CDT: The Bob Marshall Wilderness

The Bob — or should it be The Bog? — provides a tough stretch. A 10-day food carry, blowdowns, an insane amount of river crossings, and a winter storm on top of all that turn this section into serious type 2 fun. Next, we enter the Scapegoat Wilderness, where we’ll finally experience extended-duration ridgeline walking directly along the top of the Continental Divide. Instead of crossing passes and descending into valleys, we’ll stay up in the alpine, enjoying the high-altitude terrain.

We know that we are about to set out into a potential winter storm when we’re leaving East Glacier on a sunny day. We are prepared with warm clothes and sleeping gear, multiple gloves, rain gear, and spikes. But as always, it’s a different story when you’re actually experiencing it. In theory, everything sounds manageable. And it is, you’re just going to be miserable while pushing through it. It’s part of an adventure — it’s not always sunshine and happiness. The Bob takes SOBOs to the test. Do we have what it takes to hike the CDT? We are about to find out.

CDT Day 8 — Towards the Bob

Today we are hiking the stretch between East Glacier and Highway 2 at Maria’s Pass. The challenge today is a heavy backpack with a 10-day food carry to Lincoln in 192 miles and mosquitoes. It’s always something, the CDT will not give you an easy day for free.

Starting the Bob Marshall Wilderness Section

It’s hot, but I don’t want to take my long sleeve off to keep the sun off my skin for recovery. My hands hurt a lot yesterday from having sun blisters, for the first time in my life. I moisturized a lot yesterday and today they feel much better now. My feet still hurt a lot, so I have to take a break every 3 miles to give them a rest. I don’t know what happened to them. I trained so well and was so fit, my hike in Spain was going great, and now this. It sucks as I can’t go as far as I want to. But maybe that’s better to avoid injuries anyway, I don’t know.

The Bob Marshall Wilderness starts easy on us

It’s mostly a green tunnel with countless mozzies swarming around us. The Sawyer Picaridin lotion saves our butts today. I normally avoid insect repellent as their smell and stickiness are a sensory nightmare to me. The last thing I want on my dirty, sweaty skin is layers of products. I was doubtful, but the lotion is actually nice with a neutral smell.

We have several little stream crossings and occasional views of some mountains. Before we get to the road, there are rail tracks to cross, but a long train is standing in the way while another one is passing. We wait until the train has passed and then climb over the standing one, which I don’t feel very comfortable with. It feels illegal and dangerous, but there is no sign the train is going to move anytime soon. Everything works out.

There is a campground on the other side and a monument to Roosevelt by the highway. We hike a bit further up and have dinner, swarmed by mozzies. Then we continue one more mile to pitch our tent for the night between trees to have some shelter from the gusty wind.

View into the sky

CDT Day 9 — Getting into the Winter Storm

We wake up to a blue sky and take the Kitchen alternate along the river. That involves nine river crossings in six miles, but it avoids a blowdown section. The water is freezing cold, especially right after coming out of the river. It feels like having ice blocks on my feet. But there is enough time to warm up before the next crossing.

We run into Carl, who’s on his way to the Great Divide Trail in Canada. He has a fever, and it might be related to a tick bite, so he’s getting off trail to get it checked. He gives us some of his home-made dehydrated food, and we’re hopeful to make it all the way to Lincoln without having to hitchhike to Augusta with that booster.

One of the countless river crossings in the Bob

We take a little break at the intersection with the red line when it starts raining. First, it’s just drizzling, but it gets more intense until it starts to turn into sleet. We’re planning to have lunch at the Badger Station, hoping to find a sheltered spot there. The trail is super easy until lunchtime, so we’re making good progress. It’s the first time we are doing 12 miles by 12 again.

I’m having daydreams about running into lovely rangers who invite us to a cup of hot tea because they have sympathy for us. And I can’t believe it, but there are actually people at the station. They are doing weed spraying of an invasive species. And Zach, the leader of the group, really gives us hot beverages! There is even a choice of coffee, tea, and cocoa (with marshmallows!). Trail magic!

He tells us about Bob Marshall, an outdoor enthusiast and early advocate for sustainable forestation. This area is named after him, although he hasn’t been much out here.
The cocoa with marshmallows is a dream, sweet and hot. We’re sitting on the porch and eating our cold-soaked lunch. While we’re sitting here, it starts snowing heavily. We’re happy we made it out of that just in time. We do get freezing after a while, though. My wet feet are freezing. So we say our goodbyes and move on. Luckily, it has stopped snowing and raining, and I can warm up by walking. There is another river crossing and I don’t like that as I’m so cold, my teeth are chattering. We do find a way to rock hop, though.

We make our way up the mountain and suddenly, it clears up, showing us some blue skies, and views of snow powdered mountains around us, and even some sun. We’re getting our hopes up. We are still learning about the moody Montana weather.

We take a break to dry off our feet a bit. I make the mistake of switching out my socks, enjoying their dryness for like 30 minutes until they get soaked again. It starts snowing more, and the wind blows the snow horizontally hard in our faces. I keep my head down, only looking at my feet to keep the snow out of my face. Only occasionally lifting my head to see where the trail is going. Or turning around to let the snow hit my pack instead, to catch a break.

We’re making it further up, hitting some snowfields and the highest point so far. It stops snowing for a bit again while we make our way over the last high point for today. Every time we stop, I get super cold. This weather is basically forcing us to keep moving, which is exhausting. I have to put all my gloves on. We descend and it starts to snow heavily again. I just want to get into the tent and my warm sleeping bag, I don’t care about anything else.

Sleet in the Bob Marshall Wilderness

There is a campsite by the river, but Ryan doesn’t like it. He has a perfect image of a campsite in his head that just doesn’t exist. I really don’t care, I just want to get warm. We keep on walking further, but nothing is to be found, so we turn around and take one of the spots we saw earlier. I pitch the tent and get in there, it takes a while for my feet to thaw out. We have dinner while sleet is hitting our tent. I’m just happy to be out of that. We get a weather forecast on the Garmin InReach that gives us some hope. Tomorrow it’s not supposed to rain or snow. But Monday and Tuesday there is a winter storm warning. But I’m only focussing on tomorrow for now. In the worst case, we have to wait it out a little.

CDT Day 10 — Calm in the Storm

The green tunnel has turned into a white tunnel overnight. It’s cold, and I have all my layers on. Some more river crossings are keeping our feet wet.

The green tunnel of the Bob turned into a white tunnel

We get into a burn section after lunch, where the sky turns blue and sends the warming sun our way. We can finally dry off and get warm. And to our utmost delight, we can keep our feet semi-dry. Life comes back too. We are seeing some ground squirrels, peaking out of their holes. And birds are chirping away. I’m getting a bit too optimistic about all that by putting shorts on, which is still a little too chilly.

At another river crossing, we’re trying to find a way across without getting our feet wet again, but we have to accept defeat. My socks just started to dry out, damn. It’s not as bad when it’s not ice-cold outside anymore, though, and there are five miles left to dry out again. Or not. Because our tent site turns out to be on a little island between two river crossings. It’s a nice spot, but it means getting our feet wet getting into camp and getting out of it the next morning.

Ryan hurt his foot while trying to hop over rocks to keep his feet dry. Now in the tent, he catastrophizes his foot is broken, thinking the hike is over for him and fantasizes about having to hop trains and being a pool hustler in Tijuana to avoid the shame of failure this early on.

CDT Day 11 — Winter Storm, the Second

Our day starts out promising, as it doesn’t snow much at night and there’s no rain or snow when we wake up. We use that opportunity to get going.

Soon the sleet picks up again. It’s very muddy, and every step feels heavy, like wearing cement blocks on our feet. The trail is suddenly quite overgrown, so we get wet from the bottom, the sides from the wet bushes, and the top. It was fine until this point as my gloves start to seep through, my feet are wet all day, and we’re going up into the real snow now. I can’t stop, I can’t drink, I can’t eat. As soon as I stop for a bit, I get cold.

Back in the winter

It’s the second time on the CDT I feel like crying for a moment. I get out my hand warmers and shove them into my gloves and shoes. They don’t do much, to be honest. But at least the trail goes down into lower elevations again, and I can warm up a bit. We’re even considering pitching the tent and calling it a day on a lovely meadow. But suddenly, it gets warmer, the sleet stops and there is some minor sunshine warming us a tiny bit. I feel much better now and after a snack, I’m ready to continue.

We know we’re not going to make it over the pass today, but we want to get closer to the place where the Spotted Bear alternate connects. It’s going to save us some miles, which is very welcome in this nasty weather right now. If I had known what I was getting myself into, I would probably have waited it out. We were contemplating taking the alternate even earlier, but there is a questionable river crossing that might be too high, and we didn’t want to risk backtracking. So the plan is to connect with the Spotted Bear later.

The day just doesn’t want to end, we don’t seem to get closer to the planned campsite, and there are countless river crossings. By this point, I don’t even care anymore. It has warmed up a bit and at least I’m fairly warm except for my feet.

There is a perfectly sheltered snow-free campsite, and we are considering taking it, as we don’t know what it’s going to look like further up. But we want to make it a little further, so we turn that offer down to make two more miles. It turns out to be a bad choice. We get into the snow, and we can’t find a good flat camp spot. We look around and finally settle for a slanted spot under the trees. It’s really not great, but it will hopefully do for the night. More snow is expected tomorrow, and we have to go over a pass. I don’t like that, but we will see tomorrow.

CDT Day 12 — White Out at Switchback Pass

It’s not snowing when we wake up, so we hurry to get going. It’s the third day in a row that we put cold wet socks on our feet while it’s 32° Fahrenheit outside. A big sensory nightmare of thru-hiking is having to put wet, half-frozen socks on your feet on a cold morning.

We head up steeply to Switchback Pass, soon trudging through snow. There is a lot of route-finding involved as there is no visible trail and no footsteps to guide us through the fresh snow, but at least the snow is nice and grippy.

On our way to Switchback Pass

It starts snowing again and sends us into a whiteout while we’re approaching Switchback Pass. The views are supposed to be stunning here, but we can’t see more than a few yards ahead. I’m getting warm while going up, and the snow is dry, so we are not wet all over. I’m guiding us from landmark to landmark, where we check the direction on the map again. That way we slowly make it to Switchback Pass where we enjoy zero views.

On our way to Switchback Pass

Luckily, it’s easier to find the trail on the other side, as there is less snow. We make it back into the forest, leaving the snow behind, and enjoy a few hours without rain. But river crossings get our feet wet anyway.

We reach a little hut that is called Pentagon, named after the river that’s running by. I always wanted to have lunch at the Pentagon, but the food here is lackluster. We have a crunchy cold soaked lunch while looking at a flattened dead mouse. The sun is coming out for a few minutes, though, and I’m spreading out on the ground, trying to do some photosynthesis.

My Lake in the Bob Marshall Wilderness

The rest of the day is pretty unspectacular, but easy to walk, on saturated soft ground full of pine needles and mushrooms. The rain starts again, and the trail gets overgrown, so we’re getting wet from all sides again. I’m sick of being wet. At least there are no mozzies which might be a nightmare in a swamp like the Bob later in the season.

It’s a long day, as it took us so much time for the two miles to the pass this morning. We made it to 16 miles in 9 hours. We’re getting a good snow-free and sheltered campsite tonight.

CDT Day 13 — The Chinese Wall

The day starts wet once more. It’s not raining, but the overgrown trail soaks us for the first hour. I’m cursing and insulting the Bob Marshall Wilderness throughout that time. I have this irrational thought of never being dry ever again.

Once we get out of the Spotted Bear alternate, it gets much better. I find some fresh-looking footsteps in the snow that give me hope that they will lead us along the Chinese Wall today, a 12-mile-long stretch along a steep rock wall that is mostly covered in snow. Not much later, I smell fire and wonder why, then we see people. They turned around because there was too much snow for them ahead. They’re not CDTers, they only came out here for a few days of hiking, so I can’t blame them.

My Lake in the Bob Marshall Wilderness

We continue our way, the snow starts at My Lake. The weather is much friendlier today and gives us hope with some blue skies. Soon the sun comes out while we’re trudging through the snow. There are no fresh footprints, but the old ones are visible enough that we can follow them without having to navigate a lot. It’s quite a bit of post-holing that only gets worse throughout the day. In between, there are stretches with no snow where we can make up some time. The snow travel is incredibly slow. So much time for so little progress. It’s frustrating.

We get to a climb where we can see the impressive Chinese Wall for the first time. Ryan notices that he dropped his beanie and gloves somewhere and turns around to look for them. While I’m waiting, the sun comes out, and I’m having a yard sale, putting all our gear out to finally dry. I’m trying to do some photosynthesis again, soaking up that sunshine.

I feel like appreciating having warm and dry feet is something only thru-hikers can do. And getting all giddy when the sun finally comes out after days of rain, snow, and cold. The bare necessities, the first stage on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs: Being dry and warm. Ryan comes back, he found his stuff. Both gloves and beanie didn’t cost more than 20 bucks together, but out here they are priceless as we are days away from getting new ones that would probably be expensive too. Beanies and gloves are an essential resource in this unpleasant weather that keeps hitting us.

Having a yard sale to dry our wet gear

It seems like there are endless ups and downs today, and especially the post holing on the way up is taking everything out of me. I’m exhausted. It’s like the Glass Bridge Game in Squid Games. You take a step, hoping it will hold, until it doesn’t.

It’s a good thing that we are two, so we can take turns making the steps. For the second person, the post holing gets a lot easier as they can use the deep but already cut steps.
I’m starting to understand, while this wall is called the Chinese wall, it appears to be endless. By 2 pm, we haven’t even covered 10 miles yet.

Chinese Wall

But we’re deeply grateful for the Bob finally giving us some views. The Chinese Wall is stunning despite all the hard work. We finally reach the last pass, the highest point for today. The view from here is breathtaking, and we say goodbye to the Wall.

Chinese Wall

From here on, it’s only downhill. There is almost no snow, almost no mud. It makes me so happy. I’m singing along to let the bears know we are there until we reach the lovely campsite by a gushing river with a little waterfall.

CDT Day 14 — Hiking into Benchmark

The morning starts with a river crossing. There is nothing better than getting your feet wet in ice-cold water in the morning, am I right? It’s followed by another one shortly after. There are some narrow log bridges, but there is really no point in risking that. Your feet will get wet eventually, in one of the countless river crossings in the Bob. It’s not deep and after a few minutes the ice block feeling starts to disappear.
The day is pretty chill, not much uphill, just a leisurely stroll through the forest. The sun is shining, and the sky is blue. I run into two hikers that are out here for some days, carrying heavy looking packs. I got a little rusty in conversation after not seeing another human being for a week.

Now that the weather has turned for the better, we start meeting people again after being alone for some days through the storm. Three groups of horses and mules and multiple groups of backpackers. It was snowing, it was raining, now it’s peopling.

Pack strings on the way into Benchmark

Everyone tells us a bit of a different forecast for tomorrow. From no rain to heavy rain. We’ll see. So far, we have learned that Montana weather has its own plans. It’s sunny and warm today, so we are finally back to shorts. It’s crazy how fast it turns one way or another. We have lunch by a lovely bridge to have a bit of a dip in the ice-cold water while we watch birds and butterflies.

We make it to the junction where we walk out to the Benchmark Trailhead and then three miles down the road to the Benchmark Ranch. There, we find one of Carl’s lovely meals in the hiker box but nothing else. We do have enough to make it to Lincoln, though. The hitch out to Augusta is tough, we didn’t see a single car going that way on our road walking.

Nobody is here, but after we make dinner on the patio, we find a lovely lady who lets us charge our powerbank and gets both of us a well-needed shower. The hot water feels so good. It’s a 10 dollar shower that comes with a towel, but it’s worth it. Just enjoying the hot water and seeing the dirt wash away from us is so pleasurable. Benchmark Ranch is really off the grid, everything is powered by a generator. The owners have their wedding coming up on the weekend out here, so they are getting everything ready.

We get our clean bodies back into our smelly clothes and camp a little further up the trail.

CDT Day 15 — Easy day with a Mountain Lion

It’s the first time in a while that we get into dry shoes and socks in the morning. We also have sunshine at our camp. It takes me longer to get going because I’m soaking it up like a lizard, warming my blood up.

A few minutes in, we see a Mountain Lion on the trail, only 50 feet from us. It’s not very big, probably a juvenile. There is a big river next to the trail, so he probably didn’t hear us coming. But as soon as he sees us, he runs off into the woods. Finally, I’ve seen a mountain lion! What a nice reward after a tough week in the Bob that we are now leaving to get into the Scapegoat Wilderness.

Welcome to the Scapegoat Wilderness

We have lunch and nap in the sun, I start listening to music which boosts me. To be honest, we don’t care much about bears anymore. Furthermore, I learned my feet feel better when I get them wet in a river once in a while. Ironically, now that I can finally have dry feet, I’m voluntarily making my feet wet. No problem with the sunshine.

It’s a very easy trail today. It’s almost like a PCT day: Easy, gradual, hot, dry, fast.

Then some drops of rain start coming down. We get into our rain jackets, and five minutes later the sky is blue again. We do the same game later again. Montana weather. A hummingbird circles around us, giving us a nice close up view of its iridescent feathers.

Scapegoat Wilderness

We run into our first CDT hiker since coming from East Glacier, Chef from Chicago. He’s also SOBO, but bailed out from Many Glacier because of the winter storm we just went through. Now there are 40 hikers waiting it out at Luna’s. He was sick of that, so he flipped south to Helena to hike up. Good choice in my opinion. He did the PCT and the TA both since last year. I say he’s probably super fit, and he replies he’s tired. A full year of hiking, that’s quite something. He says there is almost no snow ahead of us, which is great news.

Some thunder rumbles, and some heavy drops come down for like 10 minutes. That’s it, the rest of the day is wonderful, and we can make it to 23 miles today.

CDT Day 16 — Windy Ridge Walk

There is lots of elevation today. It’s a long ridge walk which is exposed, but we have nice weather today, only a bit of wind. There is almost no snow left, only some patches, although we are at a higher elevation than ever before.

Ridge Walking in the Scapegoat Wilderness

There are brightly colored flower cushions everywhere, blue, violet, yellow. It’s a barren landscape, with only some dead trees. Water is suddenly sparse, rivers are dry. Wild, how much it dramatically changed from the wet Bob to the dried out Scapegoat.

A lake finally has water and mozzies. We keep our mouths shut on the way back up from the lake to not swallow some.

We are tired, our feet hurt, I’m hungry. I can feel my body eating itself after being out here for 9 days without a break. But we have a lovely campsite up on the ridge, nicely sheltered by some trees, and tomorrow we finally reach the town of Lincoln to have a zero to replenish our energy. When getting closer to town, you discuss what and where to eat, what clothes are the least smelly to not bother these poor people who give us hitches too much. It’s so exciting.

Scapegoat Wilderness

CDT Day 17 — Hiking out to Lincoln

We witness a beautiful sunrise from our campsite on the ridge. There are more steep climbs, a total of six climbs today. The first three are the steepest and longest.

Sunrise on a ridge in the Scapegoat Wilderness

We keep following the ridge in the beautiful golden light of the early morning. We descend through many rocks, and I’m glad we didn’t do that yesterday anymore, it would have ruined me. It hurts my feet, I’m so slow, I’m dragging.

Scapegoat Wilderness

We reach the junction with a meadow after what feels like a lifetime. We sink into the grass to have a break. It gets super windy on the way down to Charlotte Pass. A lovely Yurt is a haven in the storm. I can’t even imagine this in bad weather. The wind is howling around the yurt while we take a break.

The yurt gives shelter from the wind

There is just a short walk down to the road left where we get a hitch almost immediately towards Lincoln. There are many Trump Hats and gun raffles in Lincoln, but everybody is extremely nice. Zach at the Post office is outstandingly helpful. 

We spent our zero mostly with eating and resupplying. Here’s what I stuffed my face within a two-hour rhythm: Hash browns with eggs, 2 lbs of strawberries, 2 lbs of blueberries, bananas, Hawaiian rolls, apple sauce, a rotisserie chicken, salad, sandwiches, chips with salsa, a jar of pickles, 2 L of coke and pizza for dinner.

And I could have eaten more.

Lincoln, Montana