After a bit of a rough night in a crappy campsite it was time to hike into town. I would get to visit 3 different towns today! This part of the trail has been entirely on old dirt roads, and much of this last section was on the actual Oregon Trail! It’s fun when history and thru hiking collide and today would bring even more of that.
There was more water than I expected in the Great Divide Basin, but it was still pretty surprising to see a river sort of appear out of nowhere. The Sweetwater River was a welcome site and it was really nice to have some shade under the bridge.
After the bridge I was walking along a 4x4 path when I came up to a fairly big gravel road. That was a bit unexpected and it turned out I had missed a turn a half mile back. I made my way cross country through the sage brush only to find that there was no trail at all. The route just randomly went cross country for 5 miles.
After looking at the comments in my app it turned out everyone just walks that gravel road since there isn’t actually a trail. Frustrated, I went back to the road and continued on. At that point it I hadn’t eaten lunch yet, and all my water was hot from the sun. I decided to go off trail a mile to go into the town of Atlantic City.
As you can see, the town welcomes CDT hikers, but seemingly not many other people… It was strange seeing something explicitly racist on the trail, especially when they’re trying to rent the cabin to CDT hikers. (If this last hit is a little confusing, read the signs on the picture of the cabin closely.)
I went to the bar in town and luckily the staff was much more welcoming and seemingly open minded. The burger was great and absolutely worth the two extra miles of hiking.
The next stop was South Pass City, just three miles away. The city is run mostly as a historic state park, with a few private homes nearby. Both cities were founded around a gold rush in the area and saw big boom and bust cycles through the last 100 years.
From there it was only 3 miles to the highway where I would hitchhike into Lander. I was surprised to find out that a few of my friends that were ahead of me only just left Lander a few hours early. After a good nights rest, maybe I can catch them before the next town.
I got to the road and started hitching. There wasn’t much traffic and I didn’t have luck for awhile.
Then two hikers came in headed south. They were headed back to Lander because one of them was sick. The healthy one came to the road and helped hitch and we immediately got a ride. Not saying it was definitely because she was a girl, but that really does seem to help.
Our ride had a pickup truck so the other hikers sat in the bed and I sat up front. I had him drop me off downtown and he recommended a restaurant called Cowfish that he said was the best in town. It was also the home of Lander Brewing Company.
Even though I knew a few hikers in town, I went straight from dinner to my hotel room to crash. I was tired from those long days in the basin.