’s just trash. Hiker trash. Plastic bags full of spent food packages. We are really disappointed after the Apple disappointment but took the opportunity to add our own trash to the bucket.
The campsite tonight is in an aspen grove where cows clearly have grazed. Lots of dried cow pies everywhere. A little after dusk we hear the cows. My fear is that they come back to this spot in the dark and I get trampled in my green tent because it blends in so well with the surrounding. The cows walk past without incident, but then the coyotes start howling not too far away. They continue on and off throughout the night, waking me up. Normally this might keep me up but since we covered more than twenty miles today I fall back asleep quickly each time.

Day 23

18 miles (mile 327.1)
A long, shadeless walk (around eight miles) through open wagon-train land. I walk with Tom and Pam again—my last full day with them--and we all leap frog with Paul and Chantal. Our water today comes mainly from trickling sources… springs and tiny creeks.
We pass an old horse trailer with what looks like a tin pipe coming out of the top. We find out later down the trail that it is for emergency shelter. Privately owned, probably, and a nice gesture on somebody’s part.
I pull over at a small aspen stand to go number two, which will require some hole digging. I tell Tom and Pam that I will catch up with them. In a little while I am back on the trail and pass a pair of colorful socks on the side of the trail. Over a small crest, I see Tom and Pam maybe an eighth of a mile ahead, down a gently sloping hill. They are talking to someone on the trail who is not carrying a backpack. I can’t imagine anyone being way out here on foot without a pack. Pam waves her sticks and yells to me up the hill, “Do you see some socks up there.” “Yeah,” I yell back. She doesn’t say anything else. Not catching on I walk a few feet forward and then it hits me that the backpackless person they are talking to dropped their socks. I go back and pick them up and walk with them down the hill. The backpackless person, Dragonfly, lost her socks but didn’t realize it for a mile and a half, or so. She dropped her pack off under a tree and headed back to find them. Madness, I think. I would have just walked on and bought a new pair at the next resupply. Dragonfly shows us the best place to tank up at a spring that is marked on our maps, so we get water and eat snacks and get rolling again.
The bridge at Cochetopa Creek was washed away because of the unusually late and vigorous spring storms that Colorado had this year. Hikers had been posting online how to get over the creek. Maybe it had been an issue earlier in the summer, but when we got there it was an easy, shallow crossing. Tom, Pam and I went across carrying our shoes and socks. Paul and Chantal forded while wearing theirs. No biggie. Somebody left a toy goat on a rock.

Baaaaaaaa! Or whatever goats say.
Across the creek are several hikers taking a break after the hot, sweaty walk today. Jen and Petunia are there with a friend who has joined them for a few segments. Two others I’ve never are there, too, and also a fly fisher who has hiked in for the afternoon from a forest road not too far away. Wendy and Mary show up, too. It is like a reunion. Most of us are stripped down to shorts (and the women to their bras) and we lie down in the creek and let the cold water wash away our dirt and stink. It feels glorious. The best feeling I’ve had in days. To feel clean after long distance days. I wash my clothes in the river-- many of us do--and spread them out over some bushes to dry. Because it is so hot and dry today, my clothes are fully dry in about 20 minutes. Thank you modern synthetic materials.
Tom and Pam and I set up camp about a mile farther down the trail. We are in a gorgeous, open field on top of a cliff overlooking Cochetopa Creek. We can see trout leaping in parts of the stream and keep an eye out for a bear or moose to take an evening sip of water, but none come.

Cliffside camping.

Day 24

15.5 miles (mile 342.6)

Sunrise.
Pam, Tom and I hike a few miles together to the Eddiesville trailhead where we see a mysterious severed trout head laying on the ground. We tank up on water and, after a near-tearful moment, I go on ahead to make Creede later today. I had been pushing hard on the miles to make it and we all got along really well, enjoying each others’ company so much that they pushed heavy miles so that we could all hike together, even though they had enough food for six or seven days. Tom and Pam have been my favorite people on the trail so far. I miss them exactly ten seconds after I start up the trail beyond the fish head. We don’t exchange emails or contact info or anything like that. Our journey together was just right the way it was. We had fun, made each other laugh, learned a thing or two and experienced all the awesome beauty and seriousness that this trails requires. Salida to Creede has perhaps been my favorite part of the hike so far, not because of any particular thing, but in large part because of Tom and Pam.

One of the mysteries of Eddiesville.
I make the saddle next to San Juan Mountain (a 14er) that unofficially that marks the entrance to the San Juan Mountain Range. (Most everyone bags the peak. I don’t. Maybe next time I’m in the neighborhood I will, too.) The next 130 miles will—by far—be the most beautiful, expansive, awe-inspiring, high, intimidating, and uncomfortable part of the trail. This is the part that postcards are made from. This is the part we are here for. This is the part. I can’t wait.

Gateway to the San Juan mountain range.
Walking along a particularly steep and deadly (if you are not paying attention) ridge, I pass “The Marine Corps” having lunch on a rocky ledge. The Marine Corps is the collective name of four to eight college-aged girls hiking the trail. The group changes from segment to segment as people join or leave the group. They hike in tight formation, not marching, but sticking close together. I saw them before Salida, where they must have passed me while I enjoyed my zero day with Lola and Milo.
At the segment end I eat lunch and then leave the CT heading south on South Willow Trail toward Creede. It is a one mile side trail that will take me to a Jeep trailhead (one where people park to summit San Juan Mountain) where I can hopefully hitchhike into town. I have a resupply box of food waiting for me at the post office and I plan on getting a room. Originally I planned on taking a day off here, but I feel great and would just be wasting time doing nothing when I could instead be hiking and having fun. At the trailhead is a family from Nebraska that summited San Juan Mountain this morning. I start up a conversation with them—because you don’t want to ask for ride cold turkey…you have to ease into it if you want to be successful. I ask them about their hike this morning and then they ask me about my pack and where I hiked from (Wow! You’ve hiked 342 miles?! That’s awesome!) They are interested in the contents of my pack and how I cook food and ensure that I have clean water and what my pack weight is (a very light 18# at the moment, thank you very much) and if I’d seen bears (yes!) or moose (no ☹), etc. They are waiting on the rest of their group, but since it has started to rain the dad says, “C’mon, let’s go to town. We’ll leave a note with the others to meet us there in their car.” So we jump in their Suburban and take the bumpy dirt road ten miles into Creede. My phone doesn’t have any bars so I can’t pull up maps to see where exactly I need to be at once we reach town. Not wanting to ask too much of them, I ask to be let out anywhere in the downtown area. We say our goodbyes and I eventually find the post office where the resupply box that Lola mailed out for me ten days ago is waiting. Resupply in hand I head out for the Snowshoe Lodge not too far away, where John Wayne once stayed the night.
The Snowshoe Lodge is owned by a sweet older couple—Ruth and Stan. Stan is out and about at the moment, and Ruth tells me sadly that there is no more room at the inn. She makes some calls around town to help me find a place to stay for the night but every hotel is full. There is a gem and rock convention in town and not a room to be had. I ask if I may pitch my tent somewhere on their property and she tells me sure, but that a bear has been coming in every night looking for food. This makes me nervous but my options are limited. Mountain bears don’t concern me because I hang my food high in the trees. They never even see it. Town bears concern me because they have expectations of finding food and when they don’t find it they can become unpredictable and smash tents and their sleeping contents if they are upset.
There are two bunks in the laundry/shower room but they are taken for the night. I pitch my tent on their lawn (Ruth won’t take a penny for it) and then head over to the laundry/shower/bunk room to get cleaned up. The two bunks? Gavin and Jason got them. Gavin from Breckenridge and Jason from Tennessee Pass. We catch up and make plans to go out to dinner at a local brew pub called Kip’s.
After tidying up Stan stops by my tent. He asks if I heard about the bear. I say, “Jeez, yes, I heard about it. I’m trying not to think about it.” “Well,” he says pointing to the parking area, “If you want to you can sleep in the back of my truck over there. It’s got a topper on it and a window you can lock so no bears can get in.” “Oh my god, that would be great! I really appreciate that. I was pretty worried about the bear,” I say. “Yeah, you should be,” he replies. “I’ve got video of him knocking down the bird feeder for the past three nights. “ The bird feeder is 15 feet from my tent.
I happily take down my tent and move everything into the back of his truck.

Stan the Man's bearproof truck.
Today is Jason’s birthday and since I’m not going to be murdered by a disappointed bear tonight I joyously buy dinner for us all. After dinner Gavin buys us a six pack at a liquor store and we bring it back to the Lodge. We sit in chairs and shoot the shit and talk about the recent old days. Gavin says that now that I have a safe place to sleep for the night, we should buy some steaks and blueberries and throw them around the property and watch the bear carnage through our various safe windows. That would be some good TV, for sure.
Soon after sunset we all go to bed because we can’t party like we can when we’re city slickers. I think we only drink one beer each. Shameful.

Day 25

5.2 miles (mile 347.8)
No bears last night. From the safety of my truck bed I was hoping to see one. But no. No bears last night. Damn. The slope the truck was parked on in the parking lot didn’t make for the greatest sleep I ever had, but I eventually made it to sleepy town, thankful that I wasn’t a bear treat.

The next morning Stan is The Man. He makes a mean, hearty breakfast intended for all the paying guests of the Lodge. Since I’m not technically a paying guest, I make a “donation” and am allowed to hit the buffet: pancakes, breakfast bake, sausage, pecan sticky roll, cereal, bagels, toast, muffins, butter, jelly, cantaloupe, honeydew, watermelon, bananas, properly brewed coffee, orange juice…the best $12 I ever spent. Can you imagine how good this tastes after several weeks of breakfasts that consist of either: 1)Instant coffee and Pop Tarts, 2)Instant coffee and Carnation Instant Breakfast, 3)Instant coffee and granola and powdered milk, 4)Instant coffee and untoasted bagel and peanut butter ? (I slam on instant coffee but I love it. I love the ritual of coffee and the feeling of it easing into my veins early in the morning. I have no problem with instant coffee on the trail. At home: unacceptable. But on the trail, yespleasemorernowplease.) After breakfast I invite myself to catch a ride with Jason and Gavin who organized getting a paid ride ($20 per carload) back up to the trailhead by a former town council member who has several nasty things to say about the current mayor. She drops us off and we hike the mile up West Willow Creek Trail, turn left and get back on the Colorado Trail. Gavin and Jason are long gone—they are young and fast—but I have valuable Middle Aged Man skills: I can buy dinner for everyone when the moment suits me and I can confidently use language to make things happen that need to get happened.
A very difficult, slow and mostly uphill trail today. Our late start doesn’t do much for my odometer. Only 5.2 miles covered today, but I’ll be set for a particularly high pass early tomorrow morning. Breathtaking views going over passes and saddles stacked close together. The beauty and intensity that the San Juans promised are delivering. The only downside is that the Pine Beetles have killed more trees in this part of Colorado than I have noticed anywhere else in my travels. Whole mountainsides of dead brown as far as I can see. It breaks my heart because we all know that a well-positioned lightning strike or a dumb-dumb with matches will ruin it all for 50 years. It is going to happen. Only a matter of time, unfortunately.
At mile four I pass Tom and Pam who have pitched an early camp! They are trying to kill some time before arriving in Lake City. We catch up for a few minutes and I tell them about Creede and the bear and the pancakes and it’s like old times again. Much as I’d like to stay and camp with them, I can’t live with a four mile day, so I tank up at their river and keep going. A mile or so later the thunder and rain hit so I throw my pack under the relative shelter of a living pine tree and pitch my tent as quickly as I can and dive inside for an hour. The rain lets up for a little bit and I make dinner, hang the bear bag, tighten my tent pitch, change into my thermals and read myself to sleep. Beloved is a good book. Heartbreaking and brutal. A little too ghosty and supernatural for my taste, but I can see why it won the Pulitzer: it’s meaty and professional and entertaining. I wish everything in life was like that.
The next few days will be hiked entirely above treeline so I set my watch alarm for 4:30 a.m. With the morning ritual of coffee, breakfast and breaking down camp whittled down to an efficient one hour process at this point, I should be able to get over the hyper-exposed mountain passes before noon each day, minimizing my chance of getting caught in the daily storm threat.
I thought I might catch up with Jason and Gavin today at camp, but I guess they either camped a little farther on or, most likely, they just went for it and powered over exposed mountain tops during the rainstorm. I’m sure they must have experienced some degree of thunder-fear this evening. It sounded like it was just up the hill from me. It got pretty raucous. If they were hiking, I bet they were hiking fast, trying to move through all that nonsense.
Another blister has formed on my left heel. This is my second blister. The first--on my right heel--is still there, but it has morphed into a calloused version of a blister. When I stick a flame-sterilized pin into it I can squeeze some fluid out, but never enough for a satisfying end to it. The insoles of my shoes are mostly disintegrated and sliding all around, not offering the support they used to. When I get to Silverton—the next town I’ll come to—I’ll need to replace them.

Day 26

18.3 miles (mile 366.1)
I am hiking by 5:30 a.m. today to get over Snow Mesa as early as possible since it is five miles of flat, high, treeless exposure. Pam and Tom passed my camp as silhouettes wearing headlamps just after I got up this morning. I thought I would catch up with them today but it’s the last I will ever see of them. They are fast and Tom mentioned getting over Snow Mesa as quickly as possible. I think they may have gotten caught in a storm up there last time they did the trail and did not want a repeat. Later, on the trail over the mesa, I see clouds off in the distance in the valleys below me. It’s an easy crossing, though. Very flat land, which is rare in these parts. It makes for fast walking.

The start of Snow Mesa. A sea of clouds at a lower elevation in the upper left of picture.
On the descent from the mesa, toward the road that leads to Lake City (a popular resupply point) I come across two huge male elks. I try to get video but they are too fast and are gone before I even have my phone out of Kermit 2: The Reckoning’s hip pocket.
I’ve got two more treeless, exposed peaks to make before camp, both above 12,000 feet. The first I make alright, but on the way to the second one nasty clouds are forming to my east and my west. Two different cells. Luckily the trail keeps me between them. The thunder and lightning is significant. Glad I’m not under them. The rain from the edge of one of the storm cells catches up with me for the last mile to the campsite.
At the campsite, which is wet now, and which required walking through a bog, I meet Dan, who is hiking the Colorado Trail for the FOURTH TIME! I meet section hikers Tim (“Warthog”) and Derise (“Granny D”) there, also.
Across the valley is a yurt I heard was available for CT and CDT hikers to use. It looks pretty upscale (for a yurt) from this distance. I’d like to stay in it tonight and somehow I convince Warthog and Derise into scouting it. Leaving their packs behind with Dan and me they cross the valley and check it out. At that moment it starts to rain, so I move their packs under a tree to keep them dry. After going inside, Warthog yells from across the valley that the yurt is open and that we are good to go, so I sling my pack on and head back across the bog, shoes soaking, up the hill past Warthog and Derise on their way down to get their packs and return to the yurt where we will all stay the night. Up close the yurt is a dump. Inside is even worse…rusty-springed bunk beds with no padding on them except for discarded and mouse gnawed sleeping pads, stained carpet, mouse traps, empty liquor bottles...an overall air of crappiness. It’s a shithole alright, but it’s a dry shithole and I am grateful for it. They recommend a $20 honor fee to stay the night. IOUs are fine, so I take an envelope and will mail in a check after I return to Denve. Warthog and Derise soon return. The rain intensifies. We got lucky. It would have been sloppy camping tonight on the ground. Sitting in a chair at a table while we eat dinner is welcome luxury. I tell Warthog and Derise that I plan on leaving by 6:30 tomorrow morning and hope that I won’t wake them. They say they’ll be leaving then, too, that we can all hike together. Sounds good. I hope my shoes will be dry by the morning. I hate wet shoes. We all do.
When the rain breaks momentarily, Warthog and I walk back down to the bog to get water for the night and the first part of tomorrow’s hike. We meet Daniel there, also getting water. He is from Philadelphia and is hiking with his girlfriend who, evidently, rarely comes out of the tent once they have set up camp.
At about 8:00 p.m. two mountain bikers enter the yurt. They peel off their sopping wet clothes, change into dry ones, make and eat dinner and crash. They sleep on some army cots that were stashed under the bunks.

Day 27

14.2 miles (mile 380.3)

At 6:30 a.m. I am ready to leave but Warthog and Derise are not. The mountain bikers—awake but still in their cots—decide that they will stay for the day and tend to their bikes which have taken a muddy beating lately. My shoes are only about 50% dry. I say goodbye to everyone and make my way across the valley to pick up the trail. I try to walk gingerly across the bog but it’s useless and my shoes and socks are soaking wet again.
An epic hike today, a lot of it steep and rocky, much of it soggy, but all of it indescribably beautiful, with a few marmots thrown in for fun. On my way to the highest point on the CT I came across Old School heading north. He had just a few more days to go and he would be done with his flip flop hike. He said that it was very hard hiking coming from Silverton…that it was wet and cold—what he called a “slopfest”-- and a constant battle against hypothermia. In an attempt to avoid the afternoon rains he would start hiking at 2:00 a.m., then duck into his tent around noon for a few hours, then get back to hiking. It was nice to see him again, but he knew that I was about to spend the next two days hiking above 12,000 feet and that I needed to make tracks in order to avoid the storms myself, so we said goodbye and hiked on.

Suck it, Colorado Trail! I am 6'1" taller than you.

Beware the bloodthirsty marmots!
I stop at mile 376.3 and lay my shoes and socks out on a rock to dry in the momentary sun while I eat lunch, deciding if I should try to boldly make the next pass two miles up where, two miles farther along, I will reach the next cam. Dark clouds are moving in. It’s either stay here for the night or go four miles to the first, safe campsite…nothing in between. I am like a squirrel in the middle of the road, trying to decide to go left or right. Finally I decided to just go for it and make cover what feels like the fastest four miles of the trip, even though it includes a nearly 1,000 foot climb to almost 13,000 feet elevation before descending. I was motivated!

Drying out.
I make it to the camp near Cataract Lakes and pitch the tent under nasty clouds. A marmot pos out of his burrow to see what I am up to, then goes back to doing whatever it he does. The moment I get my last stake in the ground the clouds open up and starts dumping, soon turning to hail. I close my eyes for a while and try to nap, but then the sun comes out strong and it’s too bright inside my tent, so I get up and set up the rest of camp. There are no trees above 12,000 feet so I can’t hang my bear bag. Most hikers recommend sleeping with your food bag in your tent or vestibule. Like the trees, bears aren’t hanging around at this altitude, so it should be okay. Marmots, on the other hand, will rob you blind in the middle of the night, so I sleep with my food bag at my feet inside the tent, instead of out in the vestibule.

Campsite near cataract lake. An excellent location for Zip-loc sailing.
A bold little bird hops under my tent’s vestibule flap looking for scraps of food. I have nothing for him but he sure is cute. For 15 minutes he comes and goes, darting in and out of my little home. A nice mountain friend.
My shoes are mostly dry now. I am optimistic about a dry hike tomorrow. I am ready for one.
Two other campers arrive at the lake. They keep their distance and pitch camp far from me. I like the spot I am in at the end of the lake. The wind comes from behind me, then over the lake. I was concerned that if I stayed at the other end of the lake the winds would chill over the water and blow over my tent all night, making it feel colder than it actually is, and that the condensation would make my tent soaking wet by morning, forcing me hike with a heavy wet tent. At this altitude I expect it to be colder than any night so far.
I make dinner at 6:00 p.m. as usual-ish. My Zip-loc bag, emptied after I pulled the day’s last food out of it, is caught by the wind and lands on the water. I watch as it begins to sail across the lake. There’s nothing I can do to retrieve it right now short of jumping in and swimming for it—and that is definitely not going to happen—so I leisurely enjoy my dinner, clean up, and wait for the bag to make its way across. When it hits the far shore I will walk around and retrieve it.
I walk around the perimeter of the lake past the first tent. The occupants are inside so I can’t tell who they are. At the far shore I see the other tent. It’s Wendy and Mary. I stop by and say hi and tell them why I’m over here and that I not a weirdo walking around their lakefront property but that I’m trying not to be a litterbug. After a few minutes of searching I find and retrieve my Zip-loc, glad that it didn’t sink. On the way back, I see Daniel, from the bog by the yurt, emerging from his tent. We chat for a minute or two about nothing much. He motions to the tent and says that Kristin, who I never met—only heard about—is in the tent. She says from inside, “I stay in the tent as much as I can,” which makes us laugh. I head back to my campsite with my recovered Zip-loc bag.
Tomorrow I plan on hiking 17.4 miles.

Day 28

19.3 miles (mile 399.6)
Wake up to a cold morning. The coldest so far. My watch said 30 degrees at 5:00 a.m. Inside my 20 degree sleeping bag last night I wore wool socks, regular underwear, thermal underwear tops and bottoms, my down jacket, gloves and a fleece beanie. Basically, most everything I have. I was a little bit chilly but nothing unmanageable. I remove the thermals before I began hiking for the day but keep the down jacket, gloves and hat on.
Segment 23 in the San Juan mountain range is about the most awesome thing I’ve ever seen. The trail is high and I can see for miles in all directions. Forests, clouds (below me!) and the path that I travel on disappear into the mountains. I wish I could live here and see this all the time. Mile 386 on top of a peak has an especially pleasant view. I feel like I am truly on top of the world.
Meet Paxton the thru-hiking dog and the four people traveling with him.
Meet four llamas in segment 24 (can only remember two of their names: Cimarron and Redhawk). About six humans with them. I had seen the tracks for a few miles in the soft trail dirt and thought they might be those of llamas, but wasn’t sure. Pack animals are allowed anywhere along the CT.

Redhawk and Cimmaron.
Walk past a particularly patriotic field of wildflowers displaying all red, white and blue.
As unimaginably awesome as I thought segment 23 was, the descent down Elk Creek (near where the CT finally parts ways with the CDT) into the Weminuche Wilderness (which itself is ¾ the size of Rhode Island!) might beat it out. Steep, endless switchbacks through endless wildflowers…I descend below a massive cliff with two lakes on top…down, down, down along the creek past the ruins of an old mining shack that is only being held (somewhat) upright by a couple of 2x6s. You may enter the shack if you are bold enough. I walk past chalky cliffs and dome mountains and waterfalls. This is National Park quality scenery…but I’m glad it’s not because then it would be paved over with roads and parking lots and reek of unplumbed toilets.

Elk Creek. Possibly the best vista on the trail. Notice the insane switchbacks in the foreground.
I find one of the top two or three campsites of the trip so far a few miles from the bottom of the descent—just 4/10ths of a mile from the 400 mile mark—next to Elk Creek, out of sight of the trail, on a mini beach hidden in the trees. The mosquitoes are horrendous, but the site is perfect. I pitch my tent six feet or so from the creek. The sound of the water should put me to sleep tonight in minutes.
One pair of my underwear has broken. A hole has worn at the crotch. Since I will be going into Silverton tomorrow I just shove them into my trash Zip-loc bag stuff with empty meal bags, spent tuna fish foil packs, gooey single-serve peanut butter packs, squeezed-dry mayonnaise packets and other smelly delights that have had a few days to ripen.
I hiked almost two miles more than I thought I would today. My legs are strong and carry me swiftly. I feel like I have lost some weight but I am not exactly sure how much. Maybe ten pounds?

Day 29

11.1 miles (mile 410.7)
After packing up camp this morning I arrange and photograph green aspen leaves into the number 400 to commemorate that number of miles. Technically I’m not there yet (still have 4/10 mile), but I’m priiiiiiiiiiiiiiitty confident I’ll make it.

400 miles.
The path is narrow and the plants along it are tall and wet this morning so I wear rain pants for the first few miles. Nothing I can do to keep my shoes dry. They are just going to get wet. After an hour or two the trail widens out and the plants aren’t as tall, so I de-pant and continue on in shorts. Then of course the path narrows again the wet plants grow. You just can’t win sometimes.
I pass Paxton the dog and his four people camped near the trail. I stop and say hi and pet Paxton. Not so interested in the people…just wanted to pet a dog. That’s always nice.

Paxton the dog. A good boy.
Not far ahead I hear a train whistle. Must be the Durango-Silverton line. This train actually has a stop at the trailhead. No cars can get there. You have to either walk or take a train to get to this particular trailhead. I love that. By the time I get down to the tracks the train is gone. The CT follows the tracks for a few hundred feet, so I play hobo and whistle while I walk down the tracks.
The trail leaves the tracks and crosses the Animas River. It looks chalky but nice. I cross the river and tank up at Molas Creek (a feeder creek that dumps into the Animas) before a hot, waterless, five mile, 1,800 foot ascent. Once at the top I’ll be at Hwy 550, which leads into Silverton.
Near the top, I strip down to my shorts and take a whore’s bath in Molas Creek and put on my fresh town shirt, which I never wear while hiking. I want to keep my hiking stink to a minimum so that when I hitch a ride at the highway they driver won’t have second thoughts and kick me out of their car.
This was easiest hitch I’ve ever received in my brief hitchhiking career. When I got to the road I took Kermit 2: The Reckoning (my trusty backpack) off and opened it up to get to the inside pocket where I keep my wallet, ID, credit card, etc. I like to take that stuff out and put it in my pocket in the unlikely case I get a ride and someone steals my pack. Just as I started digging around in there a car being driven by a woman with a man in the passenger seat pulls over and asks if I need a ride. “You bet!” I enthusiastically reply. “I’m going into Silverton,” I say. “We’re going right past there. Hop in,” says the guy in the passenger seat. I finished getting my stuff out of the pack, then, toss it into the back seat and slide in beside it. The hitchhiker picker-uppers are named Natalia and Rick. They thru-hiked the CT in 2014. Rick hiked the entire Appalachian Trail a year or two before that. They live in Durango and were heading north for three or four days of car camping somewhere beyond Silverton. For the first time in days I have glorious cell service, so I map us to the Blair Street Hostel, where I made a reservation while I was in Creede. Addresses here are, I think, only suggestions, so my phone takes us a few blocks from the hostel. Rick gives me his phone number and says that I should call him when I reach Durango, that he will come pick me up from the trailhead and give me a lift into town to wherever I’m staying. In fact, he says, if I need a place to stay I can crash on their couch for a night. They’ve got an apartment on the edge of town. Very generous. Seems like most of the mountain people I encounter are generous. I accept the ride but decline the overnight stay. I know I’ll want a shower and a room once I get there. Plus, I want to stay in downtown and walk around to see the sights.

They drop me off near the hostel in Silverton and after a few minutes of walking the unpaved streets I find it. It’s a pretty small town so it isn’t too difficult. Jan, the owner and operator of the hostel--according to the chalk board behind the front desk-- is away. I call the number the chalk board tells me to call and get Jan’s voice mail. I walk to the back of the hostel and see a meth-skinny lady listening to a man speak too loudly at her about some crap that happened to him somewhere some time ago. It smells like pot out there. A lot of pot. I don’t want to interrupt so I wait for 30 seconds or so until the lady sees me. I tell her I want to check in to the hostel. She says, “Great! I’m Jan. I can get you checked in.” So she checks me in, shows me where my resupply box is that Lola mailed to me, then shows me to my room which has peeling paint on the walls, a single underpowered lamp for illumination and may or may not have been a crime scene in the near past. She leads me back to where the showers are and where the laundry room is and what the prices are for those things. Except I can’t do laundry right now because she’s washing sheets, but probably in an hour it will be okay. Feeling somewhat clean from my whore’s bath in Molas Creek a few hours earlier, I head out to the nearest restaurant and have a cheeseburger, fries and a Fat Tire ale. It’s one of the worst burgers I’ve ever eaten, but the calories taste sooooo good and I clean my plate, wishing I had another in front of me. I return to my room in the hostel. It’s a casual place so I leave the door open while I unpack. In the lobby I hear a familiar voice and stick my head out the door to see who it is. It’s Dan, from the campground near the bog, downhill from the yurt. I say hi as he gets check in. “I’m starving,” he says. “Wanna get some food?” Just then Jan says that the laundry room is available, so Dan and I go to our rooms, change into our rain gear and put every other article of clothing we posses into the washing machine. Our combined wash makes a half load, max. We wait for the cycle to end and then transfer it all to the dryer. Synthetic clothes dry quickly, so in no time at all we are dressed in our best town clothes--which is to say nothing special--and walk down the street to another restaurant. We both order cheeseburgers, fries and a beer. This restaurant has a much higher quality burger than the one I ate two hours ago and I am finally full.
Silverton is cute, with costumed period actors doing the whole horse and buggy, cowboy and prostitute thing, but it’s a little too heavy handed with the tourist trapiness. Unless I was using the town as a base of operations for mountain activities or taking the train or doing something rivery, I can’t imagine visiting for more than a day. Kind of a one horse town. Any more than a day and I think I would be really bored.
The next order of business is finding new insoles for my shoes and a new pair of high-performance underwear. Dan joins me in my quest. We go from shop to shop but the closest thing to performance underwear I can find is novelty underwear with a Sylvester the Cat print on it and the nearest insoles are ½ mile down the road at the grocery store. Dr. Scholl’s most likely, not the expensive insoles I would prefer. Dan takes his leave and I walk down to the grocery store. Dr. Scholl’s it is, but anything is better than the limp fabric remnants that I am currently walking on.
Back at the hostel I trim the new insoles down to fit my shoes and try them on for size: perfect enough. My new motto.
Paxton the dog and his four people arrive and check in.
Dragonfly (the lady whose socks I found in segment 19) checks in, too.
In the guest book in the lobby I see that Gavin (Stealth), Jason and Mothership all left this morning. I certainly expected Gavin and Jason to be ahead of me, but Mothership? That’s a surprise. She was slow, for sure, but she would hike all day from sunrise to sunset and I guess you can really cover a lot of miles that way. I underestimated that. She is a machine, like all of us out here.
For dinner I eat up the miscellaneous few snacks left over from this last leg of the hike and some surprise treats Lola added to my resupply box. Cookies, brownies, Cheese-Its. Dinner of champions.
I’m taking tomorrow off—my second day off on the trail. I don’t really feel like I need it, but I probably should. My knee hasn’t hurt for 200 miles. I feel stronger than ever.

Day 30

0.0 miles (Zero day)
Dan and I eat average quality breakfast burritos at Mattie & Maud’s restaurant.
Dan says that he is heading back out on the trail later today. Before he heads out we grab lunch at a little place next to the hostel. I have the Thai Wrap with a salad and a delicious Avalanche ale. We sit outside on the patio and enjoy the nice weather.
Dan gets a ride back up to the trail from Jan, the hostel proprietress, for $5. I arrange a ride with her for 7:30 tomorrow morning.
I visit the Silverton Jail and Mining Museum, an excellent attraction that confirms my suspicion that I would enjoy being neither incarcerated nor a miner.

My single-pair-of-underwear issue is concerning me a little. I don’t want to wear my one remaining pair for five days straight on the trail. I am a savage on the trail, but I’d like to not be that level of savage so, not being able to find another pair of underwear in town I reluctantly fish the broken pair out of my trash Zip-loc bag from my room’s trash can. They reek like old tuna-peanut-butter-mayonnaise-awful. If a fart fucked a dead squid that had been lying on a summer sidewalk for three days and they miraculously had a child, it would be unloved and it would smell like my broken underwear. Out of options, I sneak them across the hall into the communal bathroom and wash them out with plenty of soap in the sink. They’ve still got the hole in the crotch but at least now they smell like Procter and Gamble. I sew them up as best I can with the needle and thread I brought along on trip for just this kind of thing and then they are perfect enough.
That evening I hear that the Gold King Mine plug blew and dumped hundreds of tons of yellow toxic sludge upstream into the Animas River and that it was headed toward Durango like a wave of poison orange juice.

I call and reserve a proper hotel room and a car to drive from Durango to Denver for next week. The end is too close, but I’m also ready to be home.

Day 31

14.8 miles (mile 425.5)
In the lobby at 7:30 a.m., ready to go, I wait for Jan. Meanwhile I meet Opie, a Border Collie, and his owner. The Gold King Mine spill is the topic of the morning. I call the number behind the desk for Jan to find out when she’ll be here. No answer.

Opie, the hostel Border Collie.
At 8:00 a.m. I call again. She answers sounding hungover, says she’ll be right down (she lives upstairs), that she overslept. Five minutes later she arrives, already reeking of cigarettes. I remember those days, when you had to have a smoke before you did anything. Glad I’m not a slave to that anymore. Now I can walk ridiculous miles and scale tall, rocky triangles. I toss my pack into the bed of her pickup truck and she drives us up the road to Molas Pass where the trail meets the road. It is sprinkling lightly so after I hop out I quickly put on my rain pants and jacket. I am happy to be out of town and hiking again. It felt like I wasted a day doing nothing.
Meet two northbounders: One named Abraham, a Denver architect. Didn’t get the other’s name.
The new insoles feel sooooo comfortable and supportive. My feet are insanely happy.
Two hours in I hear weird noises to the left off in the distance. I stop to look and listen. I see white specks moving slowly across a mountain side. Sheep! Hundreds of sheep, bleating and grazing.
Later, my first attempt to gain the saddle of Rolling Mountain fails as black clouds and thunder move in. A few hundred feet from the pass I find a small cave, enough for one human to uncomfortably hide in, and take shelter in it when the rain comes. I take this opportunity to make lunch (tuna, mayo, relish, tortillas) and wait out the weather. As I finish tidying up, the rain stops and I quickly make the pass and descend the other side.
I pass very closely to a doe feeding near the path. I expect it to run away as a approach, but it doesn’t so I get some video. She steps away and poops, unworried as I walk near. She is clearly used to people walking by.
Approaching camp I meet John and Tom—two brothers in their 60s hiking as much of the trail as they can each season. John has recently hurt his back so they will be leaving the trail at the next forest road access point to try and hitch a ride to civilization for some medical care. This is a bad place to be hurt. There is nothing near if something goes wrong. You have to keep walking. You have no real choice.
I make camp for the night in one of the prettiest sites of the trip, next to Cascade Creek. Waterfalls and cliffs all around me. I make dinner and eat it on a wooden bridge above the creek. A nasty storm cell moves in and it looks like it means business. I secure the tent stakes with large rocks and when the rain finally comes I end my outside day. I have placed my tent in an unfortunate place, in a slight depression, and soon water starts to pool under the tent. My sleeping pad is a thick inflatable so I have about two inches of insurance above the tent floor if the water finds its way in. The rain continues to dump for a few hours but it never enters the tent. Even after 30 days of sleeping on it, there is not one hole in the tent floor. Quality construction and taking care of your equipment goes a long way out here. TarpTent is now officially my favorite tent company in the world.

Day 32

16.1 miles (mile 441.6)
In the morning with a wet tent packed in my backpack I pass Paxton the dog and his people. I give him a good petting which he seems to enjoy. I talk with his people about water options up the trail. The next few days are light with water so we have to plan smartly.
I gain Blackhawk Pass. No weather issues this time, just the Rocky Mountains at their typical best. I can see several mountain ranges from where I stand. I also have cell phone service so I send a quick video of my kingdom to Lola and Mom. I call Lola. She asks what I would like for dinner upon my glorious return to Denver. I barely even have to think about it: Roast whole chicken, buttered peas and mashed potatoes with the skins.
Everybody I have hiked with at this point is either ahead of me or behind me, so these last few days are strictly solo hiking. It’s okay, though. I feel like I know this place now… I know my place and I do not fear it. My fear imagination does not run wild. I am not lonely. I enjoy this place and this thing I am doing and exist with it, not against it, to some degree. I’m not Grizzly Adams but I’m also not pure city slicker. I’m now somewhere comfortably in between.

Tomorrow is a long haul with only the possibility of water so it’s important to tank up with enough this evening to get me through 19 or so miles tomorrow. We hikers all know about this stretch and dread it, since we’ll have to carry so much water. Weight sucks. We do all we can to keep it to a minimum, but sometimes, like back in segment 2, you just have to carry a ton of it.
I pass a perfectly nice, published campsite at treeline because it is so windy and cold here, deciding instead to hike down one more steep mile to the last reliable water for 22 miles at Straight Creek (unless the seasonal seeps are flowing 14 miles down the trail), thinking I’ll find a stealth spot near to pitch my tent. The water is there, the creek is flowing, but the mountain is steep and, despite a good 20 minutes of searching, I can find no suitable place to sleep for the night. I was hoping to sleep next to water--using it with abandon for dinner--and then tank up in the morning for the long, dry hike the next day. Instead, I will now tank up on water and hike down to the next published campsite—a dry campsite one and a half miles farther--where I’ll have to conserve water because I still need to make dinner tonight, breakfast tomorrow (I love my coffee!) and make it last for a day and a half if the seasonal water seeps are not flowing. It’ll be a close call but I think I can do it.
The campsite is a nice one. It’s a dry site, piney and sheltered from winds. I make camp, then dinner, then I’m joined by a 67 year old northbounder from England named Robin, trail named “Proper Cheddar.” An experienced long-distance hiker, in the American mountain towns he is always searching for an excellent—and proper—English style cheddar cheese. A lively and cheerful Englishman who lost his blind wife ten years ago to cancer, every season since then he has been hiking long trails in the U.K. and the U.S. He’s done much of the Pacific Crest Trail and and now he’s walking the Colorado Trail. Two days ago he finished the CT southbound, then he turned around and is now hiking it northbound. One of the nicest chaps you could ever meet. We talked for hours next to a campfire ring neither of us had any intention of using. Night finally came and we went to our respective tents to sleep the sleep of the long-walkers.

Day 33

13.2 miles (mile 454.8)
A beautiful, easy hike today along scenic ridges on which hundreds of birds were nesting in the bushes. My presence pissed them off and they would loudly dart out and fly around in circles, chirping madly, trying to scare me off. The trail took me through shady pine forests, green meadows and general awesomeness.
I pass Jen and Petunia on the trail. They say they are going over Indian Ridge today (considered by many hikers to be one of the prettiest parts of the trail) and will camp at the end of it, near Taylor Lake, a long 22 mile hike. They are tough as nails.
Along the way, some mountain bikers stop to point out that we are in a massive field of wild strawberries. They are everywhere and I didn’t even see them. I take my pack off and start gorging on them. My fingers are almost blood red from picking so many. I decide to have lunch here, which is perfect because today’s lunch is one of the most boring I have: 2 tortillas, two packets of Justin’s nut butters, and a packet of honey that exploded into a sticky mess. I add strawberries to the mix and lunch isn’t so bad now. For dessert…yep: wild strawberries. A nice treat filled with sugar and water.

Free food from the ground. (And a Kermit 2: The Reckoning photobomb.)
At mile 454.2 the seeps are flowing! I stop and tank up and drink about a liter of water right there (after filtering, of course). It’s a muddy area, but I search around until I find a tiny, clear pond and pull my water from there. I walk another half mile up the trail and set up camp alone near a sign that says “scenic overlook.” That makes me laugh, as if I had been walking for 454 miles and now, finally, I get to see something pretty. I am camped near a cliff and the scenic overlook is a rocky ridge you can walk out on and have a 270degree view of the mountains. I sit on the rocks and watch the evening settle in. Then, below, a half mile back, I see that Paxton the dog and his people are camped below. So are Wendy and Mary. I yell down to them in their little valley and they yell back up. We are all one big family hiking at our own pace. Kind of.

Scenic overlook. Unfortunately, the only one on the entire trail.
A note on my food for this trip: it has been tasty and, mostly, filling. I’ve lost some weight, I know, but I rarely feel super hungry. If I were to do it again I would take two extra snacks per day with me, so that would be breakfast, lunch, dinner and five snacks per day (as opposed to the three I have now—a snack consisting of, say, an energy bar or trail mix or Goldfish crackers or things like that). I tired of granola and milk for breakfast (I think it was the dried blueberries that I threw in that I didn’t like). The fruit leather snacks I dehydrated myself got boring really fast, too. My favorite dinner was the ramen noodles (the shitty college staple, but I threw out the worthless flavor packet and added dehydrated shiitake mushrooms, corn, scallions, nori seaweed and chicken bouillon). Overall, the dehydrated dinners were really satisfying. Next time, though, I would bring some extra stuffing or instant mashers for those long hiking days where I desperately needed more calories. I loved coffee in the morning with Coffeemate and believe it or not I came to really, really enjoy mornings when Pop Tarts were on the menu—they were quick, easy, filling and loaded with calories. Calories, calories, calories! We hikers need them desperately. If a person living his normal life requires 2,000 to 2,500, we need at least double that. Sometimes more. Although I rarely felt hungry, I know I needed to be eating more.

Day 34

25.2 miles (mile 480.0)
The penultimate day of the trip. I don’t want/but kind of want it all to end. Mostly don’t, though.
Lots of coyote howling out there in the darkness this morning.
On the trail hiking by 6:00 a.m.
Except for the taptaptapping of my trekking poles along the trail, it’s a quiet hike up to Indian Trail Ridge. I am hoping to see a bear or something dangerous, but the most terrifying thing I see going up is a bleached out old cow jawbone colorfully painted by some Germans, bidding Vilkomen alongside depictions of mushrooms, hearts and an elk or deer. The jaw rests upon some wildflowers on a tree stump and it's not very terrifying.
The entire morning the sky is clear, the air is cool and crisp, the trail is up and down and the scenery may top anything I’ve seen so far.
I walk down The Knife’s Edge: a few hundred feet of trail that travels along a high ridgeline with steep, descending talus slopes almost straight down either side.

Knifey sharpy.
The trail eventually leads to Taylor Lake (7 miles from my campsite this morning) which I can see from way up high. This is probably my last opportunity to see a moose, so I pull over to take a break, giving any moose a chance to let me see it drink at the lake. I have a snack, convert my schlongs into short pants, roll my sleeves up, apply some sunscreen, drink some water. No moose. Damn. I continue down to Taylor Lake and tank up on water for the rest of the day.
Since I’m in no hurry today and I would only have 15 or so miles tomorrow to finish the trail, I’m thinking I’ll camp at mile 15 today next to the bridge at the next crossing of Junction Creek (the trail crosses this creek about six times) in segment 28—the last segment. When I arrive it is a pretty enough spot and I take my pack off, take my shirt and shoes and socks off and clean up in the river. There is lots of horse manure around and within seconds I am attacked by biting flies. They are relentless. Perhaps the worst on the trail. I try to enjoy the river and cleaning up but it’s too much for me, so I get dressed to move on, flailing my arms all around like a crazy person to keep the flies away.
I meet a German couple on mountain bikes pushing their bikes up the mountain. They are nice and chatty. The wife just yesterday wrecked and split her head open a little. They will go to the hospital once they reach Durango, but for now she is patched up well enough. She is in good spirits and takes the pain like a pro. There is nothing you can do out here about that kind of thing except deal with it. I like them. They have biked the entire trail in 14 days and are tired and beat. I ask them how much of trail they estimate they have had to walk/push their bikes uphill or over unrideable parts and they think it’s around 30%. I tell them about the free beer every Colorado Trail completer gets at Carver’s in Durango and they perk up. Everyone loves a reward.
I call Rick (one half of the couple that gave me a lift into Silverton) and ask if his offer to give me a ride from the Durango trailhead into town tomorrow is still valid. It is, so I thank him and give him an ETA of 10 am-ish tomorrow.
The next potential campsite is 4 ½ miles past the Junction Creek site. It’s in an aspen grove which is almost always a gross, wet, disappointing thing. I check out the site and—big surprise-- it’s muddy, unlevel, and looks like a stampede of cows recently blasted through. Lots of cow dung and biting flies. Not a chance I’m staying here. I have plenty of energy still, and there are many more miles to go to the next potential campsite, so I decide to power on. There is one last campsite on the trail. One last campsite five miles from the end, before hitting Durango. The CT Databook, which has been hyper-accurate so far and not let me down once, assures me that the campsite has a year-round spring nearby. Not questioning it, I dump a liter and a half of water (more than three pounds) to keep my pack as light as possible until I can reach camp and get more water.
Dusk is moving in. I find what I think is the campsite, more than 25 miles from where I woke up this morning—by far the longest I’ve walked in a single day since I’ve been out here—marked ominously by a bleached-out cow skull perched on a tree stump, but I cannot locate the spring. I walk ¼ mile past the site trying to find the year-round spring and instead find the most disgusting cow pond ever made. The water is murky and filled with weeds and emerging flies and there are hoof prints and cow shit everywhere. It looks poisonous. There is a rotten water trough nearby but no spring. I search and search but nothing. I determine how badly I need water from here and decide I don’t need it enough to chance any of it, even if I filter. I am beyond the last legal camping area on the trail, so I head back to the cow skull campsite with only ¾ of a liter of water remaining until tomorrow. Not enough for a proper night’s dinner and tooth brushing and drinking and breakfast, but enough to get by. I set up camp and make dinner and decide that after I pack up camp in the morning I will stop at the next river crossing (a mere two miles farther) and make breakfast and coffee there. Meanwhile, I have phone reception here and I call Lola to check in. I’m going to make it, I tell her. By tomorrow morning I will have hiked 484 miles and some change through the Rocky Mountains. We are both very excited. I have an airline of bourbon that I bought in Silverton for the last night on the trail. I pour it into my titanium cup and sip on it before setting up camp. By then it is almost dark. This was a long day.

The welcome mat.

Fresh mountain dung water.

Day 35

4.6 miles (mile 484.6)

Last day on the trail.

I wake up at a slothful 7:00 a.m. with a cup of water left, so I forgo breakfast and tooth brushing. I will take care of those things when I reach Junction Creek.

I pack up camp, trying to dry the tent as much as possible before stuffing it into Kermit 2: The Reckoning and on the way out decide to look one more time for the spring. Of course I find it. Just as described in the Databook—a nearly-hidden hose pipe sticking out of the dirt, dripping clear water. Glad that the Databook did not lie I continue on without getting water. I’ll wait for the river.

I pass Gudy’s Rest--a wooden bench and plaque monument to Gudy Gaskill--perched on a rocky overlook. She is the person most responsible for getting the Colorado Trail made. She worked tirelessly for many, many years with the Forest Service and private donors to get it done. Everyone on the trail knows who she is. I sit down and take in the view.

At Junction Creek I filter my last water, make my last cup of coffee and eat my last breakfast on the trail. Only 2.6 more miles to go.

This close to the trailhead there are lots of day hikers and dogs and children. It’s nice to see them. I am in a good, sentimental mood.

I reach the Durango trailhead--the southern terminus of the Colorado Trail—uninjured and feeling great. I call Rick who says he can meet me in the parking lot in ½ hour. I call Mom and Dad and give them the news that I have completed the trail. Dad seems especially pleased, and while we talk I construct the numbers 486 out of pinecones that have fallen from the trees and snap a picture. The CT Databook and the app on my phone disagree on the total mileage of the trail. I choose to embrace the slightly larger number.

486 miles. That is plenty.

Rick arrives and gives me a lift into town to my hotel, the Durango Downtown Inn, near the Animas River. I check in, shower, wash some clothes in the sink and hang them to dry in the air conditioned room. I strip down to my underwear and look at myself in the mirror. I have lost more weight than I thought, looking leaner and stronger than I ever have. (I don’t know the specific number yet, but when I get home and weigh myself I will discover that I have lost 17 pounds. When I first decided to thru hike I was pushing 200. Just before I began the trail--after several months of training hikes--I weighed in at 192. I’m now at 175 and hope to keep it around there. )

I go out for a walk, of all things. The Animas River only looks mildly yellow from the Gold King spill in Silverton, but I can see residue on the rocks and shorelines. This can’t be a good thing.

I stroll through downtown and for lunch decide upon an Indian/Himalayan restaurant for lunch. Bonus: there is a buffet (which I normally am weary of, but in this case decide is a good thing for gorging purposes). I take photos of plate 1, plate 2, plate 3 and plate 4 and send them to Lola to laugh at.

After lunch I visit various shops, buying a book at a local bookstore, get some new tent stakes at an outfitter (laughing a little to myself at the heavy, over-engineered car-camping gear that I love but would have broken my back had I had to carry it for the past month) and generally just stroll around. It’s a nice little town, kind of chic but still mountainy, a lot like Bozeman, Montana.

I go back to the hotel and arrange for a cab to take me to the airport tomorrow morning where I have a rental car waiting for the six hour drive home back to Denver.

I pitch my tent on the lawn outside my hotel room (more like a nice motel) and let the sun dry it out. It will need a well-deserved douching when I get back home. It held up so well and kept me dry and sheltered every night on the trail. I really can’t recommend this tent enough. The TarpTent Notch. A beauty of simple, effective engineering.

Early dinner time is approaching so I head back out to Carver’s for a veggie burger, fries and my well-deserved free Colorado Trail Nut Brown Ale. Everything is delicious. I wait around to see if any other CT completers arrive, but no one does. I walk back to the hotel, looking forward to some TV and a soft bed. The local news is on. Albuquerque news. I walked so far the local news comes from Albuquerque, New Mexico. The weather there is nice right now, they tell me. Tomorrow will be sunny and mild. The lawyers have arrived in Silverton and the school board is making tough decisions. It puts me to sleep.

The best beer I ever drank.

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The Avocato

Colorado Trail Thru Hike, Summer 2015

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