Welp, this last section didn’t go completely smoothly but we’ll get into that.
Day one was fairly uneventful, I hitched back to the trail with Kate(katethewild) and we met a few cute dogs in the truck. Cute dogs who were first dropped off at this lovely cabin in the back woods of Lincoln and we actually got a little tour of the place. It was super sweet! Once we actually got back on trail everything went perfectly fine and we went about 19 miles and camped with Smokebeard(edthesmokebeard) and Frito. I actually ended up burning my pasta a little bit(sorry Foureyes) and ended up trading dinners with Frito because he liked the smokey taste and I didn’t.
Day two was the start of the drama. Although I didn’t know about it until we were five miles in… At which point I went to put my bear spray back on my pack and learned that there was no bear spray to be found 😦 almost certainly left at the campsite the night before. Unfortunately that didn’t end the drama for day two, not by a long shot. The next issue was that Kate suddenly developed a limp about ten miles from the Llama ranch a popular spot for thruhikers and bikepackers to stop and rest. So we limped our final miles into camp, in the 90 degree sun hoping that would be all for the day… It wasn’t. We had a negative interaction with the owner of the Llama ranch because someone accidentally moved a lawn chair in front of his front door. We know that he was taking an EMT test the next day so I understand why he was stressed and for that I wish him well. However that didn’t stop him from blowing up on a fellow hiker for the chair in front of the door and then demanding us to answer why ‘you hikers don’t have common decency.’ Apparently the exact same thing had happened the year before to a similar negative reaction and he had issues with hikers leaving their packs on the porch. He also repeatedly went on about how the bikers never give him these problems. I recommended a sign with some of the things he wanted, ie, no packs on the porch, please don’t move chairs, etc. Because if we don’t know, we don’t know. I don’t think anyone broke any social rules other than merely not noticing the door when moving the chair. Anyways, Llama drama, so we did another 7 to a meadow where we camped.
Day 3 was better but not perfect, Kate was still limping having already limped 15 miles the night before. We also didn’t want to go on the main route — the red line — because there wasn’t going to be any water for 15 miles plus it would put us in a weird place to do a fire reroute. So instead we went and did a road walk using Gaia gps. A road walk that turned out to go through private property 😦 So we rerouted again. Going through fields filled with cows and following two track.
At about 3pm Kate, 511, and Disco decided that they shouldn’t walk anymore in the heat while Radio and I pushed on the final 10 miles to town. I’ll admit now that we did have to jump locked gates into a cow field but in our defense there wasn’t any signs posted that it was private property. Radio and I finished the day around 8pm where we met back up with the others and a few others hikers at the bar in Elliston, MT.
Day 4 had no drama, Kate and I went into town, replaced some gear — bearspray — got more food and spent some time at a hostel with other CDTers. I left for trail slightly after midday while Kate stayed back to rest her foot. I went about 7 miles down the road where I slept next to a remodeled schoolbus owned by a french lady and her husband pictured below. They gave me a nice warm dinner that night and sent me off with warm wishes in the morning.
Day 5 was uneventful other than a miserable amount of blow downs slowing me down although I still made nice milage.
Day 6, I channeled the name of another hiker out here “Wrong Way.” I knew there was a marshy bit about a hundred meters from camp if you followed the trail but a helpful comment noted that you could avoid it by following a dirt road around the other side of the hill and add maybe .1 miles. So I took the road and rejoined the red line after a little bit of confusion by accidentally jumping on a cow path and not the actual trail. This cow path luckily led right to the fence and cow trough that I was planning to get nice cold water from the pipe that filled it. I did so and after a short break I started back out again on the red line proper. 1.7 miles later I cross a marsh and my feet get all muddy. After 3.3 miles I finally noticed that the arrows on far out were not pointing in the direction that I was going. Cue massive denial but in the end I turned around and walked a very depressing 3.3 miles back to the cow trough I’d been at earlier, climbing over blowdowns all the way. This mistake also kept me from getting into Butte that day and I ended up staying at a campground about half a mile off trail and 8 miles from the interstate. But hey, at least I met some cool British bikepackers doing the Great Divide Trail and ate dinner with a nice guy named Kevin who gave me a can of tuna to go into my mac and cheese. Kevin had apparently hikes the Appalachian Trail in 1988 with a backpack that weighed 75 pounds at the start — it weighed 35 at the end. Ouch.
Day 7 was the eight miles into town where I went to the Montana Folk Festival in Butte. The festival was a lot of fun, with traditional folk music from around the world and now I write to you on my birthday, ready to get back on trail tomorrow for the next 95 mile section.
CDT Blog 