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Day 47 – 50 Rainy days
Day 47
You’d think sleeping in a bed would result in a good night’s sleep after being on trail. Sadly, no. Though the second pizza at the bar last night is likely to blame. It made sense from a caloric standpoint, but it was a lot of food. It was a nice bar. Only open a few days per week and not for very long but it had a nice atmosphere. And I ended up signing a dollar to hang up there, I’ve never done that before.
Into the mist!
Hectic rainy morning before Monty picked Quickdraw, Tropical, and I up for the ride back to the trail. When we got to the trail there was a hiker trying to hitch into town. That seems like it’d be impossible without the shuttle; that road has zero traffic.
A new national forest!
Hit the trail for some rainy hiking around 10. After a while, the rain stopped though not before making sections of the trail quite muddy. We ran into a rather grumbly nobo hiker who was down about the vegetation car wash he’d gone through. Hiking through it later didn’t seem that bad. It was curious that he thought of that over the multiple steep muddy descents he must’ve gone down. That seemed way worse to me.
Why this is here is a bit of a mystery, but I’ll take it.
Camped fairly early at a spring that, oddly, has a random bear box. That, plus a break in the rain, made camping here appealing. Also, after hiking quite late the last few nights on trail, being at camp at like 5 was pretty nice.
Day 48
Very wet and muddy day. Rained a bunch overnight and realized that water had dripped off my tent fly and onto the (waterproof) footprint which created a small stream that ran under my tent near my feet. Not a huge problem, but everything in the vestibule was soaked. Most annoyingly, my shoes and a pair of socks.
Well, there’s a stream. Under the tent.
Drying party! Photo cred: Quickdraw
Hiking thru the mud was a slip sliding experience. Managed to slip and fall on my ass once. Kinda jarring and messy, but otherwise fine. The rest was some manner of ‘skiing’ on mud. The miles felt pretty slow today, though. It didn’t rain too much after the morning, which was nice.
Introducing the Anti-Crampon ™!
Didn’t hike quite as far as originally planned. We would have had to hike to nearly dark to do that. And there didn’t seem to be much of a benefit to pushing; we’re getting to island park the day after tomorrow regardless.
CDT hazard #112. Experimental sheep.
Day 49
It poured overnight. Though with a better tent set up than the previous night everything that should stay dry did.
This ridge was the highlight of this section. Pretty. Views of the Tetons. And not raining.
The ridge in the morning had some great views. Notably the first sighting on the Tetons off in the distance. Also it was not at all muddy despite the overnight rain.
I had hoped that the bushwhacking would be a tad less literal.
The weather caught up with us though and it poured when we were bushwhacking during the first part of the alternate going to Island Park. More involved bushwhacking than I had really expected. It was the coldest I’ve been on trail so far.
Well, hello there Bullwinkle.
The weather did break though and it was sunny for a few hours in the evening. Camped on a ridge 10 miles from town so we can get down in time for the breakfast buffet. And shortly after hopping in my tent for the night it started raining again as I write this.
Camping in the glade. Photo cred: Quickdraw
Day 50
Good morning, Tetons. See you next week!
Well, with what may well be the fastest hiking of the trip, we made it in time for the breakfast buffet.
As one does.
After breakfast and laundry/shower I arranged my permit for yellowstone. Then called the old faithful post office to make sure my packages were there. …and found out that my shoes weren’t there. Some investigation later and found that REI sent it UPS to the post office. Which doesn’t work. Some chatting with two REI reps later and had a replacement order sent. The fastest it can get there is Friday. I guess I’m zeroing in old faithful to wait for my shoes.
Probably the nicest shower I’ll see on trail.
The campsite leaves a bit to be desired, though.
Then ended up chatting with Tropical, Quickdraw, and her uncle who was visiting. It started raining so we moved into his (really cool) sprinter camper van. And then it rained. Really, really, hard. And the campground flooded and we ran around trying to do damage control.
Emergency flood mitigation.
After we went by the nearby bar to tell other hikers the bad news. In the process an older couple bought us some shots before heading back to start the drying out process and building my nest on the porch.
Backup sleeping arrangement. Photo cred: Quickdraw
Shortly after the couple from the bar stopped by and dropped off some ingredients for stores, ponchos, and some cash. It was realky sweet of them; I’ve never gotten money as trail magic before.
Heading to dinner! Photo cred: Quickdraw
Tomorrow will be damage recovery and hiking the minimum to get out of town. Which looks to be about 10 miles.
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