Part Thirty

     July 26-30                                        Salmon, ID                                (Go to Pt 1)

We arrived back in Salmon around mid-day with plenty of time to drop our gear off at the motel, shower and show up at the café for a late lunch.  Imagine Zelda’s surprise!  She looked almost ready to give us a hug, then second guessed the gesture, which I’m sure was wise since being seen hugging strangers in the café, strangers who may or may not be on the run from the law, might get a little gossipy around town.  We settled into the booth next to the window and instantly felt like we’d never left the place.
​
Our second stay in Salmon turned out to be somewhat extended by a visit from my Mom and Dad and a dentist appointment.  When I had talked with my parents the last time Craig and I were in Salmon, they’d said they wanted to come out and meet us while we were resupplying in a town.

Since they were going to be in Denver during the same time frame that Craig and I intended to be back in Salmon, they made plans to drive up and meet us when we got back into town.  So, after we’d checked into the motel and freshened up with a couple of cheeseburgers, I called my parents and they drove up from Denver the following day. 
​
Hal and Dona (my folks) stayed over three nights in Salmon and it was great to see them.  I know my Mom wanted to come out and make sure I was doing okay while I know my Dad wanted to come out and make sure we were doing what we said we were doing.  And by golly if the old man wasn’t surprised!  

Apparently, I looked a bit different than the last time he had seen me, which was maybe a week or so before we’d started the trip.  First off, Craig and I had both gotten those boot-camp haircuts during our previous stay in Salmon so we were sporting that military look my Dad liked so much. ​​

He also mentioned, by the way, how bronzed by the sun we were and how much our calf and quad muscles had developed over the past ten weeks I think he was pretty satisfied that we were on the level about this whole Continental Divide-by-foot business and stared to get quite enthused about how we were going about putting the next section of our trip together.
​
Also while I was in Salmon, I had a tooth that’d been bothering me and I needed to get a cavity filled before I started off again so, between my parents coming out to see us and the dentist’s chair, Craig and I spent the better part of a week in Salmon before finally escaping town.

While we were in Salmon we’d projected out some long range dates correlating to where we needed to be in order to reach Colorado by mid-September and I was a bit taken aback by how many daily miles we were going to have to cover if we planned to keep up with that schedule.  

Thus far, a twenty mile day had been a pretty big day and now this next couple of weeks was going to demand 20 plus mile days as a starting point.  It was intimidating having that much daily mileage out in front of us but we had known it was coming. 

The route ahead was mostly defined by various types of roads and 4Wtracks crossing rolling terrain and we intended to take full advantage of these ‘easy’ miles in hopes of gaining some ground and banking some time.

---

Go to Part 31

---

The CDTC was founded in 2012 by volunteers and recreationists hoping to provide a unified voice for the CDT. Working hand-in-hand with the U.S. Forest Service and other federal land management agencies, the CDTC is a non-profit partner supporting stewardship of the CDT. The mission of the CDTC is to complete, promote and protect the Continental Divide National Scenic Trail, a world-class national resource. For more information, please visit continentaldividetrail.org.

---