Week 6: Of Mountains and Bulls

Cuba to Chama

June 2 – June 10

150 miles

Warning: this is a long blog post as it includes 2 zero days, 7 hiking days and a lot of my endless waffle. You may require coffee (wine) and a more suitable seating arrangement.

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After filling my fat dumpy self with salad and beer, we waddled, full to the brim and crippled A MILE back to the motel. Need I remind you that non trail miles are stupid miles. Yes, I need.

Coma.

22.5 miles on the day.

Day 31 : Zero 4#

Our fourth zero was the first one which felt incredibly necessary. That if we didn’t take at least a day, we may incur an injury. My feet throbbed throughout the night and sleeping in a bed now makes me restless.

Poor me.

The following morning we set out to perform town chores. Splitting the tasks seemed sensible. Deciding where I would be better placed was the first task.

Resupplying risks the possibility that it takes me 5 hours and I come back with all manner of items we never knew we needed. Or should I do laundry? Where I’m known to shrink, bake, colour, ruin clothes, and wash electricals.

The compromise was that Snake Legs dropped me at the laundromat (the best laundromat ever) put the washing on and left me to guard it, while she went shopping.

I successfully managed to transfer from washer to drier while only forgetting one arbitrary sock. Well done me.

She stuck a cartoon on the TV before she left me

She picked me up and we went for breakfast at the Cuban Cafe, if you ever find yourslef here, which you absolutely never will, I can highly recommend this trucker cafe.

My trail name is now Bambi. It’s a little known fact that your trail name is only officially cemented after 2.45 months on trail, and up until that point can be changed without incurring any fees, as long as all the correct paperwork has been submitted.

When I set off from being sat down for too long I look like a baby faun, walking for the first time.

We headed back to the motel.

Generally hikers stay in the same motel and the place becomes fairly communal with everyone wandering in and out of each others open rooms.

On this occasion, much to the initial dismay of the owner, Flora, let Snake Legs know we weren’t allowed ‘honies’ on our room. Snakes quickly explained that these were our friends, also staying at the motel, and not random men off the street. This time our room seemed to be the party room.

I called my Mum. I love my Mum, she’s just great.

Knock Off (Flip Flop) went for beer and when he returned, all hell broke lose. I drank far too many, unaware they were 6.2%. Luckily I was already lying down. We all went for dinner, I didn’t need to eat, I wasn’t hungry, but I was drunk. I made no bones about how lovey I thought the 18 year old waiter was, fresh out of high school. I’d had three pints.

Day 31: Zero 5#

Snakes and I were in fierce agreement that we needed another zero. I was mildly hungover and that’s not a good position to hike from. I was also concerned that my herpes might be back, or, not over, and so wanted to go to the pharmacy for more drugs and today was Sunday. Oh well, we’ll have to stay put.

We dragged are sorry asses back to the café for breakfast. Noodle, Taz Baz (From essex but living in Tazmania) and Knock Off were unable to join us as they were all still congealing within themselves after last night.

We ate with Pooch, Dutch, Ranger and Quill who sneakily snuck into town yesterday.

Breakfast burrito, the food to cure all.

Back to the motel for some serious lazing about. This was quickly disturbed by our still drunk pals re-positioning themselves back in the exact spot in our room they’d been in last night and polishing off their beers.

They hiked out and Snakes and I went for fresh food for the next stretch.

It’s only 55 miles ish to Ghost ranch so bagels, avocado’s and tomatoes are in the bag.

Maps and Cliff returned from their day jaunt in Santa Fe, bearing gifts. Maps had offered to get us anything we might need as she was at REI (REI is like Cotswolds or Go Outdoors, except that it has things that aren’t totally shit).

I got a silky pillow by cocoon. 40g. Snakes has had one from the off and it’s too good. I’ve been sleeping on my clothes and it’s no match.

We joined freshly arrived hikers, Snapper, Red Wing, and 6-Meals with Pooch in their room.

It’s pretty much the first year of university for us right now. Not that I went.

Dylan was cremated today. This was a very hard thing to comprehend. I imagined his beautiful body melting away and it hurt like nothing else.

Distractions were welcome, and easily found.

We headed back to our room to complete the resetting chores, bag packing and ablutions.

I ate a smashing subway sandwich and we watched a back to back Jurassic Park 2 and 3.

We’re really good at zero days.

Day 32: The shit storm

We left swiftly, but at 8:00am, late for us as I wanted to leave via the medical clinic as I heard they had a pharmacy.

My herpes was clearing, but not over, it was still painful and itchy and I wanted to carry the second prescription in just in case.

On arrival we discovered that because it wasn’t a retail pharmacy, I had to have a full-on appointment with a doctor.

She had no appointments until 1:00pm, except for, maybe an 8:30am, as the guy usually doesn’t show up.

Given that we’d already waited for the clinic to open, 30 minutes seems reasonable.

It was 10:00am before we left that building.

I ended up getting the 8:30 appointment but had to fill out loads of forms, visit a nurse (who I thought was a doctor) to get weighed in one room, my temperature and heart rate checked in another room, and all the details of my (already diagnosed) shingles in another.

After this she left me waiting for 20 minutes in a creepy poky room, for what I though was to be called for my prescription. After 20 minutes and 14 seconds I escaped to the pharmacy to be told “it can take a few moments”. I sat, waiting on the bench opposite, glaring.

Eventually the nurse came hurtling round the corner, as if she’d lost something. Which she had, me.

Upon finding the escapee, she said:”have you been seen by the provider?

I said:”I have no idea what that means”.

It means doctor, and no I hadn’t been seen my yet another medical professional. Jeeez.

So I was marched back to the room and told to await the doctor who was lovely but INCREDIBLY slow.

I was pretty certain Snake Legs would be asleep in reception by now. Or have left without me.

The doctor asked to see my shingles, after I’d explained I’d already been diagnosed and just need a refill on my prescription. I let her look, “yep, that’s shingles” she said. I thanked her kindly for the re-diagnosis and asked if we could hurry things along.

This prompted many trail related questions. Unfortunate, as she was unable to type and talk so this chat slowed things down further.

Eventually I got the pharmacy where some creepy pharmacist was creeping all over me before I snatched the drugs and left.

All in all extremely successful.

In the meantime, Snake Legs had made friends with a entire family of Native Americans and was fully aware I’d all their ailments and conditions. So not all bad.

We ran out the door and made our way back to the trail, in our rush we totally forgot to get lured in to the gas station for sugary treats.

It was hotter than the sun and the first 9 miles was road walking, uphill. Literally my favourite thing ever.

God, why I am even on this stupid trail – OH AN ELK!!

Elk are seriously majestic and cool.

Anyway, because this was a two day stretch to Ghost Ranch to pick up resupply boxes, our packs were initially lighter and emptier, because of this extra space, we put more food in. Good logic hey?

After a late start and a crappy 9 miles, before a big climb up to 3,500m we rewarded ourselves with bagels, avocado’s, cheese, hot sauce, lettuce, tomatoes. Two of the beasts. Totally unearned. Amazing.

Full, uncomfortable and lethargic, we began the climb. It was stunning.

Snake Legs immediately entered the death zone once again. (I’m extremely nice and helpful in this situation, making fun of her in hindsight is totally acceptable).

Pretty much K2 summit

The climb was long. And involved snow and wet boggy patches. We made every effort to keep our feet dry, for two miles, which probably slowed us down a lot. After we completed the climb everything became even more beautiful and even more snowy and even more wet.

We had to cross a bridgeless river. Glad we wasted all that time trying to keep dry feet.

For the next two miles or so we were wading through waterlogged meadows on a trail which was increasingly hard to navigate. But, stunning.

Snakes feet were becoming increasingly numb until a major breakdown, which coincided nicely with me postholing through the snow, up to my hip, and tearing a few small shreds of skin off my leg. While my leg began to gush red tears and Snakes struggled to move her frost bitten hoofs up the steep snowy incline, I tried to navigate through thick, impossible, trail-less woodland.

More ice water, more snow.

Eventually I demanded we stopped and unveiled Snakes’ frozen stumps. Then warmed them with my bear paws. We cooked up a litre of yellow for dinner.

We set up camp worried we might die at almost 3,200m in snow. It was one of our warmest nights.

15 miles on the day.

Day 33: Decending

My clever idea of laying our soaked socks, inner soles and gaiters out under our sleeping pad overnight to be dried by our body warmth was totally ineffective.

On went the wet gear. Shelley made the mistake of putting dry socks on, into wet shoes and immediately into snow they went.

Moods were brighter today and we made a swift 7 miles descending down the mountain to breakfast by the spring. It was both super, and duper hot today.

We undulated through beauty.

We had another smaller climb in the latter part of the day as winds picked up and it began to rain.

We’d been yoyoing a hiker, Redwing who walks faster than us, but stops to smoke every hour.

I found a magnificent shortcut which saved us 100m of ascent (unless there is a summit on route, avoiding ascent makes you extremely clever and cool).

We stopped at 22.8 and realised we were still 16 miles from Ghost Ranch and the infamous buffet. We needed to be there for the lunch buffet at 12 as we would then have a full hour to eat all we wanted for $12. We pushed on another 5 miles to camp, leaving a reasonable 11 miles the following morning.

Along the way Snakes stopped behind me, then called me over, as if to show me something adorable she’d found in the bushes. I walked back over to her, to find her cooing over a rattle snake up on its belly, literally shouting in her face for her to f*+k off.

Knowing these things could jump one and a half times their body length, and seeing that it was a baby snake (more dangerous that bigger adults as they haven’t learned to control the venom they inject, so just give you it all) I dragged the enamoured gal away quick smart.

I then called her a moron. Which she seemed to agree with.

27.8 miles on the day.

Day 34: Ghost Ranch

An early start saw us marching up the dirt road at 6:00am. I was pretty exhausted and my nearly empty (of food) pack felt unfairly heavy. The trail turned a sharp right and went cross country for the next few miles with no apparent trail to follow.

Keen not to fill up too much before the all you can eat buffet, we had coffee and a half breakfast before plodding on through more unknown-ness, following the line on the map as best we could without trespassing, which I’m pretty sure Americans can lynch you for.

Before 10:00am we reached the ranch. The weirdest place I may have been, ever.

Seemingly bustling with people, from, where the hell? All moving with some kind of purpose but, what the hell?

We purchased our meal tickets from the grumpy 19 year old server and asked if we could pick up our mail. Snake Legs received a new pair of socks from Darn Tough (amazing customer service on their lifetime warranty) we picked up our box of food for the next 5 days , shipped from Pie Town and an anonymous package too, with fairly illegible writing, it must be Jaqui Betts….

We were informed by the grump that showers were $10 each (EACH!) luckily we’d already been informed by our pal Maps, that you can just walk in and no one would know.

Camping was $36.

$36 to sleep in my own house.

Needless to say: Nope.

Grump couldn’t change my dollars to quarters so said I would have to do it at the ‘Trading Post’….. I left a silent pause to allow her to let me know where the hell this was.

Nothing.

Maybe I looked like a regular.

Equipped with change we walked around old sheds and shacks for longer than we’d have liked, trying to move in the vague direction of the sign which said ‘camping’ as this was where laundry and showers were. Conscious we had one hour before the buffet, 5 days later, we arrived at the ‘bathhouse’.

We performed our ablutions, for free, I might add.

Then we went for the buffet. It would be modest of me to say I only had one helping, but when I tell you the ‘basket ‘ we ate out of was the size of my first car and that I put three portions inside it, you won’t think me so reserved. Not that you did anyway.

Who the hell are these people and why are they here? Redwing is far right.

Jacqui’s parcel came next. By jolly. Sweets, chocolate, power balls, PURFUME! Soaps and creams, all in mighty small containers. Jac-boy you’ve excelled yourself. Thank you!

After coffee and cake I waddled to the reception. after a few emails and some sorting of some things we set sail for Colorado, where these next 5 days will end. A big climb awaited, but, a big beautiful canyon-y red rock type climb, so that’s acceptable climbing.

5 days of food and 2.5 litres felt so good on my now skeletal (not quite) shoulders.

We made our 5 mile aim in no time, so pushed on 2 more.

Memories of Dylan were flooding through me today, I welcomed thoughts that hurt. Mostly today, I remembered the friendship throughout our childhood. We shared all our hobbies he and I, our friends too. It shocks me like a loud noise in the quiet, constantly. I just don’t believe it.

We experimentally tried rice for dinner. It was everything we wanted and more.

Whence trying to sleep, we were roused by aggressive grunting sounds.

Eventually I popped my head out to see a pretty gross and dribbly looking bull staring at us about 30 metres away. I popped out the tent. He continued to shout, and started to kick up dust with his front hoofs. A short charge toward us. At this I calmly suggested Snakes remover herself from her tent cavern and join me in the pursuit of escaping the bull. Luckily there was a sturdy metal corral next to us, which we promptly climbed to be put of harms way.

The bull passed us, shouting and dribbling. I thought maybe he wanted water. I’m fairly sure he in fact wanted a good lady cow to see to him.

Eventually he passed back and left, giving us a good stare, perhaps making sure we weren’t in fact lady cows. (Cows are ladies always right? So saying lady cow is like saying lady lady….) anyway, we climbed back into the tent rather startled and listened to him roar on for a good hour.

Lessen learned, don’t camp near cow toughs.

Is this just a horny bull?

18 miles on the day.

Day 35: Big gains

Today began with a mixture good and bad feelings.

I momentarily misplaced the trail as it seems to be half rerouted (why oh why would you half reroute?!) we began on dirt roads gently climbing and began at a stonking pace.

This didn’t last long as the terrain began to beat us down. We stopped in a beautiful meadow for breakfast, earlier than usual. We drank coffees delivered to us by Jacqui. Hoorah!

Onward and upward through beautiful gently climbing meadows higher and higher.

I tried to hide from Snakes that we were ‘at altitude’ to test how much of her past experienced made her affects psychological. Almost bang on 3,000m she asked how high we were because she couldn’t breathe. Turns out she’s not faking it guys.

We sat and ate lunch just below (South) of an extremely melodramatic thunder storm. It missed us only just and we were merely left with a short but brutal thunderstorm. Thank goodness for the umbrella. No, not goodness, thanks Katie and Sophie!

Rain came and went between burst of sun, as we continued to climb. Snow returned but was thankfully less annoying and damaging than before. Then we came upon a raging mother of a river. I immediately jumped into total assessment mode, walking up and down the river looking for a less death inducing crossing point. Meanwhile Snakes pulled out her sleeping pad and lay on it.

Satisfied that the only chance we had of crossing was in fact the ridiculously perilous and shambolic attempt at a log crossing I began to test it out.

If there is one thing I want less than me drowning today, its Snakes drowning, ever.

After a clear pack-less practice run, I came back, took my pack over, returned for her pack then fully briefed her on what she should and should not do while she looked at me as if this river was a log flume at Centre Parcs and I was a total loser.

We both crossed together without injury, but our feet were now frozen. We made it one more mile before another wet stream crossing and decided we were no longer having fun, therefore sitting down and eating must commence, followed by 10 hours of sleep.

We found a pretty dry patch in amongst the boggy, snowy, torrent mud-land that was the trail, and slept once more at 3,500m

20 miles on the day.

Day 36: Reynards

We made it a half mile before Snakes feet were frozen solid. We’d crossed bog and snow and it was stunning, but tough going and slow.

We stopped as soon as the sun came out and changed her socks and made coffee. 1 mile in.

Almost back to normal we undulated through snow covered valleys and woodland. Eventually descending past the snow. I found a handy short cut, which took us to a beautiful meadow water and green grass abundant.

We lay out our wet tent and gear and had breakfast.

Our tent is as light as it is because it’s a single wall tent unlike the usual inner and outer set up. This means a level of condensation occurs when near water, in depressions, by snow or when breathing. i.e. always. Its not quite big enough for us not to touch the sides when sleeping, resulting in wet sleeping bags. Down becomes useless when wet. We need another tent. Shucks.

Drying gear at breakfast

The trail descended rapidly and we made up for the lost time in the morning.

We pushed to 14 for lunch and saw an older lady passing with a tiny sack and ‘day clothes’. I greeted her and asked where she’d come from. She said she was just wandering around as she was on a silent retreat. Snakes laughed at her and the ridiculousness of what she’d just said. Her excuse for conversing with us was that it was “the last day”(of 4).

We made it a tough 8 more miles to a campground. I was particularly excited that we push to get there for the bins. I love a bin. When we arrived all the water was off, so we dropped down to a fishing lake to get some from there. We ate dinner in a small shelter and decided to push on a little more to reduce the miles on our last day.

24.2 miles on the day.

37: Snow and beer magic

We began, early as usual, feeling pretty good. After a swift 2 miles on boggy terrain gently ascending we saw two familiar packs, bobbing up and down as the owners made upward miles. It was Maps and Cliff Jumper. A joyous sight to be sure.

We had much to chat about, so the next 12 or so miles went by in no time.

We stopped for lunch at a magnificent view of the snowy valley below.

Gross

We yoyo’d one another for the remainder of the day. Snakes and I were aiming for 25 miles to make tomorrow’s last day to town shorter.

We met again for a break at 20 miles and lay off the dirt road talking of all the things we’d like to eat but can’t.

Three snow buggies stopped by us. A group of chaps from Texas out fly fishing avoiding the heat at home.

Every American seems to drive about with a cooler of drinks, whether in a snow buggie or otherwise. When beer was offered we gladly accepted, even if it was the worst beer in the world, this made little difference.

With our bellies full of gas, we chugged up the hill. Eventually passing the snow buggies, now stuck, in snow.

A slow climb through soft bastard snow to a windy ridge with some mighty fine views.

It was extremely tough going. We had to get off the snow to avoid freezing overnight. We made our way down, an initially steep then gentle descent, full of melting snow. Often we’d hedge our bets crossing snow bridges over rivers, and fall in. Finishing the day with cold wet feet is on the short list of horrible things I hate a lot.

Eventually we found a flat (enough) spot in between snow patches. We ate dinner as a 4, talking big about our big town plans.

Cliff wants pasta, Maps wants a clinic for her swollen ankle, Snakes wants crisp white wine and I require beer and salad.

I now have a gammy, possibly infected leg wound, which Cliff kindly helped me dress with some antibiotic cream and a gauze she sensibly carries.

We have a shopping list and it does include updating our med kit. We currently have gaffa tape, a needle and one small crumpled plaster. I know, extensive.

26 miles on the day.

Day 38: Colorado

Snakes and I woke at 5:30, we figured we may as well leave while the snow is crunchy as we knew at least 10 miles of this 15 mile day was snow covered. Putting on frozen shoes, with laces frozen upright like snakes, had to be funny, otherwise it would be something much worse.

Frozen shoes brightening my morning

We initially made good miles over patches of hard snow.

My feet were almost instantly wet again. Things slowed when the trail became harder to follow and the snow softening with that big ball of helium and hydrogen getting itself all hot and bothered.

Pretty much no idea where I’m going

We descended to a few fairly horrific river crossings, breaking through ice as we stepped in, then began our climb.We stopped in probably the most stunning spot for a breakfast at the top.Onward and now mostly downhill.

We took an old logging road and then another clever shortcut down a steep snowy slope.

Tired and totally over snow and postholing we stumbled upon the border of Colorado and New Mexico.

While eating lunch, Flip Flop appeared from the snow, we thought he was a day ahead of us. No doubt he slowed down because he misses us.

It was a joyous moment.

3 miles on to Cumbress Pass where its apparently difficult to get a hitch into Chama.

We bolted down the snowy slopes, and pretty much fell into Della’s 4×4 at the pass. A hitch within 30 seconds.

Unfortunately Della was 112 and liked to drive without her hands on the steering wheel.

8 miles and we’ll be in Chama for a much needed rest.

That or Della will drive us all off a mountain to our deaths.

Colorado awaits….