Posted by 26.2 miles
There was some rain overnight. This seems to be the general pattern at the moment; cool air in the morning, building to hot and humid by mid afternoon, thunder starting to rumble in late afternoon and lightning storms through the early evening, only to back off during the night.
I had 12.9 miles to hike on the CDT until a side trail of 14 miles would take me down towards Pinedale for a resupply. Along the way I met Mulligan, a CDT section hiker. We wouldn’t hike together as I was much quicker but Mulligan would catch up when I pulled over for breaks. We played this game through the whole morning.
The mosquitoes were insane throughout the day and were driving me insane.
My plans changed throughout the day.
Plan A was to reach the Elkhart trailhead and hitch into town until it became obvious that I would arrive quite late. There wouldn’t be that many opportunities to hitch so late and it wouldn’t be the best use of a motel room.
Plan B was to push to reach town tonight and have a full zero the next day. Finally, with Plan C, I decided to camp short of the trailhead and have a Nero day into town tomorrow.
Unfortunately, none of these plans worked out.
Having crossed multiple streams, rivers and lake outlets all day with plenty of water on hand, towards the end I needed to top up before camping around 4 miles from the trailhead. But do you think I could find any? No. I ended up walking the four miles right out to the trailhead without finding a single water source. I had about 250ml left.
I ended up at the Elkhart trailhead to camp at a cost of $12. No big deal but I still needed water. No taps on site. I had to approach a young couple camping next door with a camper and asked for 2 Lt of water. They happily obliged.
Again I had my tent up just in time as the skies erupted overhead with a lightning show and huge dumping of rain. Now you are not supposed to cook in your tent but having failed to see any signs of bears through the day and rain pissing down outside I had no other option. At least there was a bear box to store food in overnight.
So Plan D it is. Camp at the trail head and hitch into Pinedale tomorrow and take a full zero.
Mick Beckers 