Well we are off to a great start, the dogs are still alive, we are still married (hahaha), and we plan to keep moving forward toward Durango. The stretch from Denver to Breckenridge was kind of surreal and eight days, looking back seemed to fly by. However on days 2 and 3 I was living in my own personal Hades, but we will get to that in just a minute. Let's start from the beginning...
Day one of our hike was amazing, we were riding the high from the party the night before. All of the positive vibes and well wishes we received really fueled us that first day. I had zero apprehensions on day one, which if you know me seems a little odd, but it was true, I was feeling amazing! We trekked 11 miles that day, cutting ourselves off a few miles short of our goal just because this campsite we found was so beautiful, perched right on a high rock outcropping looking down onto the South Platte burn area. We camped there knowing we’d push early the next morning to the South Platte where the next segment would begin, a long grueling day, 12 or so miles across the burn area. This was our first mistake, we should have pushed down to the end of the first segment that night when we were still feeling good. By the time we got water, had breakfast, and packed our bags that morning even after hiking down to the water early, we didn’t get on the trail until almost 9am, this was mistake number 2 heading into the burn section. Hours and hours later I found myself severely dehydrated, throwing up, heat rash covering my entire body and nowhere close to our end goal for the day. By that night I couldn’t keep food down or the water I was trying to drink, and though we did continue hiking as far as we could that day, due to my condition we didn’t make it anywhere close to our goal and had to camp out in the burn area that night. Luckily in preparation for this section Mike carried in a zip-lock and our cooking pale with an extra gallon of water to help get us through. If he hadn’t done that I’m not sure what we would have done?! The dogs did really well that day, we were really worried about them going into the day and stopped every 20 minutes for a doggie water and snack breaks, looking back we were so worried about them, I may have over looked my own self-care and ultimately found myself in the position I did. Joey led us faithfully this day with such perseverance and loyalty, he seemed only to have us and our well-being in mind. He was our champion for the day, and I don’t think it would have turned out so well if it weren’t for he and Lil B. They both comforted me that night at camp and laid with me in the tent like my very own mountain rescue pack. Our family is the strongest wolf pack you will ever meet.
My illness brought on some really bad anxiety, I spent most of day three inside my own head asking myself, “Why in the hell did you want to do this Erika? You are probably going to kill yourself out here.” On the morning of day three we hiked early and got to the emergency water stash mentioned in our guide book, it is placed just off the trail under a tree near a local fire station (life savers) and then pushed to the previous days end goal, Little Scraggy Trail Head. Here we ate breakfast and decided to try pushing a half day in and then setting up camp early to let me have a good amount of recovery time at camp with plenty of food and water. The next morning we slept in and woke up refreshed, I wasn’t puking anymore and I was keeping my water down, all seemed well. As we began getting ready to pack up camp Little Britches came up from the creek with a club foot. My poor little tripod wouldn’t put any weight on her back left foot and it was the size of a ping-pong ball. Worried we gave her a doggie anti-inflammatory and an anti-histamine and Mike wrapped it. At that point we were only a few miles from a road that would take us to Bailey via hitching or we had an almost 30 mile stretch if we decided to move forward. We opted not take our chances, with me having been sick, and us not knowing exactly what was wrong with Little Britches we decided to try for Bailey. These are the moments you can acknowledge your personal growth and flexibility while on the trail. Initially I felt like I’d be cheating if we bypassed a section of the trail. But Mike reminded me that we were “travelin’ people” and that this experience was about the journey itself. I agreed and quickly embraced hitch-hiking. I am reminded of quote shared with me before I left on this adventure: “The thing to remember when travelling is that the trail is the thing, not the end of the trail. Travel too fast and you will miss all you are traveling for” Louis ‘Amour. We hiked out to a road where we eventually caught a ride from a couple local guys. You could tell they had a small buzz on, but they were cool and ended up showing us all sorts of cool aspects of Bailey and brought us all into town in one piece. At one point in the drive we were all heading there down the highway no problem, and to his friend the passenger say, “take a right here!” EERRRRRRR, the driver makes a hard turn across two lanes down a dirt road, Mike and I both look at each other silent but eyes super wide like, “where are they taking us?” We reached the bottom of the road in less than a minute and a beautiful historical structure was at the bottom of the road. He was so proud of his town he just wanted to show us the old train station that was “in the history books”, Mike and I have yet to discover what history book this station (now house) is in, but it was kind of funny and really sweet of him. You just gotta trust in the kindness of strangers sometimes, and this trip is really showing us that.
Once in Bailey, Little Britches was of course fine and I was feeling 100% as well. We decided she had gotten stung by a Bee and we didn’t need to take her to a vet. We went to the Conoco off HWY 285 and waited about ten minutes with our thumbs out until two young hippies from Salida picked us up and squeezed us, our dogs, and the 2 huge packs into their tiny Honda Civic which was full of their stuff and fishing gear, I feel compelled to mention this because not a minute earlier did the “Bro Bra Hummer” with a GoPro attached to the side mirror tell us they were too full for us (eyes rolling). Oh the irony! The couple was on their way home from seeing Pretty Lights at Red Rocks the night before and were just nice people who make a rule to “pick people up if they don’t look too dirty and look like they are doing something, not just like homeless ya know.” We chatted with them the whole way to the top of Kenosha Pass where they dropped us off so we could continue from there.
Due to our unexpected stop over we got to Kenosha a day early and now could really relax and enjoy the push to Breckenridge. We camped at Kenosha and early the next morning made our push to the base of Georgia Pass. This section from Kenosha to Georgia Pass was stunning and so far my favorite scenery of the trip. We hiked down into and across the South Park Valley, which on 285 is my favorite view when driving, so to be able to see it so up close and personal was really a dream come true for me. I just wished I had a horse so we could gallop across the valley full speed with the wind in my hair! But hiking at very slow speeds with dripping sweat through my hair was just as amazing and something I hope never to forget.
We slept the night of August 9th at our first high alpine campsite, dispersed but absolutely perfect, out in just the last few groupings of trees before we hit tree line. Huge 12 and 13 thousand foot mountains all around us and so many wild flowers the landscape looked almost quilted with colored and textured fabrics. What an amazing place to wake up on the morning of my 29th birthday. On the 10th we pushed to the top of Georgia Pass and descended down down down, hiking past Keystone Outback and the Dillon Valley. We got our first rain of the trip that day as well. Mike set up a quick tarp and let us sit under it as the storm passed. We hiked a long day and found a beautiful campsite near a forest road, so there were many other people there, which at times is really nice and comforting to me, even if we don’t interact, just knowing they’re there. Mike hiked in for my birthday a small box of wine, candies, a card and some nail polish for me. What a treat! The next day we were back at it hiking over Swan Mountain to the Breckenridge side. This put us in Breckenridge a day early so we camped in the rain just a few miles outside of town and hiked in the next morning.
It was weird getting back to civilization, Breckenridge was a little overwhelming since it is like Disney Land for adults from Oklahoma and I felt a bit culture shocked and a little bit anxious for the first few hours settling back in to “town”. Leah and Christian our very dear friends, put us up at their place in Dillon for a couple days and it was a wonderful time catching up and sharing with them our travels so far. We also got a much needed respite for both us and our dogs.
8 days in the back country is a lot to take on; the food for that period of time is really heavy and mileage in the first days is so crucial in order to stay on track and get to each destination on time. However, while those things are important and us being prepared has everything to do with our eventual success, it isn’t the most important thing once you are out there. Time spent in nature in the places that so many will never work that hard to see, mountains as far as the eyes can see, clouds below you as walk the high alpine passes, bathing in Mountain streams, watching weather systems build all day and then watching and feeling them let go upon you, star gazing, smelling the forest floor and the Ponderosa Pines and seeing fresh mountain dew upon everything on the early morning hikes, watching the dogs have the best day of there life every single day, spending time with my spouse having no negative distractions or dramas around us, these are the important things, and out there I’ve never felt more content with myself and the path I'm choosing to walk in life. Before I left, my grandma asked me why I was doing this? She asked very simply if it was just for me to see things? I responded with something very self-important like, “Grandma, it’s for my soul”, but the more I walk the more simple everything is becoming in my life and now the answer is simply “yes, I want to see things!” But even more I want to see the things that you have to work to get to. Nothing good in life is free, and I think she’d appreciate that sentiment more than most.
We are learning and growing each day. We are living our dreams!
Big Thanks to each of you for all the love and support over the course of this journey and as always, Thanks for reading!
Awesome awesome awesome! Keep it up! We love you both
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