Hitting the trail today was hard. Not because I was in town, but because I know I’m leaving a lot of people behind and I may not see them again. I’ve only known some of these people a few days but something like a thru hike makes connections happen fast.
I had breakfast with a few hikers who were zeroing and it kinda took forever. Then I walked to the other side of town (which was the way the trail went) and resupplied at the grocery store. I saw a few hikers there, said my goodbyes and went to McDonalds. Unsurprisingly there were more hikers there too. I had lunch and grabbed some snacks for the road (walk.)
About half my time hiking today was spent walking a 2 lane highway with no shoulder and a 70 mph speed limit. There wasn’t a ton of traffic so it wasn’t particularly dangerous, but it was pretty draining to have to pay attention the whole time. It was also really hot.
Eventually I left the paved road and continued onto a dirt road. This went on for a long time past farmhouses and eventually up into the mountains.
For much of the road, I followed a creek so there was plenty of water and when the sun started to go down the hiking was pretty pleasant. There were also plenty of cows.
You just can’t get away from them out here. Forest cows can be pretty startling since they’re big, loud, and the same color as a black bear. This one wanted very little to do with me.
I eventually made it far enough that I was off the Anaconda alternate and back on the CDT. This is where I found Raider, Pitch, and Icarus camped. I assume it’s them anyway. They were all in their tents and I got there just before dark at 9 pm. Hopefully I wasn’t too loud while I set up and cooked dinner.
The next week is going to be a long push without a true town experience for about 200 miles. Then it’ll be another 130 and I’ll be in Glacier National Park!