It’s been a busy few days since finishing the trail. The hike out to Chief Mountain was long but it was cool to see both CDT finishes.
Meghan and I had tried to coordinate our meeting time so she could pick me up but when I made it to the parking lot, she wasn’t there. Luckily, about 30 seconds later I heard a car pulling up and it was Meghan! She brought drinks and snacks that I enjoyed as I waited for the other guys to show up. We chilled in the parking lot for a bit and finally took photos at the monument.
Meghan drove us all back to East Glacier where we had dinner and hung out with the new hikers that were at the hostel. It was really fun showing Meghan that little slice of hiker life.
The next day we went for a hike in the park and as we were driving to the trailhead, we passed a whole crew of hikers that I knew! I had hiked with many of them on and off since New Mexico. It was cool to be able to give them trail magic just a couple days before they too finish at the border.
The hike we did was really great. It went near one of the big passes I climbed on the CDT and we were able to turn it into a bigger hike because we could loop back to our car with the free shuttle in Glacier. The wildfire smoke in the air also began to clear and it wasn’t bad at all once we were on top of the pass.
The next day we drove home to Seattle. We took the Going To The Sun Road across the park and stopped for some photos. There’s way more to see at Glacier and we both want to go back.
We got home pretty late so we pretty much just unpacked the car and went to bed. Before my flight the next day I went to the grocery store to get food for the first leg of my trip.
I made it to Albuquerque pretty early and got a ride to REI to get some stove fuel, then another ride to my hotel. I had a few hours to check out some breweries nearby and they were actually pretty cool. It looks like they’re really working to improve downtown Albuquerque.
My Greyhound the next morning got me to Grants, NM around 7:30 am. I immediately started walking to the “trail” which just follows the main road through town. It was a couple of miles before getting out of town.
Grants is kind of a prison town so hitchhiking is probably kinda hard. Luckily I didn’t need to do that today.
After leaving town I started up Mt. Taylor, an 11,000 foot dormant volcano and I think the tallest part of the trail in New Mexico. Technically it’s not on the trail, but why wouldn’t you climb it?
Most of the trail is pretty easily accessible by forest roads so you see some weird stuff. This was way further from a road than I would have expected.
The climb to the summit was actually pretty hard. It was gradual but I haven’t been at 11,000 feet in a long time. It was also really hot and there wasn’t much water today.
I made it back to the official trail and ended up hiking pretty late. I used my headlamp for about an hour to get a few extra miles in. I’m really excited to get back home.