August 5th, 2024
Mile Marker: 1093.7
Miles Hiked: 5
We woke up this morning around 6 AM feeling warm in our sleeping bags. I so did not want to get up and out but we only had 5 miles to go to get into town. Town day!
It felt like it had been so long since we were last in town. It was quite the stretch!
We packed quickly and put on our very dirty/muddy shoes from yesterday and headed out.
Our campsite had a huge view of a rock wall behind us that was lit up by the rising sun. Incredible!
We walked on a crazy amounts of switchbacks that felt unnecessary and then the trail opened up into a meadow with 360 views.
Journey and I stood here for a moment taking it in, this was beautiful. We had been told by many that this area and the Winds coming up are some of the best parts of the whole CDT, I’m already starting to think it’s true. I can’t wait for the Winds!
We then continued on for a couple more miles, looking up as much as the trail allowed.
We reached the highway just before 9 AM and stuck out our thumbs for a hitch. Finally no more having to pay for shuttles!
Within about 5 minutes we had an SUV pull over with a man, woman, and child. They asked where we were headed and to hop in. They rearranged their luggage into the back along with their child and us three piled in the middle.
It was fun to talk about our adventures and hear about the ones they had recently been on. They currently live in Idaho and were taking a closer to home vacation trip.
They were so sweet and as per usual, I’m so thankful they were willing to give us a ride.
We then got a hotel and went to the Cowboy Cafe. This was one of the restaurants Captain’s NOBO friends told us to eat at, claiming it was best.
I ordered pancakes, eggs, and boysenberry pie with vanilla ice cream.
It was delicious. I ate all of this and still had room for more. The comments from the NOBOs were spot on, this place is the place to eat no doubt.
We hung around for a while drinking cup after cup of coffee until almost noon to check into our room at the Stagecoach Inn. Our hotel room is ginormous and very old fashion. But it’s extremely clean and we love to sprawl our gear out all over so it was perfect.
We hustled and bustled on getting our town chores done of laundry, food resupply, and cleaning our gear so we could also have time to relax.
We then went back to Cowboy Cafe for round two and kept it light splitting a sandwich and salad. However, we each got our own piece of pie again, this time I ordered the apple caramel pie. This place knows how to pie!
We headed back to the hotel to relax and then eventually I called my parents. It felt like a while since I had chatted with them but really it had only been a week and half. The time warp of trail is so strange.
Around 8 we went back to the Cowboy Cafe for dinner. Yes, there was other restaurants in town. No, we didn’t have interest in eating at them. When getting good food… it’s hard to go anywhere else since it seems to rarely happen.
I ordered a burger, sweet potato fries, and Journey and I split a cherry raspberry pie.
Soooooooo goooooood! We plan to come back tomorrow for breakfast before heading out to trail. 😂
We spent a good portion of today trying to figure out what we wanted to do about the fire closure coming up and if we trusted the reroute provided with how the fire is growing.
As of now, we will head out first thing to try and get past it before it continues but if it seemed too dangerous we may have to find a ride to Pinedale to continue.
We will see how it all shakes out.
Iz and Oz
Izzy + Ozzy 