SUMMARY:  We started walking early this morning, all clean, rested and much more relaxed.  Our goal was the CDT trailhead on Lobo Canyon Road.  But before we reached it, four different Grants people stopped with offers of water, food, and even a ride to the trailhead.  Very generous!  One lady even told us that this Monday the city fathers of Grants will be having a meeting to discuss ways Grants could be even more hiker-friendly.  They like hikers!  Meanwhile, back on trail, a spring we’d counted on for water was dry, but we found another one.  We are camped in the woods tonight.

DETAILS:  We decided to do the “run for your life dash” across the RR/freeway overpass first thing, early this morning, so by 6:00 am we were tucking our last bits of gear into the packs and getting ready to start.  We felt much better than when we first got here–now we are well rested, clean and relaxed.

We made the dash across the overpass just fine, running as fast as we could, and began walking along what used to be Route 66, “The Mother Road” as it headed into downtown Grants.  So sad, though.  Many businesses are closed, and things really look run down.  The locals had told us that there used to be over 50,000 people living here in the 1990’s, but now it’s way less.  We ended up getting breakfast (burritos & coffee) at the only place we could find that was open–“Lotaburger”–a hamburger joint which was started in 1952.

Then we followed Yogi’s map through the residential neighborhoods of Grants, till we reached Lobo Canyon Road.  At the intersection, there was a grocery store, and I decided on one last trip to a “town” bathroom before we started the roadwalk to the CDT trailhead.  After I came out, and we were walking through the parking lot, a sweet older lady pulled up alongside us and got out of her car to talk.  She told us that the city of Grants has woken up to the fact that they are a very important “way station” on the CDT, and that this Monday night, the city fathers are having a meeting to discuss how they could make Grants more hiker-friendly.  They are already known as a “Route 66 City”, and now they’d also like to be known as a “CDT Gateway”  city as well.   She told us some of the ideas they are considering, like free bus passes for hikers, so they don’t have to hitch hike.  We told her it would be a big help if the city could appeal to the BLM to allow water caches north of town, for the hikers to use.  But she looked very sad at that, and said, “The BLM thinks they own everything.  They are closing roads up in the mountains here, that people have been using for years.  They are even closing off whole areas and saying nobody is allow to go in at all, not even hikers.   They are arrogant and rude and awful.  I don’t think there is much we can do with them, but I guess we could at least TRY.”  Then she asked if we needed water or food or anything!  We told her we were just fine, and appreciated her kindness.

The walk up Lobo Canyon Road had several highlights.   After we’d reached the edge of town, we got to a sort of informal shooting range right by the road.  It was basically a bunch of concrete barricades (the kind you see in highway construction zones) at a turnout, with various targets on the hillside across the way.  Then we came to a prison, where we could see the prisoners in their red & white clothes behind a LOT of razor wire.  Sad.   Fixit goes to a prison back home and a couple of times a month he goes in with the Gideons (the guys who put Bibles in hotel rooms) and they go cell to cell to see if any prisoners want a Bible, and to talk to them.  Prisoners have lots of time to read, and the Bibles have a very good effect.  We hoped the prisoners we were seeing had someone visiting them, like Fixit does at our local prison.

While we were walking along the road, three more folks from Grants stopped to offer us water and rides to the trailhead.  So generous!  We were grateful, but had to decline.  “We’re WALKING from Mexico to Canada, and we want to leave a trail of footprints, not tire tracks!”

Finally we reached the CDT parking lot, where there was a whole collection of the usual signs about trail rules, critters, etc.  We look at all that stuff and just shake our heads…use ordinary common sense, and you will be fine.  And all those signs could easily put off newbie hikers who are not confident yet in what they’re doing.  We have friends who never hike, because they see all those signs at trailheads and get scared.  But wow, it felt so good to be back on TRAIL!  We had so many miles of roadwalking INTO Grants and then OUT as well.

The trail began with a stiff climb up to the top of the mesa, where once you get there, it’s totally flat.  We ate lunch in the shade of some small trees, right near the edge, with a great view.  Continuing on, the only hazard along the way (other than the usual rocks) was what we call “anklebiters”–short little cacti lurking right by the trail, waiting to stab you in the ankle with their spines if you’re not careful.  The anklebiters were hiding in the grass and plants on both sides of the trail.  Sometimes it was like running a gauntlet to get past them.

On the mountainsides across the way from the mesa we were on, we could see mines that looked like they were actually in use.  We wondered what they were mining?  There used to be uranium mines around here…are they still working some of them?

Our afternoon’s walk took us closer and closer to Mt. Taylor, till we reached the road that takes you to the top.  We’d already decided, though, to stick with the official CDT, which goes AROUND Mt. Taylor instead of up it.  So we stayed with the trail, looking forward to replenishing our water supply at a nice piped spring with a metal tank not too far away from the trail route.  When we reached the spring, though, we met with a HUGE disappointment.  There was the pipe all right, and the metal tank, but somebody had opened the valve at the bottom of the tank to let all the water drain out.  So no water.  None.   We growled and snarled and said, “I bet the BLM did this!”

But there was nothing else to do except start rationing our water we had left, to make it last 11 miles, till the next water possibility.  Fortunately, we had already started hydrating our dinner, so when we stopped late in the day to eat, we did have a good meal.  And even better, it was one of the freezedried dinners our daughter had given to us as a Christmas present, so that made it even more special.  I needed that encouragement–I was very concerned about our water situation.

We walked on, mostly in dry forest (but with one section where the trail went along the edge of a cliff, and there were awesome views!) and at 7:00 we started looking for a flat place to camp.  The trail took us down into a small canyon, and aha!  A flat place at the bottom!  That’s when we saw the little sign.  It said, “Spring”, with an arrow pointing down the canyon to the left.  It didn’t say how far, but we decided, “Fixit will go see if he can find the spring, while I (3rd Monty) will look for a good campsite.”  So Fixit headed off into the woods, while I started looking around for the best place to camp.  In the process of looking, I walked just a bit farther up the trail and discovered that it crossed a dirt road, and near the road in a little hollow, nestled in a bedraggled plastic bag, I found a quart bottle of WATER!  It had never been opened. I figured it might be all that was left of one of the Mumm’s water caches.  I was really thirsty, so I carefully drank about 1/3rd of it, figuring that Fixit needed more than I did, with scrambling down and up the canyon.   When I got back into the canyon, I didn’t have to wait too long before Fixit got back, very happy, because he had found the spring.  No more water worries!  He drank the 2/3 quart I’d found, then took all our water containers and headed back down, while I set up our camp in the best flat spot I could find.  Whew!

Now we are very comfortably cowboy camped, watching a gorgeous sunset overhead, and enjoying the quiet of the woods with just a breath of wind.  And we have plenty of water to last us awhile.

SUMMARY:  We had a great zero day today, and when we went for lunch to the Chinese buffet we joined a tableful of other thruhikers.  Of course they asked, “When did you start?”  and when we told them “April 30”, they rolled their eyes and said, “What did you do–RUN here??”  Well, we didn’t run, but we did keep walking a lot.  So what did our zero look like?  Sleep in, eat big breakfast, do laundry, pick up resupply box, lunch at the buffet, do the mending, load food bags, take a nap, finish the journal, eat dinner, go to bed.

DETAILS:  We seriously needed a zero today–we are so tired.  We’ve been pushing it a lot–maybe too much–and proof positive came at lunchtime today. We went to the Chinese buffet.  Buffet ANYTHING is going to be a thruhiker magnet, and this was no exception.  We walked in and were standing there looking around when we heard a call from one of the tables– “Are you CDT?  C’mon over and sit at the hiker table!”

So we joined 4 other CDT’ers and of course one of the first questions they asked was “When did you start?”  We told them “April 30”, and all their jaws dropped.  “Seriously?” they said.  “What’d you do–RUN?”  Turned out that all of them had started a week or more before we did.  But where we basically did a series of pit stops in town, they had done neros or even zeros.

Of course we all had fun telling trail tales….only I think for the CDT, it’s more like war stories.  Everyone has concluded that this trail is beyond tough:  it’s brutal.  But there in the Chinese restaurant, all our aches and stress faded as we laughed together and ate and ate and ate.

Since we didn’t do any miles today at all, I thought I’d do a little description of the anatomy of a zero day.  It goes something like this:

1. Slept in till 7:30.  At that point we were starving hungry and had to get up and go eat.
2. Went to Denny’s and had a Lumberjack Slam each.
3. Went shopping at Walmart to get another umbrella for Fixit (he lost his already)
4. Go back to motel and tackle laundry.  Begin by prewashing filthy socks in the wastebasket, then off to the laundry room, where I discovered they have no soap for sale.  Had to go to Walgreens for soap and come back.  Since I was only doing one load, that meant a lot of soap left over.  Oh well.
5. While laundry was going, went back to motel room and cleaned/reorganized my pack plus finished writing yesterday’s journal.
6. Went out front to sit on curb and wait for trail angel Carol Mumm to come along with our resupply box.  Was joined by fellow CDT’ers Half Mile (Yes!  THE Half Mile!! Great to meet him in person!) and Afloat.  Carol Mumm soon arrived and told us some hair raising and awful stories about how she and Hugo were being harassed and even threatened by the BLM for the “crime” of putting out water caches along the trail for the hikers.  Unbelievable!   Our tax dollars at work to make life miserable.  I guess the BLM guys south of Grants are nice, but to the north it’s another story.
7. Go to the Chinese buffet for lunch.  Hang out with the hikers and relax.
8. Fixit found a small towel lying by the road.  He wanted me to make a couple of even smaller towels out of it.  So I cut it in half and hemmed up 2 little towels.
9. Naptime.
10. Write down today’s journal.   Load food bags and packs.
11. Go to Denny’s for dinner.
12. Crash.

SUMMARY:  We woke up to a thick ground fog that made everything (including us and our gear) soaking wet and fringed with ice.  But oh, it was beautiful!  We packed up and walked out into what looked like a misty watercolor painting.  Gradually the fog cleared, and we went through “The Narrows” where menacing black lava reaches the foot of dramatic sandstone cliffs, including the famous “Ventana Arch.”  Many hikers do a trail that goes across the lava, but we skipped that (lava – very sore feet) and roadwalked into Grants, continually amazed at the rock formations.  We had some trail magic, too, from a tourist family and from a ranger, and reached the Grants Motel 6, ate dinner and collapsed.  Zero tomorrow!

DETAILS:  In the dim light of early morning, Fixit woke me up.  “Oh no!  Everything is soaking wet, and we’re in a tule fog!”  Sure enough–a look outside the tent showed ground fog so thick that we could barely even see the road.  Everything was soaking wet, and fringed with ice, both inside and outside.

But being a thruhiker has its benefits, and one of them is previous experiences.  So my response to Fixit was, “Oh boy!  Washington State again.”  We both remembered similar mornings on the PCT in Washington.  So we sighed and got dressed and packed up our wet stuff and headed out into a magical, misty, beautiful world.  It was like walking in an old watercolor painting, with the sunrise light making the fog sort of glow.  It was very cold (32 degrees).  At one point, I stopped in awe–there was a sort of rainbow in the fog clouds!  I’m afraid I started sounding like a broken record after awhile as we continued down the road, saying  “This is so BEAUTIFUL!” over and over again.

Soon we reached The Narrows, where dramatic, colorful sandstone cliffs meet up with menacing black lava.  The road squeezes between the lava and the cliffs, and it’s a good thing we were on a ROAD, not a trail, because we spent most of our time looking up and doing some variant of “oooh, aaaah” because of the awesome, gnarly, color-layered rock formations.  There was even a small natural arch right by the road that we could stand in.   We waited till things had warmed up a bit before stopping for breakfast at the Ventana Arch parking lot.  The Arch was really impressive, but unfortunately it was still in early morning shadow and I could not get a decent picture of it.   We found a great sun patch, sat down and leaned on the wooden fence  to soak up some rays and eat granola.

As we were eating, along came a whole family (mom, dad, kids), who had just walked the Arch access trail.  They were all wrapped up in blankets because it was so cold.  Seeing us, they stopped by to talk and had a lot of questions about our CDT adventures.  We’d noticed their car in the parking lot–a really old one that looked like it was on its last legs (or wheels).  The family went to their car, unwrapped themselves from the blankets, and climbed in, except for the youngest boy.  He came back over to us carrying two little bottles of Gatorade.  “We want you to have this,” he said.  “Good luck on your hike!”  We were awed.  Here was a family who obviously didn’t have much, and yet they were sharing what they had.  So we told him how grateful we were and how this would really help us hike better today, while he looked pleased and scurried back to the car.  After some difficulty, the car started (it sounded kind of rough) and the family drove away, waving to us.  We hardly felt worthy to drink that Gatorade.  But we could pray for the family, that they would make it safely to wherever they were going.

The roadwalk continued, with more spectacular cliffs on our right, and lava flow on the left, which included “islands” of colorful rocks.  We were pushing it a bit, hoping to make it all the way to Grants by tonight, when we met a group of 5 bicyclists all wearing matching shirts that said, “Flatlanders Riding the Divide.”  Turned out they have been RIDING the Divide from Canada to Mexico, doing 300 miles each year, and they were on their last leg of the trip, looking forward to finishing.  Wow!  We wished them all the best and congratulated them!

Many CDT hikers don’t walk the road as we were doing–they take a trail that goes across the lava field.  But we feel like we did our lifetime quota of lava-walking on the PCT in 2005 and 2010.  Lava walking = very sore feet.    So we stayed with the roadwalk instead.  And besides that, one benefit of the road is that we can really look at the awesome scenery instead of having to stare at the ground, constantly calculating where to put our next footstep.

By lunchtime, we had reached El Malpais BLM ranger station, where we planned to get water and eat.  But the driveway up to the station was closed.  No problem–we walked past the gate and went there anyway, because we wanted to do a “garage sale” to dry out all our wet stuff.  Sure enough, there was a picnic table and benches and lots of places to spread out our gear.  The rangers were there, and very friendly, but apologized that there was no water–in fact, they were working to fix a water main break, and that was why they were closed.  Some of the rangers were also working on making a firebreak around the station, anticipating the dry season ahead.  One of the rangers sat down and ate lunch with us.  He said the ground fog (we San Francisco Bay Area people call it a “tule fog”) was normal for this time of year, and made his drive to work every morning a bit of a challenge.  He also insisted on giving us a bunch of his own water, since none was available at the ranger station.  Once our stuff was all nice and dry, we headed out.  It was 1:30 pm, and we had 15 miles to go.  Do-able, but we’d have to walk fast.

We hadn’t gone far when to our surprise, we met Hippy Longstocking, hiking SOUTHbound.  We told her about the water situation at the ranger station, and she looked a bit grim, since she was counting on getting water there.  All we could do was wish her luck.  Soon we could see I-40 in the distance and trains going by over the pass.  Logically, I should have taken it easy more, but the sight of the highway and the trains, and all I could think was “FOOD!   SHOWER!   BED!” and began to go as fast as I could, even though I was very tired.  The last 6 miles were along a very busy highway with a narrow shoulder, so we were constantly having to detour into rough ground and weeds to get out of the way of cars.  At 6:00 pm, Fixit announced that he was hungry and wanted to stop and eat.  At that point, I could actually SEE way up ahead, the Motel 6 where we were planning to stay.  There was no cafe or place to eat along the road, so it would mean sitting down in the weeds and trash to eat something from our packs.

So I told Fixit, “I don’t want to stop.  Look!  There’s our motel, over there!  I’ll keep on hiking–I’m sure you will catch up with me, no problem!”  So that’s what we did.  Fixit stopped and detoured into the weeds, and I kept on going.  I was desperately tired.  In retrospect, I realize it would have been a good idea to at least stop and rest, but I was so determined to make it to Motel 6 ASAP, that I just kept on going, looking at the interesting features of the outskirts of Grants.  One place I passed was a car tire place surrounded by scary-looking razor wire and two even scarier-looking snarling dogs inside.  One of them would make a great “hound of the Baskervilles.”   There were small neighborhoods with little houses, and what I wondered about was why nobody seemed to have a garden, not even a fruit tree.  Most of the yards were just bare dirt, or maybe a bit of grass and a couple of bushes.  There were no flowers and no veges anywhere.  Trains were going by constantly, which was really great–I love trains!  And there were lots of cute wild bunny rabbits, which might explain why nobody has a garden??

Fixit caught up with me just before the turnoff to the Motel 6, which involved getting over the I-40 freeway and the railroad tracks.  The overpass was for cars only–no room for people on foot.  So all we could do was pray and then RUN as fast as we could.  Whew, we made it, and soon we were at the Motel 6 by 7:30 pm.  After a brief cleanup, and putting on our “town shirts”, we headed to Denny’s restaurant and ate till we were totally stuffed.  Showers followed, then we completely collapsed.  I felt like I never wanted to move again.  But before we went to sleep, Fixit read Psalm 107, which includes “They (Israel) wandered in the wilderness in a desolate way…hungry and thirsty, their soul fainted in them.  Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble, and He delivered them out of their distresses…and led them forth in the right way.”  Then verse 8 says, “Oh, that men would give thanks to the Lord for His goodness, for His wonderful works to the children of men.”  Yeah.  We know about that, for sure!  And we ARE grateful!  Like Joe Anderson at Casa de Luna on the PCT says, “It’s not just trail magic.  Give God the credit He deserves.”

SUMMARY:  We sure are grateful for our nice pine-needly campsite last night.  It rained and rained, so all the ground around us became a sea of mud…except where we were.  We spent all morning slipping and sliding along a very muddy road, with rain so cold that it actually snowed on us for awhile.  But by lunch time, the sun began peeking through, and we reached “El Malpais” lava fields, which meant walking a paved road.  Goodbye, mud!  But yikes!  Ahead of us lay some of the blackest clouds I have ever seen, with thunder rumbling.  But as we walked along, the blackness gradually disappeared and tonight our little blue tent is perched by Hwy 117 on a nice gravel area out of the mud (which is everywhere!)

DETAILS:  It rained for much of the night, and we made another new discovery about staying in a tent instead of under our usual tarp: in a tent, when it rains, condensation builds up INSIDE the tent and then when raindrops strike the OUTSIDE of the tent, it knocks the condensation droplets loose and pretty soon it’s “drizzling” inside the tent.  Yuck!  With a tarp, there was no condensation and the underside of the tarp (where we were) stayed dry.

Because it was still raining in the morning, we ate breakfast inside the tent (braving the condensation drips).  Fortunately it let up a bit when we had to crawl out and start packing up.    We sure are grateful for our nice pine-needly campsite!  All the ground around us had become a sea of mud except where we were.  We’ve heard stories about “New Mexico mud” and now we know firsthand what they’re talking about!   But I was worried about Fixit.  Last night we had some troubles with the tent, and he went out in the rain to FIX it, while wearing his down jacket.  The jacket ended up soaking wet, and is still wet, on a cold and rainy morning.  Not good.  Both of us kitted up with full raingear and walked off down the very muddy road in the pouring rain.

A few miles along and we reached the Thomas Ranch.  Our info said it was near an historic building along the road.  Last night we had seen such a building and hoped we’d reached the Ranch, but now we know that it’s the SECOND historic building that marks the ranch location. For about a mile before we reached the Ranch driveway, we were being escorted by a pair of dogs who cheerfully ran along next to us, being very friendly.  One was a pit bull and the other was a dark colored mutt.  They accompanied us right into the Thomas’ yard, then disappeared.  As far as we could tell, nobody was home, but since it was 7:00 am, maybe they just weren’t up yet.  There was a collection of trailers and campers in the yard which are available to hikers, but all we wanted at this point was water.  I filled up all our water containers from the faucet, with the rain still coming down.  Brrrrr, it was cold and getting colder.  My hands about froze.

Back to the muddy, slippery road we went, and continued our trek.  We discovered that usually the best place to walk was right in the center of the road–it’s a bit higher and less wet than the sides.  The air grew colder, a freezing wind was blowing, and soon the rain turned into big wet SNOWFLAKES that melted as soon as they hit the ground.  Then the snowflakes started to accumulate into a frosting of white on the mud.  I was seriously worried now about Fixit.  I was wearing all my layers (including down jacket) under my raingear and I was still a bit cold.  Fixit’s jacket was still wet.  I began to pray, “Please, Lord, for Fixit’s sake, please give us some sun.”

Finally the snow turned back into rain, and the rain began to slow down.  A pickup truck came along, with CHAINS on the tires so that it could travel in the mud.  Fixit said, “Aha!  That explains why the cattle guards on this road are so beat up!  It’s from people driving over them with chains on!”  A little while later, we crossed a county line, and the road instantly improved–it went from rutted muddy mess to a nice gravel surface.  The rain stopped and hooray–by lunchtime a bit of sun broke through!  We had been walking all morning with no snack break because it was too cold and wet, so being able to stop and eat in the sun (sitting on some grass, out of the mud) was wonderful, and we had plenty of water from the Thomas Ranch and from another cache later on near a windmill.

It didn’t take much longer before we reached Highway 117 at the edge of the huge Malpais lava flows and cheerfully began walking on nice clean, solid pavement.  So much better than mud!  But up ahead lay a wall of the blackest clouds I have ever seen, and we were headed straight for them.  They looked rather daunting, and we were also sobered by the fact that we have 38 more miles of this before we reach Grants.  But we faced the black clouds, determined to chew into as much of that 38 miles as we could, and by 6:00 pm, the clouds started to break up. Whew!  But now we were concerned about where/how we were to camp.  The highway was thoroughly fenced in with barbed wire and No Trespassing signs, and thick mud was everywhere.

But a short time later, we found a nice turnout by the highway, with a big gravel pile in it, and gravel all over the ground.  The wind was blowing, so we said, “Hey, let’s set up our tent here (no mud!) and let the wind blow on it till it dries out (it was still wet from last night) while we eat some dinner!”  So that’s what we did.  The tent dried  quickly, we took off our very muddy shoes, rolled out our sleeping bags, and now we are snug and dry, with a magnificent view of high cliffs right across the road and dramatic clouds behind them.  I ‘m glad the clouds have contented themselves with just LOOKING impressive–they are not dumping any more rain on us!

SUMMARY:  The weather was brewing for nasty right from early morning–dark clouds were moving in.  But we had a wonderful breakfast at the Pie-O-Neer Cafe and when we returned to the Toaster House, the wood stove was crackling and purring, hikers and bikers were organizing their stuff, and all was cozy and cheerful.  Once we were ready, we headed back to the Pie-O-Neer for lunch, and there were so blessed to meet a wonderful Christian family and have a great time with them.  Manuel, the dad, prayed for us, and as it turned out, we sure needed that–we ended up walking in steady rain most of the afternoon, with thunder and lightning nearby.  Then we found ourselves in SNOW, on top of MUD.  Tonight our tent is tucked under a tree, while the rain continues.

DETAILS:  We had a very comfortable night at the Toaster House and slept in till 7:00 am–time to head over to the Pie-O-Neer for breakfast. Brr, it was cold, and there were some seriously nasty-looking clouds moving in.  We had a great breakfast, and equally enjoyable conversation with a couple from Virginia, because at the Pie-O-Neer, you don’t sit at your own table–it’s set up more family-style, with long tables.  The Virginians were really fun–very feisty, outspokenly political conservatives.  “Where we come from, ” they said, “we take care of each other.  Nobody ever goes for a government handout.”  It also turned out that they work with Morgan horses, and we told them about the Morgan Horse Ranch out at Point Reyes National Seashore, where we often go to hike.  The Point Reyes Morgans are being trained as trail horses for rangers to ride.  We sang the praises of Morgans–they are smart, curious, and strong for their size. The Virginians told us some funny stories of the mischief their Morgans got into!  Turned out that the reason they came to Pie Town was that it’s on their “bucket list” of places to visit.  We were glad to have met them!

Stepping out of the Pie-O-Neer, we were into a very cold and very strong wind, so it was wonderful to get back to Toaster House and find the wood stove crackling and purring (thanks to Masshole) and coffee on. Hikers and bikers were making breakfast and organizing their stuff.  Everything was very comfortable and warm, in contrast to the weather outside.  I finished up my journal for yesterday, then Fixit headed to the post office to mail the journal, while I loaded up our food bags for the hike to Grants.  The rest of the hikers were getting ready to go see the “Very Large Array”, which is nearby.  Eventually Fixit got back and we hung out just a bit longer.  Masshole commented, “Looks like dirty weather brewing.”  But Canada was calling, so Fixit and I put our packs back on and headed for one last meal at the Pie-O-Neer.  There were black clouds just to the west, spitting lightning.  Not good.

Back at the Cafe, we ended up sitting by a very nice family–Manuel, Rosa, and their son.  They were very interested in what we were doing, hiking the CDT.  One thing led to another, and we discovered that they were also fellow Christians who know and love and follow the Lord.  After that, we had a wonderful time talking about all the evidence we’d seen along the trail for creation and then destruction (the great Flood in Noah’s time), and the many ways God had already taken care of us.  Before Manuel and the family left, Manuel said, “I want to pray for you guys.”  And he did, right there in the Cafe.  Then before we could stop him, he snatched up our check and took it along with his to the cash register to pay.  We were blown away.  “God bless and keep you,” he and Rosa said as they headed out.

It turned out we were really going to need Manuel’s prayers and blessing. At about 1:45, as we left the Pie-O-Neer, it began to sprinkle rain and the lightning was getting closer.  No problem, we had put on our raingear and I had my umbrella.  I didn’t like the lightning being so close, but oh well.  Less than an hour later, though, the sun came out and I thought, “Yeah, it’s just a passing thunderstorm.”  The clouds looked like they were breaking up, and there were patches of blue sky.  The sun felt good!

But it didn’t last.  The clouds reconsolidated, the rain returned, this time as real rain, not just sprinkles.  We could hear thunder all around us, though we couldn’t see any lightning.  The CDT here is a dirt road, and it was climbing slowly but steadily higher.  Soon we started seeing patches of snow that looked pretty fresh.  “Must have fallen last night,” I said to Fixit.  As the rain continued, the road became muddier and muddier, with more and more snow.  Since we were still quite full from all the good food at Pie Town, we decided to skip supper and just push on through to the Thomas Ranch, 15 miles from Pie Town, where hikers can spend the night under cover.  We figured we could get there by 7:00 if we hiked fast.  But what we didn’t factor in was the mud.  The rain continued, and the road had turned into one big slippery mudhole, which made for very slow going.  By 6:45, we realized we’d never make it to the Thomas’, and began to look for some way to camp.  The problem was, all the properties along the road had very fiercely-worded “No Trespassing or Else!” type signs.

The light was dimming, the rain continuing, all the ground soaking wet and muddy, when we finally spotted a road leading to a housing development.  Even better, there was a grove of small evergreen trees where the ground was covered with pine needles instead of mud.  We managed to pitch the tent up close to the trees for some protection from the rain, but it was still pretty tough.  Our ZPacks tent is not really the best thing in a rain.  The part of the tent where WE are is fine, but the vestibule is not.  I tried to rig my umbrella to cover the gap where rain was coming in, but it didn’t entirely work.  So the best we could do was drape our wet raingear here and there, crawl into our sleeping bags and say, “Goodbye, cruel world!  I’ll see you tomorrow.”  But even that didn’t work.  We realized we were awfully hungry.  So we sat up again and ate some supper in bed before finally lying down.  It’s very cold and maybe it will snow tonight.

But we have the blessing of Manuel’s prayer and the encouragement of knowing that God’s love and light are WAY more awesome than any dark clouds and rain.  We’ll see what happens tomorrow!

DETAILS:  We were up ‘n at’em early on a cold morning, thinking, “Get to Hwy 60, go to Pie Town!”  We still had no idea where we actually were, but took every dirt road that went north or nor’east.  Hours went by–no sign of the highway.  Our water was running low.  Then a gift from God–“Talus”, a bikerider, came pedalling along and told us, “Only 9 1/2 miles, and you’ll be in Pie Town, and by the way, there’s a water cache in 3 miles.”  Wow!  Tired, sore feet, too bad–we turned on the afterburners and made it in by 2 pm, dumped our packs at the “Toaster House” hostel, and got a good meal, showers, laundry and lots of hang-out time with other hikers, and locals, too, sharing trail tales.

DETAILS:  Last night I was wondering if we’d have any wild critters coming by in the night to get a drink from the cow tank, but the only critters we heard were several owls hooting to each other.  It was a cold night, though!  At 5:20, when we started to pack up, it was only 30 degrees.  Our ZPacks sleeping bags once again did a great job of keeping us warm–it was hard to leave them and head out into the cold.  Brrrrr.

We were in high spirits, thinking it would not be too much longer till we reached Hwy. 60 and started the roadwalk into Pie Town.  The northbound dirt road we were on took us among several cinder-cone-type little volcanoes that were dotted here and there below Mangas Mountain.

At every rise, and at the top of every hill, we looked eagerly for Hwy 60, but by 7:30 (breakfast time) there was still no sign of it.  It was still very cold, even in the sun, so we gobbled down our granola and kept going on a roller coaster route over low hills and shallow valleys.  Still no Hwy 60, and we began to be faintly concerned.  Our water was running low because we’d drunk a lot, assuming it wasn’t far to the highway.  We passed a herd of happy cows at another cow tank.  No way would we drink their water!  Gross stuff!  Up on the hill above the tank was a magnificent log house.  Seems like when we were south of the Gila, the “in” look for houses was “pueblo/adobe” and now we’ve reached “log cabin” country. The big house had a name, it turned out.  When we passed the driveway, there was a sign, “Robber’s Roost.”  Well, the robbers must have done very well for themselves.  What a house!

Now we were actually worried, though.  Where was Hwy 60?  We walked as fast as we could, taking every road that headed north or northeast, and having no idea where we were on our maps.  There was a big “table mountain” off to the side that gave us some idea, but we still weren’t sure.  Then way up ahead in the distance we saw a wonderful sight–a bike rider!  Coming toward us!  (Talk about a gift from God when I really needed it!)  When we met up, he stopped, and I said, “Hi! Hey, we’re trying to get to Pie Town….how much farther to the highway?”   He paused a second, looking at his bike computer, then turned and pointed back toward where he came.  With a big grin, he said, “Well, you guys have exactly 9.5 miles and you’ll be at Toaster House.”  We were shocked and amazed.  “Um, then how much farther is it to the highway?”  He said, “Oh, that’s beyond Toaster House.  Just follow this road and it will take you straight there.  And oh, by the way, there’s a water cache at the animal shelter  3 miles from here.”

It turned out that the biker’s trail name was Talus, and he’d just finished hiking the CDT as far Hwy 12.  Now he was switching to biking instead. He had a big “biker map” that showed the whole area, and he pointed out to us where we were.  Amazing!  Somehow we’d muddled our way along and lost the Bear Route, but ended up back on the Ley Route.  Not sure how that happened, but whatever!  Thank you, God, for Talus!  He came along just when we needed the encouragement.  Only 3 more miles to water, then 6 1/2 miles to Pie Town!

We decided to skip eating lunch and just hike, since we’d heard that the 2 restaurants in Pie Town were closed around 2:00.  (Turned out later that yes, one of them was; the other was open all day)  So even though we were very tired (we’d been pushing it all morning), we turned on the afterburners to reach the water cache.  It turned out to be a big cooler by the animal shelter gate, and the jugs of water inside were COLD!   Awesome!  There was also a note saying, “We’re glad to provide hikers with water, but don’t linger here.  We have a lot of dogs at the shelter, and we let them run loose.  If they see you here at the gate, they’ll follow you, and it will be a lot of work for us to bring them back.”  So we filled our water jugs up quickly and moved on.  Not till we were well out of sight down the road did we stop to mix up some Emergen-C and have a nice cold drink.

After that, we pushed on as hard as we could, hoping to reach Pie Town before 2:00.  And we did it!  Up ahead we saw the “landmark ” from Yogi’s town guide–a sign that said, “Speed Limit 15”.  Pie Town!  It didn’t take long to locate the Toaster House hostel (yes indeed, it really does have lots of toasters!)  Nobody was there, so we claimed a bedroom by putting our packs on the bed.  It was 1:45 pm.  We hurried to the Pie Town Cafe and ate a huge lunch of big sandwich, fries, and of course, PIE.  It wasn’t cheap, though.  We had a bit of sticker shock at the prices of everything.  Ack.  Good food, but ouch!  Not cheap.  The Cafe folks warned us that they are closed tomorrow (Tuesday) so we went across the highway (yes, FINALLY, Hwy 60!) to the Pie-O-Neer to find out what their hours were.  Great!  They are open all day!

We walked the couple of blocks back to Toaster House, enjoying the views.  Pie Town is up on a rise, so you can see for miles around.  The next item of business was to get clean.  But there was no hot water at Toaster House–the hot water heater was not working.  Fixit does not mind cold showers, but I do, so I took a towel from Toaster House and went next door to the RV Park for a nice HOT shower.  Man, it felt so awesome to be CLEAN again!  Laundry chores were next.  Our socks were so filthy that I took a large pot from the hostel kitchen and prewashed them before putting everything in the washing machine.  While the machine did its thing, I lay down on the couch, covered myself up with an afghan to stay warm, and read a fun book on homesteading, starting with how to cut trees down to get logs for your house.

Once things were washed, I took them out on the porch and hung them in every convenient spot I could find to dry, since there was no dryer.  So the porch rails, chairs, etc. were covered with our damp stuff.  Fortunately, though it was 5:00 already, it was warm, sunny and breezy, so no worries about things not getting dry.  By now, various interesting people were starting to arrive.  One was a guy who just likes to hang out with the hikers.  Another was a lady who was trying to catch the wild kittens living in the shed behind Toaster House.  Right now she is feeding them in hopes that they will come to trust her  and will let her pick them up.   Other CDT hikers (including Stummy and Masshole) and another biker drifted in and claimed their spots in the house.  I should say that Toaster House is really fun.  It’s funky and hippy and it’s like time warp back to when Fixit and I were in the “Jesus People” era of the 1960’s and early ’70’s and we lived in a “Christian house” where a bunch of us shared a house and provided hospitality to lots of other people every day.  At Toaster House, the final total was 7 of us spending the night.  The local guy who was visiting said that sometimes there are as many as 50!

I concocted something for supper by rummaging in the “pantry”, and we all hung out talking (everyone is an experienced long distance hiker/biker, so there were many stories to tell) and admiring Stummy’s cartoon drawings of their CDT adventures.  All of us agreed that on the PCT, we would wake up thinking, “All right!  Let’s see what will happen today!”  whereas on the CDT, it’s more like “Oh no…what will happen today?”  It was so good to be around people again and have fun talking.  We all also agreed that scenery-wise, New Mexico is wonderful, but the trail is another story!

By 8:00, people (including us) were heading for bed, and by 9:00 (known as “hiker midnight”) the house was totally quiet. Wow, it feels good to be on a BED again!   What a day!

SUMMARY:  One thing about the CDT–to get from Point A to Point B, you often have several choices of which way to go, and those choices can overlap.  Today we began on the “Ley Red Route” from Hwy 12 to Pie Town, but finished the day on a different route–the “Bear Survey”.  This change was accidental–the two routes came together for awhile, and we went with “Bear” even though we didn’t mean to.  This happened way up high on Mangas Mountain, with fantastic views for miles around, and lots of trees (aspens, too!) and wildflowers.  Tonight we are cowboy camping down at the base of Chavez Canyon.  Pie Town tomorrow!!

DETAILS:  It pitterpattered rain much of the night last night and this morning when we started hiking, the trail was covered with raindrop prints, while everything else was still dry as a bone.  At 6:45 am, when we reached Hwy. 12 (where you can hitch into Reserve, NM),  we found a little note/ad “We’ll come get you; Resupply; Rooms”  We were filthy dirty, tired, and hungry, but with Pie Town only 2 days away, we kept on going.

As we were hiking, I was trying hard not to worry about losing the trail again today. Man, do I miss the PCT!  It was such a friendly and welcoming trail that it soon felt like home.  The CDT is like a lurking enemy waiting to trip you up.  But I have learned one thing so far: if we stay with the Bear Creek Survey route, there’s a much better chance there will be rock cairns or blazes or something to show which way to go.  If you choose a Ley Red Route instead–all I can say is “Have fun!  Good luck–you’ll need it!”  The problem is, the Ley Red Routes are often much shorter or more sensible, so despite the difficulties, we often “go Ley” anyway.

After Hwy. 12, we arrived at a magnificent “CDT gateway”.  Very impressive! There were horse corrals, signs with maps, and nice trail.  The only problem was, we only wanted to do the official CDT for about .4 mile, and then switch to the Ley Red Route.  I was concerned about locating the point where we would make the switch, but when we got there, no problema!  Somebody had scratched in the dirt a very large “L R”, with an arrow pointing right.  (“LR” = Ley Route)  After so much time being lost, I watched the trail (well, forest service roads, really) and maps very closely.  It took us through a variety of forest and pastures.

The CDT here is giving us a great sampling of New Mexico ranchland.  There are cows & calves everywhere.  We’ve crossed lots of cattleguards, gone through all kinds of gates, crawled under barbed wire so many times that I’ve lost count, while at the same time we’ve been enjoying the incredible blue sky, white clouds, golden pastures, and wide variety of trees and wildflowers.  There is a distinct difference in the kind of trees, depending on your elevation. Again I wish we weren’t trying to beat the snow to reach Canada, because I would love to stop and just enjoy all this for awhile.

By noon, we’d reached a very nice campground, and we got to sit at a TABLE to eat!  But there was no water, and our water is pretty low.  If we severely ration, we might be able to make it to Pie Town.  Maybe. Our maps showed the possibility of a spring (named “Tio Vences Spring”) not too far from the campground, up a side road off the CDT.  When we got there, at first glance there was no sign of water.  But there was a barbed wire fence around some decrepit looking concrete boxes, worn out hoses and broken faucets.   Fixit crawled under the barbed wire to have a look, and came back very happy.  “Water!” he said.  “But it will be hard to get at.  I’ll have to rig some way to reach down into the box.”

So we took ALL our remaining water, added electrolytes and just blew it down.  Man, it was good to be able to drink our fill!  Then Fixit took some string and 2 trek poles and a water bottle and rigged them all together to reach the water.  While he was doing that, I set up our “AquaMira kitchen” to “cook” some AquaMira, ready to treat the water he was pulling out of the box. This is the system we’ve figured out in order to save a bit of time:  Fixit gets the water, while I set up the AquaMira in a collection of bottle caps.  It takes 5 minutes to “cook” AquaMira before putting it in the water.  We both took on 4 liters of water, which is the most we can COMFORTABLY carry.

At this point, we started the big climb up Mangas Mountain.  The views became more and more amazing, and soon we were up in what felt like “high mountain” air, with high mountain trees.  Even though it was mid-May, the aspens were barely even beginning to leaf out.  And it just felt more like “home” back in the Sierras of California.  I was really enjoying myself!  We have plenty of water now, it’s beautiful–what more could we want?  But up close to the top of the mountain, we lost our way again.  Sigh.  We thought we were following the Ley Red Route, but when the trail and the map started to disagree, we realized, “Oh no!  We’ve wandered off onto the Bear Route!”  Ley’s Route went east, and here we were going north instead.  (The direct reverse of the time we messed up at Sapillo Creek!)

We debated what to do, and since we’d come DOWN quite a ways, we decided it was not worth climbing all the way back up the mountain again, just to find Ley’s route.  So Bear it was.  Oh well, it means a road walk to Pie Town, but that’s OK.   (With Ley, we could have avoided the road walk).  We are both so dirty (all that crawling under fences) and so tired and so hungry, but we’ll make up for that at Pie Town tomorow!

Once we were down off the mountain, we stopped to camp at the base of Chavez Canyon, near a “cow tank” (artificial pond).  The water in the tank was totally disgusting.  So glad we didn’t have to get water there!  Today was a great example of the multiplicity of choices we hikers have on the CDT, but I do wish our Guthook was working so we’d be able to do a better job of choosing which way to go!

SUMMARY:  We had a glorious time this morning, hiking high up on the Divide, with awesome views in all directions.  For a time it was a forest fire zone, which meant a lot of climbing over fallen trees; that’s normal.  But around 11:00, with no warning, the really nice trail (well-marked with CDT signs) simply vanished.  We were low on water and not sure exactly where we were, because the battery ran out on the cell phone.  So we spent the whole rest of the day bushwhacking.  It was very tough and we were severely rationing our water.  Long story short,  we finally popped out of the woods, spotted a big house, got water from their garden hose (nobody was home) and found our way back to the CDT by 6:30 pm. Now it’s raining, but we got into our tent in time to stay dry.

DETAILS: We had a ridgetop campsite last night, but it wasn’t too cold, so this morning we weren’t dealing with ice & frost.  Nice!  Mornings are way more fun without ice! Off we went on VERY well-built trail with glorious views–the only hazard was we had a lot of blowdowns to climb over, since it was a forest fire zone.  Bummer about the fire, but it did make those great views possible–otherwise it would have been green tunnel hiking.

The fallen trees and fire debris were pretty bad, but the wildflowers were beautiful.  I was specially impressed by some tiny white flowered plants.  They looked so fragile, yet were doing fine in the midst of all that destruction.  We stopped for breakfast, and just as we were packing up, along came Double Magic.  He was very happy to see us and said he had not seen any other hikers in several days.  (He’s young and he’s fast.  We didn’t see him again, and heard that he was among the first to finish the CDT this year.  Way to go, Double Magic!!)

The really nice, well built trail continued for some time, and I was thinking “Whee, I’ll call this ‘Trail Day’ today.  Finally, trail all day, just like the PCT!”  At one point we met up with a whole group of cows, calves, and BURROS, who took one look at us and ran for it, ahead of us, along the trail.  It looked like we were herding them, so I started singing “The Old Chisholm Trail” just for fun.  Finally they ran off down the hill.  At one point, our nice new trail disappeared on a rocky ridge, but no problem–there were little pink flags to show us where to go, and soon the trail reappeared.

But at about 11:00 am, suddenly the trail just STOPPED.  Dead stop. There were a few cairns after that and a few blazes on trees, then nothing.  We hunted everywhere, and to add to the fun, we were low on water.  We tried to figure out where we were on our maps, but no luck there, and we couldn’t consult Guthook because the cellphone battery is done.  It’s only good for a few looks at Guthook, and we’d used it up.  Our biggest concern though, wasn’t just “Where is the trail?”  It was “Where can we find water?”  Fixit finally said, “Let’s just head down a wash–maybe there will be water at the bottom.”

So we turned our backs on the ridge and began to bushwhack down, with Fixit in the lead and me following.  It was very steep and very rough, and we both collected a lot of cuts and scratches. (I got one on my hand that took a long time to heal).  On and on we went, with no sign of water anywhere.  Fixit finally gave up and said, “Forget it–let’s just head north.  Eventually we’ll hit the Tularosa River, if we keep going.”  So that’s what we did, and a bit later we came to a sort of trail where people had been making burn piles.  I was very hopeful of finding proper trail of some sort soon, but then even the “burn pile trail” disappeared, and we were back to bushwhacking “north and a bit west”.  At this point, we were severely rationing our water and both Fixit and I were awfully thirsty.  Fortunately it was a relatively cool and cloudy day, or we would have been in big trouble. I could see that the clouds in the area were trying to rain, but it wasn’t making it to the ground.  Occasionally we stopped for a snack and a swallow of water, but we could not do a proper meal.

Finally we found a dirt road heading in more or less the direction we wanted to go, and started to follow it, till it came out of the forest at the edge of Big Dry Lake, which was on our maps!  I cheered!  FINALLY we knew where we were!  And even better, off on the other side of the dry lake, we could see a HOUSE–a big nice log house!  Water!  We left the road and walked toward it, so thirsty and so glad.  It was a magnificent 3 story high log and stone building.

At the house, there were no cars around and it looked like no one was home, but we wanted to first ask if it was OK to get some water, so I did climb the stairs and ring the doorbell.  Nobody answered.  We walked around the house till we found a garden hose, and yes!  The water was ON!  We mixed up some electrolytes and just drank and drank and drank, then filled our Platypus reservoirs.  A look at the maps showed that the CDT was not far away, so by 6:30 pm, we happily headed down the house driveway towards the main road.  That’s when we encountered a SERIOUS fence and big iron gate with a gatehouse and lots of “No Trespassing” signs aimed at the road.  Oops.  I guess we did trespass, but in the direction we came from, there were no signs.  The only way we could get to the road was to squiggle under a barbed wire fence, and it was a tight fit.  Good thing we aren’t big people!

A bit of walking down the road, and we were back on the CDT.   We were exhausted.  We stopped and made camp and ate some supper–freezedried refried beans and cheese, with Fritos.  It tasted really good, and after that, we just crashed.  Not long after we were in our sleeping bags, it did begin to rain, just a gentle pitterpatter on the tent.  I was megagrateful to God for 1) Cool weather when we were so low on water  2) Finding “the house” so we could get plenty of safe water.   We found out later from other hikers that everybody had a terrible time with this part of the trail.  Hope someday they at least get some more pink flags in to show which way to go!

SUMMARY: Our little blue tent stood bravely last night in the midst of miles of beautiful golden prairie with distant dark hills.  Coyotes howled around us, but we slept well and warm.  This morning while we were packing up our little “tent on the prairie”, an elk came and stood on a nearby ridge to watch us.  Amazing!  Elk are usually very shy.  We spent the rest of the day doing miles of roadwalks through prairie and forest.  Great views!  Dramatic clouds today.  Tonight we are back on trail, camped on a rocky ridge.  So now I guess we’re the “Little Tent on Rocky Ridge.”

DETAILS:  Our little blue tent stood bravely last night in the midst of miles of beautiful golden prairie with distant dark hills. It made me think of a book I loved when I was a kid–“Little House on the Prairie.”   Coyotes howled around us as I studied the maps to figure out where we missed the CDT turn yesterday and how to get back to the CDT. Finally we fell asleep, but we slept well and warm.

When we woke up this morning, brrrr!   There was frost INSIDE the tent as well as outside, but our shoes (tucked inside the tent) did not freeze, hooray.  As we were doing our final packup, we could hear coyotes howling again (Or were they those nasty Mexican wolves?  Who knows?) when an amazing thing happened–an ELK came and stood on a nearby ridge to watch us. Wow! Elk are usually very shy, and as one hunter we met on the PCT put it, “They have Romulan cloaking devices.”  You normally do NOT see them.

After about 15 minutes of walking, we reached a hilltop where I could look out over the terrain and pinpoint us on the map.  It didn’t take much longer, and we were back on track with the CDT, following a dirt road headed north.  Canada, here we come again!  And it was beautiful–mile after mile of prairie all golden in the early morning light.  Once it warmed up a little bit, we stopped and had some granola for breakfast and just soaked up the incredible views.  Coyotes were still howling all around us, but we never did see any of them.

After breakfast, we cheerfully resumed our NORTHward trek, noticing that there were an awful lot of elk tracks and scat on the trail.  Sure enough, we did catch one glimpse of an elk herd, but they spotted us and instantly disappeared.  We reached FR (Forest Road) 28 where it actually crosses the Divide itself, which was sort of a big deal, because we haven’t actually had much contact yet with the REAL Divide.    Then it was miles & miles along FR 28, which meant we got a lot of miles in, but it’s a bit hard on feet.

Water is scarce on this stretch of the CDT, and it was turning into a warm day with big puffy clouds.  We met some horse packers getting ready to head out, and they kindly gave us some water to supplement what we had.  At 11:00, as seems usual around here, the wind came up and really started to blow.  Again, I dared not try to cook at lunchtime with all that wind, so we settled for rehydrating our freezedried dinner by just adding water, putting it in an outside pocket of Fixit’s pack, and hiking on.  By suppertime it would be ready to eat.  In the meantime, we ate our “supper” food for lunch.

When we finally reached Cox Creek, we got out the AquaMira (cows were everywhere; we dared not drink that water without treating it!) and we took on FULL loads of water–heeeeeavy in the packs!  Now we were headed into the Tularosa Mountains, and the scenery changed again.  Today so far we’d had golden prairies, dry forests, and now we were into GREEN forests, and really climbing–when we got a view through the trees, we could see we were really up high.  And of course there were cows everywhere, happily eating the green grass.  There were plenty of cute calves, and very calm, too.  Instead of spooking and running away, the calves stood curiously to watch us pass by.

By suppertime, we were really up into the Tularosas, and looking forward to being back on CDT trail instead of dirt road.  And we were awfully tired–we did so many miles today (but I don’t know the exact figure, because there are no handy mileage charts like we had on the PCT).  This morning’s pretty, puffy clouds have turned dark gray, thicker and ominous.  We eyed them and wondered if they were planning any rain.  But the half hour break and a good meal were very reviving, and we felt energized to get in a few more miles before camping on a ridge at around 9,000 feet elevation.  We rigged the tent for possible rain, and turned in.  Wow, it feels good to be horizontal!  But it also feels good to know that we ARE on the CDT!  And I guess tonight we are the “Little Tent on Rocky Ridge.”

SUMMARY:  We tiptoed past the horse packer camp at 6:00 am, but the dogs spotted us and set up a ruckus!  Our goal was to hike down to the Middle Fork of the Gila River, then take an alternate route to Snow Lake.  But we decided to do one last dance with the Gila–it really is pretty there, and it was only 7 miles, so it was back to lots of river crossings, hunting for trail, crossing debris, and admiring the dramatic beauty of the canyon.  We reached Snow Lake, hung out for awhile with “Hippy Longstocking”, and headed out on the next leg of our adventure–a crosscountry (no official trail) run up a canyon and into the hills beyond.  But we missed a turn somehow and are camped tonight somewhere…not sure exactly.  Hopefully we’ll relocate the trail tomorrow!

DETAILS:  We did our best to tiptoe past the horse packer camp at 6:00am, but the dogs spotted us and set up a ruckus! Then we spotted a couple of the wrangler “students” already up, chopping wood and building a fire.  They gave us a wave, and we headed back to the trail.  Our goal was to hike down to the Middle Fork of the Gila River, take another trail up the other side of the canyon, then roadwalk to Snow Lake.

We’d stopped at the Gila to AquaMira some water, when along came 2 more guys who were part of the Prior Cabin group.  One of them was limping badly–turned out that he slipped on one of their Gila River crossings and really hurt his ankle. They stopped to talk, and told us about the route we were planning to take.  “It’s quite a climb up from here to the road,” they said.  “We know, because our car is parked up there.  And distance-wise, it’s the same as staying with the river.”  Fixit and I thought about it and decided, “The river route is flat–no big climb; it has water; it’s pretty.  Let’s do one last dance with the Gila.  It’s only 7 miles.”

So it was back to lots of river crossings, hunting for trail, crossing debris, and admiring the dramatic beauty of the canyon walls and the shimmering green shade of the trees.  Halfway or so along, we met another hiker, Hippy Longstocking, who was waiting for her boyfriend.  “Have you seen him?” she asked.  No, we hadn’t.  “Well, I stopped here to warn him about which way to go,” she cautioned.  “You have to be really careful.  Can you see the river there?”  We said we could, no problem, and pointed to it.  “That’s NOT the Gila,” she said.  “It’s Iron Creek.  The REAL Gila is sneaking off into those willows.  Lots of hikers get messed up here–they follow the creek instead of the river.”  Fixit and I inwardly groaned.  We knew from experience what that was like!  I thought to myself, “AGAIN God puts just the right person in our path to help us know where to go.  Thank you!”

We took care to CROSS Iron Creek, and follow the Gila as it went sneaking along, till finally we could see the Snow Creek Dam up ahead. When we reached the campground, we all (Hippy L. had caught up with us) more or less collapsed.  “Tired” does not even begin to describe how we felt.  Finally we recovered enough to load up on water for the next leg of the hike (no water for a long way).  Hippy was still waiting for her boyfriend, and worrying about whether he was OK.  But the delay was just what I needed, because I discovered we were missing a couple of key maps for the trail up ahead.  Hippy (like all the younger hikers) uses Guthook on her cellphone, but she did have paper maps as a backup, so I was able to take pictures of the maps we were missing.  Again, I do NOT think this was a coincidence.  Many younger hikers do not carry paper maps, but she did.  I said a silent, “Thank you, Lord, for sending Hippy to help us out AGAIN!”

Just then, her boyfriend finally arrived, and we discovered why he was so slow–he was loaded down with a huge pile of “hiker debris” he’d found lying along the trail.  He had an air mattress, a sleeping bag, a tent, and more.  Fixit and I had seen the stuff he picked up, but we walked by it.  We’d even stepped over a camera lying in a mudhole.  Amazing what the hikers have lost/abandoned.

But it was time to get going.  Up the road we walked, into a very different sort of country–rolling, grassy hills, hardly any trees, and no water.  By keeping a sharp eye out,  we found the CDT turnoff, only it turned out to be a route, not a trail, which followed a grassy canyon as it twisted and turned.  Because there was no trail, we missed a key turn, and found ourselves up in a vast rolling grassland with no clue or hint of where the CDT was, and the sun going down.  So we set up our tent (no cowboy camp after our experience of being “frozen” a few nights ago) and before I went to sleep, I studied the maps very carefully.  I think that maybe…just maybe…I know where we are now.  Will find out tomorrow!