CDT – Day 49 – Steamboat Springs to Steamboat Springs

6/12/15 Day 49

Steamboat Springs to Steamboat Springs 6804′

Tent (Moots)- Nights Spent Alone: 7

13, 917.4 Trip Miles

Mostly Sunny

Day’s of Snow: 7 – Day’s of Rain: 15

# of Zero days: 5

2:02 pm to 4:30 pm

Gila Crossings Final Total:  221

Tick Count: 4 (3 more crawling on me)

Critter Count

1 Marmot****

Totals

524 Pronghorn*

119 Lizards

116 Wild Horses

80 Elk

72 Chipmunks

59 Deer**

37 Cotton Tail Rabbits

26 Squirrels

22 Horny Roads

19 Prairie Dogs

17 Jack Rabbit***

15 Ground Squirrels

8 Snakes

4 Moles

3 Marmot****

3 Coyotes

2 Rattle Snakes

2 Toads

1 Mouse

1 Skunk

1 Weasel

1 Porcupine

*181 from car, **3 from car, ***1 from car, ****2 from car

Today seemed like another wasted day in town. When we planned the hike from Encampment to Steamboat Springs we neglected to think about how we were going to get out of Steamboat Springs as we were no longer on the trail.

My new cowboy hat.

The result was a logistic nightmare. To keep our hike a continuous one we had to get 20 miles to Rabbit Ears pass. We knew we didn’t have time to hike all 20 miles and didn’t want to carry all the food for the next section too.

We planned to carry all our gear so not to slack pack and hitched up to the pass. We then hiked down hill back towards Steamboat. We got about 11.5 miles. So tomorrow we’ll have to hike about five miles from town to where we hitched back to town. Then we’ll hitch to where we started today but this time we’ll head away from Steamboat towards Grand Lake and actually be back on trail. (Of course it’s not trail but nine more miles of pavement and I think followed by more dirt roads.)

View from my shortish road walk for the day.

I’m really feeling like I need to put miles in. Two days in town and a third coming up (all partials) makes me feel like I’m not getting anywhere. My mind set is one of “Keep Moving Forward”. I also know that there’s a ton of great trail coming up, so I’m excited to get there.

Steamboat was a shit show for sure.  As I said above no consideration was given to how to get back out of town to the trail when we hiked in.  We were so focused on just getting to town, not anything past it.

I’m glad I suffered through what appeared to be a shit show to keep my hike continuos.  If I hadn’t I would never have been happy with the decision.  I guess what made it a “shit show” in my mind was just all the extra logistics it caused.  It is always my goal to make town stops as painless as possible.  Steamboat was just the opposite.

Back to Day 48, Forward to Day 50

Scatman

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Get out there!