SUMMARY:  A lot of our CDT hike so far has been miles and miles of endless forest with no views.  Not today!  First we climbed out of Ghost Ranch, through dramatic “badlands”, where the trail became a rock scramble.   Later on, we climbed to over 9,000 feet elevation and it was epic, sweeping views that stretched for miles and included green grass, aspen trees and wildflowers.  Following the “trail” there was not easy–it was just a faint track through the grass.  We could also see the snowy mountains of Colorado ahead of us–oh boy!  We are camped tonight in a meadow on the mountainside at about 9,500′ elevation.

DETAILS:  We had our packs sitting by the door, ready to roll before breakfast–our last chance to eat lots of good food and talk to people.  We had fun talking to Yeti and her husband (don’t remember his trail name, unfortunately).  All the hikers are talking about one topic:  SNOW.  Many are planning to simply go home for a couple of weeks once they reach Chama.  Others say they will flip up to Wyoming and come back to Colorado later.  Yeti offered to help us do the “flip” if we want to, but we told her, “No, we’ll just keep walking north and do the best we can.”

So we took our trek poles in hand, and headed out, following the “Box Canyon Trail” from Ghost Ranch. We passed the Art Center with its very dramatic cliff backdrop (wow) and then headed into “The Badlands”–a rugged world of colorful rocky canyons, cliffs and rock formations.  At first the trail wound its way up a pretty canyon, repeatedly crossing a cute creek, but then it began a very serious climb where in several places it was a rock scramble so steep that I had to set down my trek poles and use my hands to help pull me up.   The views of Ghost Ranch down below were quite spectacular.

Finally we reached the top of the mesa, and it was back to “regular” trail through the sagebrush, with anklebiter cacti everywhere. We saw more and more cows and even (ack!) a couple of bulls, which gave us a very unfriendly eye.  We walked past them trying to look very humble and unthreatening.

Once again, we were also having problems figuring out where the trail went, and having to stop and look at maps, landmarks, etc. to try and figure it out. Then we met a guy who had flipped up to Chama from Ghost Ranch, and was now hiking back, waiting for the snow to melt.  He said he decided to put this “leisure” time to good use by doing some trail caretaking–picking up trash, building rock cairns, etc.  Good for him!  A short time after we met him, one of my trek poles suddenly collapsed, and Fixit had to repair it with a couple of bobby pins I had brought along.  My poor trek poles are seriously looking bad.  I probably should have gotten new ones before we started the CDT.

Finally we were out of the sagebrush and back into green forest (VERY green–the aspens have leafed out!) with lots of wildflowers, especially dandelions.  But this was a very open forest, with lots of EPIC views, including the snowy mountains to the north.  Some of them have a lot of snow, others less, but we eyed them with some concern….that’s where we will be in a few days.  Oh boy.  The trail crossed miles of grassland (where it was just a faint track in the grass and hard to follow) among rolling hills.  Everything is turning green and looking beautiful.  We are camped tonight in an open meadow at about 9,500 feet.h them