SUMMARY:  As we dressed and packed up this morning, there was a gorgeous sunrise and a fierce wind.  We really had to be careful not to let any piece of gear blow away!  It was a cloudy and very warm morning even at 6 am.  We tackled the remaining 10 miles to Rawlins, still among hills where you could “track” distinctive layers of rock sticking out of the hillsides.  The smell of alkali dust and water is everywhere.  We cheered when we spotted I-80 and the railroad trains and Rawlins!  First stop was “Buck’s” for an early lunch–Stop ‘n Go joined us (he just arrived, too).  Then we hiked all the way through to the other side of town and the Day’s Inn, where our box was waiting.  Town chores were next, then a pasta dinner (need those carbs!) at Pizza Hut and now it’s bedtime.  Church, then back to the trail tomorrow!

DETAILS:  Just as we were starting to get dressed this morning and pack up our stuff, we were hit by quite a fierce wind, for about 15 minutes.  It pulled one of our tent stakes right out of the ground (fortunately, we were able to find it) and the whole tent was straining under the wind pressure.  We didn’t know how long this would last, so continued the packup, but with great care–we didn’t want any of our gear to blow away!

The sunRISE was just as glorious as the sunSET last night–it’s very cloudy still, and so warm that even as we started hiking, we didn’t need our jackets at all.  Suddenly the fierce wind dwindled down to just a breeze (from the west, as usual), and only a short time later, we reached a paved road which had mile markers, and a sign that said it was 10 miles to Rawlins.

Scenery-wise on the approach to Rawlins, it’s still hills, all layered with different kinds of rocks, and a number of the hills had a jagged row of rocks right on top that looked like teeth sticking out (or maybe a dinosaur backbone!).  The predominant color is the gray-green of the sagebrush, and the predominant smell is alkali.  Yuck.  The temperatures were very warm and even a bit humid; there was no shade at all when we stopped for breakfast by the side of the road.

At 11:00 am, we were walking into Rawlins itself; we had a bit of a puzzle at first, trying to find the pedestrian underpass to get from one side of the railroad to the other.  What a railroad it is!  Train after train went by, pulling very long strings of cars.  I stopped to read a sign (anyone who knows me is aware that I cannot resist an “info sign”!) and it said Rawlins has been a railroad town since 1868.  Besides the railroad, I-80 also goes through Rawlins.  This is very important to Fixit and I–we are from the San Francisco Bay Area, where I-80 is one of the main freeways, which we use quite often.  So seeing I-80 was like a “touch of home.”

I failed to write on my list of towns, which towns we sent boxes to the POST OFFICE and which towns we sent boxes to other places.  So just to be sure, we stopped at the Rawlins PO to see if we had a box.  No, we didn’t–but the PO guy said that this year has been the biggest year ever for CDT hiker boxes!  He said they had to put in some extra shelves to accommodate them all, and that right now they have scores of boxes waiting on hikers.  That was news to Fixit and I–it means that there are a lot of hikers behind us…or is it boxes for the SOBO’s??  We have only met one SOBO so far, and that was because he skipped Wyoming.

It was lunchtime, though, and Yogi’s guide recommended Buck’s.  What a great place!  We had just gotten our food when Stop n’ Go came in, so we started a “hiker table” and had a great time talking to him.  He’s also from the San Francisco area, and was just as happy as us to see I-80.  He does not plan to spend the night here–just get his box and continue on.

Fixit and I then headed through town towards the Day’s Inn, and along the way we passed a Subway, where there was a Korean CDT hiker sitting out front, waiting for Slapshot.  We have not seen Slapshot at all, for quite awhile, but it always seems like people are looking for him, so I guess he’s around here somewhere??  At the Day’s Inn, the people are supernice; they had our box and they have a special rate for hikers.  The only bummer, as I checked the calendar, is that thanks to Colorado, and thanks to being lost so much, we are now 10 days behind schedule.  Oh well–we will do the best we can.  We took showers and did laundry–it feels so good to be clean!   We also talked about going to church tomorrow.  If we do that, I will have no time tomorrow morning to go grocery shopping for the next leg of trail.  So I had to do it this afternoon even though I was very tired and just wanted to lie down and rest.

Back at Day’s Inn again, I sorted all the food and loaded the food bags before lying down to study the maps, especially about where the water sources are in the Great Divide Desert that lies ahead of us.  There is one stretch of 30 miles with no water, but fortunately, we won’t get to that until we’ve “eaten down” a lot of our food, and the packs won’t be as heavy.   We headed to Pizza Hut for a pasta dinner, and found a whole troop of Boy Scouts there, headed for a camping trip in Colorado; we had fun talking to their leaders.  Fixit is also thinking about an additional activity for tomorrow–going to see the Wyoming “Frontier Prison”, which is now a museum.  It used to be the prison for all of Wyoming.  Since he is a volunteer at the San Quentin prison back home, he is very much interested in seeing what the Wyoming prison is like (or maybe I should say, WAS like).

Right now, lying on a bed feels so good!   We are so tired!