Friday June 4, 2010

The landscape is changing before my eyes with each step.  The dry sandy mesa, turning to wide open meadows; green and lush, blanketed with dandelions and larkspur.  A dilapidated house sits among a stand of Aspen, lonely.  Mountains tower to the east and small patches of snow remain beneath the pines just at the edge of the forest.  I can see for miles and miles on all sides as we climb higher.  Clear springs surround us, water plentiful and delicious.  The taste of melted snow is sweet on my tongue.  The ground is saturated and I leave footprints in the mud.  Buttercups and Marsh Marigolds complement the fields of corn lilies.  The sun is slowly going down; my legs move on their own and I don’t think I can stop them.  The majestic snow-capped Rockies are getting closer and my stomach flutters.  We stand silently and watch the grazing elk.  He looks in our direction and immediately bounds up the mountain as three others follow suit.  We set up camp at 10,000 feet and watch the clouds turn orange and the sky fades from pink to purple on the horizon.  We are home, on many levels, we are home.

Camp 35: 10,000 feet with mountain and valley views
Camp 36:  spectacular sunset, major thunderheads in the distance and howling wolves!

CDT truths and philosophies

sunflower and little g's CDT Truths and Philosophies:

1. When in doubt, put on pants.
2. It is possible for a desert thorn to go through your shoe sole, superfeet and sock and stab your foot in a   single step.
3. When feeling down and out visit Deming, New Mexico...there's sure to be a homeless man telling you how incredibly beautiful you are.
4. Sandy dirt roads, desert thorns and bike tires are not a great combination.
5. Keep your receipts and Wal-Mart can be a very effective rental program.
6. If better out than in were a kingdom then Eric would be king.
7. New Mexico is indeed home to some of the most generous and kind people in the world.
8. New Mexico should hereby be referred to as the windy state, it's state flower the Bud Light can and it's state tree the barbed wire fence.
9. Fietenbuttz (German):  the smell your sleeping bag accumulates after hiking 500 miles.
10. A fellow hiker once said that if you collect all of the Bud Light cans in New Mexico you could pay for your entire CDT thru-hike.  Turns out, he is indeed, correct.
11. “Moose poop jewelry, who would wear that shit?”  sunflower
12. There is a reason why everyone else sets up camp around 4pm in Colorado while we are just starting to hike up and over a mountain pass around that same time.  It's called a thunderstorm and really, when will we learn?

Thursday June 3, 2010

Camp 34: Lost again, where is Harris Bear Spring?

We had a pleasant day of walking once we finally figured out how to get away from Ghost Ranch.  We hiked in the canyon for a bit which was nice and toasty but finally got to the top of the mesa and caught a breeze.  Trail finding was brutal today, once we find it we can’t seem to keep it which can be frustrating.  We were walking down a forest service road and saw a black bear so we stopped and watched for a while.  We were down wind so she couldn’t smell us as she slowly made her way down the road.  Eventually she heard us and darted into the woods while a second bear, brown in color, bounded across the road in the other direction.  Great! We split them up!  We didn’t even know the second one was there and weren’t quite sure if it was a mom and cub or mating season.  They both looked fairly big.  We stood and watched and eventually the brown bear crossed to the other side of the road.  She kept an eye on us but didn’t seem too concerned.  It was really cool!  We saw the Rockies in the distance…awesome!  For now, we are off trail and hungry, once again.

Tuesday June 1, 2010

Camp 32 and 33: Ghost Ranch, New Mexico

Our day began with not being able to find the trail, although we swear we were on it when we went to sleep! We followed the GPS to the supposed intersection but again, not happening.  We followed a drainage until it got so steep that if we fell it would have been a tumble straight to the bottom.  We changed the plan and decided to contour the mountainside and guess what...we found the trail!  It was a beautiful walk along the river through towering pines and hemlock.  A gorgeous blue sky, a big black bear and a couple of elk rounded out the day.  We got a hitch to Ghost Ranch with a former congressman who was moving and passing through the area.  He was super friendly and seemed very knowledgeable of the area.  We are staying at G.R. For a day or two in hopes that Eric's knee will return to a somewhat normal state.  It is a really bizarre place. We have been here for awhile and still haven't seen anyone that works here.  It is some sort of Presbyterian Retreat Camp with food that highly resembles staff cafe at the Evergreen Lodge...yum (enter sarcasm here)!  We did run into Pete again, a hiker that we met in Grants and haven't seen since.  Eric is making dinner and I'm writing under the star filled night.

first "cup" of coffee in awhile 

Monday May 31, 2010

Camp 30: Gallina River Trail beneath the Aspen

We both slept horribly last night, tossing and turning until the sun appeared.  We shared our crazy dreams and I am now a true believer that there are spirits in that canyon.  I can't explain it as I've never experienced it before but we were both glad to pack up and hike.  We started out slow as Eric's knee is badly swollen and he is unable to bend his leg.  We continued up the unmaintained river trail trying to follow the markings and cut logs.  It crossed the river several times, overgrown and impossible to keep track of.  The canyon became very narrow and both sides were extremely steep.  The trail, of course, was nowhere to be found.  I stumbled upon something that resembled a trail and we followed it for awhile before it disappeared.  We decided we had to get on top and out of the canyon so we hiked among the Aspens, straight up the mountain for about 2,000 vertical feet.  It was insane.  A few rocks slid, thundering down the mountainside and my heart nearly stopped.  I looked back, sure Eric had fallen, but instead there he was hobbling up the side of this mountain, dragging his leg along.  I had to smile as the whole scene was a bit unbelievable and at this point there was nothing left to do but laugh.  We finally reached the top and sat silently on a log.  I reached for the whiskey and we shared a shot with the mountain.  Cheers to respecting Mother Nature and the mountain.  We proceeded on our adventure staying on top of the ridge and quickly realized a massive storm had blown down thousands of trees.  We stared in disbelief at the uninviting maze before us.  We crept through the woods, climbing, or in Eric's case, dragging ourselves over the trees.  This goes on for miles.  The GPS reports that we are 1.8 miles from the San Jose Trail.  After all that we had only traveled about 1.3 miles as the crow flies, from our camp this morning.  Unreal.  5 hours and 2,000 feet later and we aren't any closer to getting out of this mess.  We continued on, exhausted and finally found our trail within the hour.  The San Jose Trail was like a superhighway compared to the path we had been on.  We hiked at 9,000 feet so there were still snow fields and the trail is really muddy and wet, but hey, no complaints here. 

We stopped a bit early tonight at a great camping spot beneath the beautiful Aspens.  We built a fire and had some warm food.  Great for the body and soul after the past few days.  So our adventure continues in the morning, hopefully after a good nights rest.

Sunday May 30, 2010

Camp 29: old trail along the river (not the CDT)

I'm laying here a little shaken up as Eric just fell in the river as he tried to cross on a slippery rock.  He banged his kneecap directly on a rock as his entire body plunged into the cold, swift stream.  I watched as it took his breath away and he fumbled to get out.  It happened so fast, I stood, watching helplessly unable to get to him.  He crawled to the bank and I met him with a million questions as I did a full body scan looking for gashes, cuts, blood and bones sticking out.  He simply held up a hand to silence me for a minute to gather himself.  Luckily he didn't hit his head and there were no broken bones but he hit his kneecap and shoulder hard during the fall.  It was already 7pm and he was cold and shivering.  We found a makeshift camping spot to set up and Eric changed into dry clothes.  We aren't even on the CDT, there is nobody for miles that we know of, the trail we are on is pretty much nonexistent.  How did we stumble upon it you ask?  We were trying to take a CDT alternate route that didn't go as planned and we ended up on a road heading North. As we all know, Canada is North so why not go with it?  The road eventually ended and we found this old trail along the river.  Once upon a time it had been maintained as we saw chainsaw work, markings and names carved in the trees.  We had to cross the river several times and our feet were pretty much numb.  On the last crossing we were trying to let our feet dry out a bit and that's when Eric took the bath.  We'll see what tomorrow brings.