On to Colorado! Days 71-77

MC: Reality set in a bit on this section of the trail. We were halfway done… but we were “only” halfway done. It has been a tough 2 1/2 months walking in the woods, and when we departed Rawlins, WY, we knew we were close to the halfway point. It was a bit overwhelming, this realization, and it really didn’t help that we were in a longer stretch of 6 days and 5 nights with 25 mile + days. Exhaustion really started to set in. But we kept trudging on each day, excited to finally cross over into the Colorado border and see what it has to offer, although a little nervous as well due to the state’s reputation for steep grade and challenging trail. So far it has been beautiful; golden grasses mixed with pockets of pine trees, all at high altitudes of 11,000ft. The mountains we climb over have brothers and sisters that lurk in the distance, standing over 14,000 ft, surrounding the backdrop of our movement southward. The weather has been on our side, low 70s and only one small instance of rain; hopefully we can keep winter at bay until October, when we exit the state. Only time will tell.

The other news that occurred was that our little trail family that we have been interacting with since Darby is now all spread out in different directions. Some of our hiker friends have elected to skip certain sections of the trail because sometimes the trail is a road walk that gets a hiker from one mountain range to the next. Hannon and I do not agree with this line of thinking, as we are approaching this hike with the intention to walk a continuous footpath from Canada to Mexico. It’s hard to explain, but for some reason we assumed all hikers hiking the CDT would think this way, but they don’t. We keep hearing plenty of stories of folks taking hitches and skipping sections of the trail simply because they don’t want to hike a section. It feels like we have all signed up to be a part of this exclusive club, but only half are doing it correctly, yet everyone will say they “thru hiked the CDT”. We almost feel betrayed by our friends, as they skipped sections and we are the lone “continuous footpath” hikers. It’s been hard to stay on course, but this whole damn trail is hard, so there’s no reason to break course.

We are currently in Steamboat Springs, CO staying at the Rabbit Ears Motel. We had great tacos for a late lunch and will look to have our second meal in town shortly. It’s supposed to rain tomorrow on our zero day. Nothing makes us happier than rain on a zero day.

HD:  This was a long 6 day haul. We finished crossing the southern part of the Great Divide Basin, worked our way back into the mountains, crossed into Colorado, climbed to our highest altitude yet, and got a hitch into Steamboat Springs in about two minutes. It was a busy week.

This section was 150 miles long. We covered it in only 6 days partly because of the flattish desert in the first two days, and partly because we had a goal to make it into Colorado on September 1st. Hot high desert faded to tree covered hills and we were quickly above 10,000’ in the Red Mountains of southern Wyoming in Medicine Bow National Forest. The change was once again startling and impressive. Good weather held for most of the week, with only one afternoon of light showers.

There were animals again (moose, bighorn sheep, mule deer, Canada jays, our first prairie dogs) as well as some new some new human interactions. We were surrounded by a flock of sheep and their dogs while taking a break. They were generally friendly and we all got along well enough for me to holster my bear spray and pet everyone. Also, elk hunting season opened in Wyoming on the 1st and in Colorado on the 2nd, so we saw more bowhunters fully kitted out than we did other hikers on this section. They don’t mess around with the big game hunting out west – these guys were carrying 70lb packs and planned to stay in the woods for 10 days. I mean.. it’s not 140 days or anything, but still impressive nonetheless.

Our big mountain welcome to Colorado was in the Mount Zirkel wilderness. It was beautiful; almost as pretty as the Winds, but more compact. We remained above 11,000’ for most of the day. This is likely a small taste of what we have in store with San Juans in a couple of weeks. First impressions of Colorado trails are well-maintained, cruisey, sometimes steep — better than the last three states. We shall see!

After a day off in this neat town, we’ll have a 10 day stretch from here to Leadville with no days off. But… this being Colorado and all.. we’ll walk through several towns and resupply once every

couple of days. I fully expect locals to hand us fresh coffee in the mornings on the way up the trail, and to greet us in the evenings with high quality home brewed beers. We saw the first signs of fall as a few Aspen leaves have started to turn yellow (as Mamallama predicted). Fingers crossed for a warm fall.