Posted by 15.6 miles
I don’t have much recollection of today other than it was a late start to hiking for the day. I was keen to have breakfast in town, wanted to purchase a Sub-way to carry out with me and needed to visit the gear store for some gloves that would handle being wet while keeping my hands warm. It was only around 10am that I positioned for a hitch out of town but it would take a while. Eventually a guy headed to Denver picked me up. He initially drove by but ended up turning around to collect me. He was an engineer on his way to a fly a drone for a job we had lined up. Ultimately it was 11 am before arriving back at Wolf Creek Pass and picking the trail up on the opposite side if the road to yesterday. Still I was keen to get at least 15 miles in. This would put me past the Creede Cut off and force my hand to continue on the red line through the mountains .
This was a great first day an introduction to the San Juans. At altitude with a lot of climbing and patches of snow.
I reached the 15 miles I had hoped for and called it a night on an exposed saddle with little cover from the winds that had ripped up. It would be a wild night for sure. X-Ray rolled into camp around 7pm. He had any easy hitch out within 5 minutes and from all the people in the world to be picked by just happened to be one of Christina’s best friends.
Mick Beckers 