{"id":905,"date":"2016-07-16T15:01:28","date_gmt":"2016-07-16T15:01:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/?p=905"},"modified":"2017-05-06T14:15:41","modified_gmt":"2017-05-06T14:15:41","slug":"saturday-july-16-on-into-rawlins","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/2016\/07\/16\/saturday-july-16-on-into-rawlins\/","title":{"rendered":"Saturday, July 16 On Into RAWLINS"},"content":{"rendered":"

SUMMARY:\u00a0 <\/strong>As we dressed and packed up this morning, there was a gorgeous sunrise and a fierce wind.\u00a0 We really had to be careful not to let any piece of gear blow away!\u00a0 It was a cloudy and very warm morning even at 6 am.\u00a0 We tackled the remaining 10 miles to Rawlins, still among hills where you could “track” distinctive layers of rock sticking out of the hillsides.\u00a0 The smell of alkali dust and water is everywhere.\u00a0 We cheered when we spotted I-80 and the railroad trains and Rawlins!\u00a0 First stop was “Buck’s” for an early lunch–Stop ‘n Go joined us (he just arrived, too).\u00a0 Then we hiked all the way through to the other side of town and the Day’s Inn, where our box was waiting.\u00a0 Town chores were next, then a pasta dinner (need those carbs!) at Pizza Hut and now it’s bedtime.\u00a0 Church, then back to the trail tomorrow!<\/p>\n

DETAILS:<\/strong>\u00a0 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.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 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!<\/p>\n

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.\u00a0 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.<\/p>\n

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!).\u00a0 The predominant color is the gray-green of the sagebrush, and the predominant smell is alkali.\u00a0 Yuck.\u00a0 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.<\/p>\n

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.\u00a0 What a railroad it is!\u00a0 Train after train went by, pulling very long strings of cars.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 Besides the railroad, I-80 also goes through Rawlins.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 So seeing I-80 was like a “touch of home.”<\/p>\n

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.\u00a0 So just to be sure, we stopped at the Rawlins PO to see if we had a box.\u00a0 No, we didn’t–but the PO guy said that this year has been the biggest year ever for CDT hiker boxes!\u00a0 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.\u00a0 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??\u00a0 We have only met one SOBO so far, and that was because he skipped Wyoming.<\/p>\n

It was lunchtime, though, and Yogi’s guide recommended Buck’s.\u00a0 What a great place!\u00a0 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.\u00a0 He’s also from the San Francisco area, and was just as happy as us to see I-80.\u00a0 He does not plan to spend the night here–just get his box and continue on.<\/p>\n

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.\u00a0 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??\u00a0 At the Day’s Inn, the people are supernice; they had our box and they have a special rate for hikers.\u00a0 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.\u00a0 Oh well–we will do the best we can.\u00a0 We took showers and did laundry–it feels so good to be clean!\u00a0\u00a0 We also talked about going to church tomorrow.\u00a0 If we do that, I will have no time tomorrow morning to go grocery shopping for the next leg of trail.\u00a0 So I had to do it this afternoon even though I was very tired and just wanted to lie down and rest.<\/p>\n

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.\u00a0 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.\u00a0\u00a0 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.\u00a0 Fixit is also thinking about an additional activity for tomorrow–going to see the Wyoming “Frontier Prison”, which is now a museum.\u00a0 It used to be the prison for all of Wyoming.\u00a0 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).<\/p>\n

Right now, lying on a bed feels so good!\u00a0\u00a0 We are so tired!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SUMMARY:\u00a0 As we dressed and packed up this morning, there was a gorgeous sunrise and a fierce wind.\u00a0 We really had to be careful not to let any piece of gear blow away!\u00a0 It was a cloudy and very warm morning even at 6 am.\u00a0 We tackled the remaining 10 miles to Rawlins, still among […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wyoming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=905"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":910,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/905\/revisions\/910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montybillpct.net\/blog2016\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}