CDT Day 92 (8/18/23)
Miles 2194.2 (Blue lune 25.9)- 2222 (WOAH!) (Red line 2570.4) (27.8 miles)
Verbatim
I’m really missing my bike right now. I camped early, trying to stay high to keep above the smoke and Bears, at 7:30. There was easily another two miles in today but, meh, I wanted to camp. I think the double zero really screwed with my mental momentum. Coming into Anaconda it was the mindset of 30’s everyday. Not so much anymore. Tomorrow will be a new day will be a different timing and circumstance. Tomorrow will be good.
The chocolate muffin I ate this morning from the grocery store was SO good. An actually quality muffin. I was stoked. Much better than the cheap donuts. And guess what, it was only packaged in paper! Hurray! Eating the left over beans and rice from yesterday’s dinner was also stellar. The dinner yesterday was fun. :)
I saw Snake again this evening. I was surprised! He’d taken the Big Sky alternate and said it was really beautiful. He’d left Durdin, Sarah, and their trail angel Michelle back in Steamboat. They took an extra zero. It seems he’s been making good miles and is ready to be done. He specifically said he’s ready to be done. I am too. And I will be quite quickly in the larger scheme.
I was offered a hitch today, unsoliscited. A man and his wife drove up in their truck just as I was walking past the adult corrections facility and offered me a ride. Said they were on their way to Helena and would take me as far as I wanted or needed. I declined, for this too (road walks) IS the experience. You don’t thruhike without the unglamorous stuff. I wouldn’t have traded away today.
It was actually quite beautiful walking back up to the alpine zone. The golden grasses of the west contrast so beautifully with the dark green conifers. It’s a cool place to be. Clouds came in the early afternoon and with them a tremendous downpour beneath thunder. I set my tarp up really fast after hoping a fence into a cow pasture. I huddled under the tarp beneath some trees and held onto my broken pole to keep the tarp rigid beneath the onslaught.
I’m writing to a cacophony of Squirrels chirping. They’re so funny. I’m in a stand of young lodgepole pine and my presence has been noted. The squeaking makes me think of a dog toy. Which makes me wish for a dog. A best friend. Both in one. Or maybe both but separate. One day my backpacking won’t be like this. I won’t be carrying trash. Instead dog food. I won’t always be alone. Instead friends and love!
Post Note
I grew up pretty conservative Christian. I’m from New England. So, there’s a sort of Puritan influence to the foundations of my life. A phrase which comes to my mind when offered hitches along road walks is, “Get behind me Satan!”. Imagine if I’d said that to the kind couple offering me a ride, hahaha. That’s a testament to how much I’ve changed I suppose. Rather than using that phrase against the litany of “immoral” indulgences I was sacred about during my childhood, I use it to celebrate denying some’s offered aid. We rework our beliefs into something new as we progress through life and experience change. Somewhere in my mind and experience the notion of yellow blazing miles off a trail took on moral ramifications. Get behind me Satan, I’m walkin here.
Even the way I write about it now seems so intense. I write, just above, that “yellow blazing (takes) miles off a trail”. Does it? Does it really take those miles away? In a sense, sure. You didn’t walk them if you road them. But conversely, not really. You still experienced something along those miles. And maybe you experienced something more than just walking under the hot sun on some asphalt while amusing yourself with the facial expressions of those people who drive by. You presumably experienced the person or persons who gave you a hitch. And that’s an infinity right there! And heck, if you’re as lonely as I was maybe it would have been better to have taken that hitch. I could have made a friend. Could have taken a number. Got a free stay on my next travels in a week, month, or year. Could have found a job. Anything is possible!
So I don’t know. Hike your own hike. I guess for me, on this trip, it felt really important to walk those road walks. I’d spent so much time enduring torturous thoughts on trail and back home while trying to fall asleep. Road walking without water (to save weight of course) was no problem at all. I saw lots of cool yards. I saw plenty of places to camp. I got yelled at by a few dogs. Eventually I got downpoured on. It was good.