“I want to buy all your chocolate bars,” I told the
manager of the Brooks Lake Lodge.
He raised an eyebrow. Then he emptied out all his gourmet chocolate
bars on the table, added them all up, and said, “That will be
$42.00.”
“Great,” I said, “I’ll take it.”
Due to poor planning, a few weeks before this decadent shopping
spree I had asked my mom to send me five days of food to the Brooks
Lake Lodge.
“I don’t know how much five days of food is!” my mom exclaimed.
“Don’t worry,” I assured her. “I’d rather you send me less than you
think I need. If you send me too much, I’ll have to toss it. If you
don’t send me enough, it’ll be no big deal since I’m sure the Lodge
will have a small store that sells nuts, crackers, energy/candy
bars, and stuff like that. So even if you send me a few pounds less
than I need I’m sure there will be plenty of options at the Lodge to
make up for it.”
A few weeks later I found myself listening to the Lodge manager
cheerfully explaining to me, “So we have three different chocolate
bars: dark; almond with caramel; and almond with nuts.”
I took a deep breath and exhaled for a long time, shaking my head.
“We also have Gatorade,” he said helpfully.
My Chilean mom is a typical Latin American woman who believes that
the more you love someone, the more you should shove food down their
gullet. At dinner we would always have enough food to feed all the
homeless in San Francisco. Therefore, I suspected she would ship an
elephant just to make sure I wouldn’t starve.
However, she later confessed that she always felt bad when she
mailed packages to me. “I just think that you’ve got to carry all of
that heavy stuff on your back for days…”
I can’t blame my mom for what happened since she followed my
instructions. I was simply caught off guard by a Lodge that had less
selection than a communist store in
Belarus.
Although I could have hitchhiked out of there, the Lodge is terribly
remote and traffic is rare. I would have wasted most of the day
doing the roundtrip. Buying $42 worth of chocolate bars seemed like
the more sensible solution at the time.
The Lodge manager was worried that I didn’t have enough food to
traverse the Wind River Range in Wyoming. “Hey wait,” he said as I
was leaving, “I have a pair of Hershey’s bars in my drawer. I really
shouldn’t eat them. Do you want them?”
“Sure,” I said, and added the two Hershey bars to my candy bar
collection.
After six days I finally made it out of the Wind River Range. The
last day I had nothing to eat, except for one lonely, thin Hershey’s
bar.
And despite my hunger, I didn’t savor it at all.
In Ghost Ranch, New Mexico
Today I’m back in my favorite rest stop on the CDT: the
Ghost Ranch
in Abiquiu. Their food is delicious, varied,
healthy, and bountiful. I hate to leave.
I’ll write again from Cuba, New Mexico, where I hope to run into
the same two dogs that followed me through the
San Pedro Mountains during a snowstorm.
I’ll leave you with one last story that took place in the southern
San Juan Mountains of Colorado…
Outfitter Trail Magic
I had lost my GoLite umbrella earlier in the day and spent over two
hours retracing my steps to find it. My search was in vain. I
despaired as storm clouds gathered overhead. If there’s one place on
the CDT where you don’t want to be caught without rain protection,
it’s the San Juans. The average elevation for 200 miles is about
12,000 feet, so don’t expect a warm shower.
In my haste, I made a wrong turn, taking the wrong drainage down to
Weminuche Pass. It was nearly dark when I arrived in a valley. My
altimeter displayed 10,600 feet, the lowest point in the San Juans.
Although I believed I was in Weminuche Pass, I wanted to confirm it.
Cold darkness enveloped me. I saw some lights in the trees and
headed that way. I expected to find a lone, humble tent. Instead, I
found a half a dozen tents, some larger than a garage! Several
hobbled horses patiently stood as the rain began to fall.
I stuck my head into one of the giant tents and said, “Excuse me,
but is this Weminuche Pass? And if so, where is the CDT?”
Six hunters, decked out in camouflaged outfits, eyed me curiously. A
tall, lean mustached man finally answered, “Yup, you’re in Weminuche
Pass and the CDT is just one mile north of here. You want dinner?”
I replied, “No, I’m on a diet, thanks.”
I gorged on their hot thick chili, sprinkled with grated cheese, and
covered with crispy nachos. I sat on a bench, eating like a
civilized man on a long table, listening to how one hunter killed an
elk with his bow. I shed my layers and dried out next to the toasty
wood stove while the rain furiously pounded the shelter. I couldn’t
believe that I was in the middle of nowhere.
Life was good. And it was about to get better.
Tom, the outfitter, said, “Listen, I got an extra tent with two cots
with thick pads already set up. Nobody is in it and with this storm
raging, you’re welcome to use it.”
I replied, “No, I have a pathetically small tarp, thanks.”
I entered the palatial tent and giggled at my good fortune. It was
so enormous I could easily stand in it without hitting the ceiling
and when I stretched out my hands, I couldn’t get close to touching
the walls. As sheets of rain pummeled my new home, I smiled in
happiness.
Tom wished me a goodnight as rain bounced off his cowboy hat. He
said, “When someone comes to my camp late at night, lost, and during
a rainstorm, you become one of my sons. I gotta take care of you.
Sleep well.”
The storm battered my nylon palace all night. Puddles were forming
outside as the earth couldn’t suck up the water fast enough. At
3:30am Tom rounded up the horses and woke up the hunters. Hunters
get up well before dawn to get in position for the kill right when
the sun rises.
I overheard Tom yelling over the din of the raindrops, “You guys
ready to hunt?”
One of his clients yelled back, “Only if you supply us with SCUBA
gear!”
At 6 a.m. I almost got up, but with no rain gear, I thought it was
silly to hike up to 12,500 feet during a storm. Finally, at 8 a.m. I
rolled out of my cozy cot and headed to the dining tent. I’ve never
woken up so late on the trail. The hunters invited me to breakfast
and explained that the conditions were too miserable to hunt.
“The elk just hide under trees in these conditions and are hard to
spot,” a hunter explained as he handed me a plate with an enormous
omelet filled with mushrooms and cheese. All this good food made me
want to become a hunter too. I tried firing an arrow but I couldn’t
even pull the string back on the composite bow, it was so taut. I’m
supposed to be Superman, having walked over 5,000 miles in six
months, yet I can’t even cock an arrow in a bow.
Finally, at 2 p.m. the rain stopped. Tom cut out a large garbage bag
so I could use it as a makeshift rain poncho. I bid a fond farewell
to Tom and his crew.
If you have the urge to kill a beast, or just want to pleasant
horseback ride in the San Juans, please hire
Tom’s
services.
With little daylight remaining I hurried over the mountain range to
get to Squaw Pass before nightfall. Unfortunately, thunder and
lightning quickly returned as I gained altitude. I donned the
garbage
bag raingear and I wrapped myself up in my tarp as the ice cold rain
battered me. The weather is the worse you can imagine: high winds
and freezing rain. I would much rather deal with snow than freezing
rain. My hands were so cold they were burning with pain.
The trail was a boggy and muddy mess. I slipped constantly and
splashed in puddles of freezing water. Wind assailed me. My glasses
fogged up in my balaclava and it was hard to see through my raindrop
covered lenses. The sun was setting and I was still well above tree
line. I frantically searched for the trail, but couldn’t find it.
Desperate, I bushwhacked my way down the mountain, climbing over
dozens of downed trees and sinking into oversaturated ground to get
to Squaw Pass. Once again I was a mile away from the CDT, but at
least I was as low as I could get: 11,200 feet.
The next day, the storm finally relented. It was cold and a thin
layer of snow covered the mountains. Eventually I got through the
San Juans and out of Colorado. Now I am in the Promised Land: New
Mexico. I have a bit over 500 miles to go.
Sponsor Spotlight: Bob’s Red Mill
With all this talk about food, I can’t help but think about Bob's
Red Mill – my main source of fuel for this journey. Bob’s Red Mill’s
food is nutritious and healthy. It delivers exactly what I will need
to walk 5,600 miles. And it’s much better than $42 worth of
chocolate bars.
I’m not cooking anything! I have no stove or pot! I’m eating a
variety of Bob’s Red Mill granola, muesli, nuts, and dried fruit. I
eat cereal with dehydrated soy milk and Bob’s Red Mill protein
powder. I'm also soaking golden couscous, potato flakes, and
textured vegetable protein (TVP). I trade off with soaking their
Spice'n Nice cereal, which has cinnamon and raisins. As a result, I
get a diet packed with plenty of carbohydrates, protein, vitamins,
and minerals. I buy high fat foods in town as treats, although
lately I’ve been avoiding chocolate. All together, that should be
more than 5,000 nutritious calories a day!
Please visit:
www.BobsRedMill.com
Buy Hike Your Own Hike for Halloween!
Get a real treat this Halloween, and buy my book, Hike Your Own
Hike: 7 Life Lessons from Backpacking Across America. As a thank
you, I donate half of my royalty to the Appalachian Trail, the
Pacific Crest Trail, and the Continental Divide Trail. So even if
you have only moderate interest in my book, buy it for a friend and
think of it as a donation to our national scenic trails!
You can download Chapter One off my website (www.francistapon.com/book).
I hope to finish my CDT Yo-Yo on Halloween, and you can have your
autographed copy before then!
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This beautiful bull elk was in the San Juan Mountains of Colorado.
Left to right: Nitro, Steady, Jug, and Francis. We all met up at the
Monarch Mountain Lodge. They were all Southbounders, going from Canada
to Mexico. They were all a delight!
Left to right: Francis, Lucky, Amy, Toek. Toek and I bumped into each
other 3 times on the trail or in towns.
Tom is the man with the blue pullover. He's the outfitter who fed and
sheltered me during a wicked snowstorm in September.
It rained nonstop for 12 hours and I got to sleep in this huge tent. I
had a cot inside and was toasty!
I lost my umbrella, so the outfitter gave me a garbage bag for the rest
of the San Juans. I got hammered again with another storm, but I kept
moving to stay somewhat warm.
Ah ha, there's the trail! Although I walked here in May, it was covered
in snow.
A cold morning near San Luis Peak (14,003 feet).
Summit of San Luis Peak. Although not part of the CDT, I can't resist a
14er that is so near the trail. I had to bag it!
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