Part Thirty Nine

Regarding Photos:
For those following this blog, I have to apologize for the woeful lack of pictures to accompany the stories.  When I started writing this thing, I didn’t give much thought to pictures and figured the handful of digital photos I had would suffice.  Well, they didn’t.  And sadly, all of my 1,000 plus Continental Divide slides were recklessly unorganized in storage where they’ve been for decades.

Well, I finally built up a tremendous amount of motivation, really got my head into it, and finally, after 40 years, retrieved the slides from storage.  To date, I have sorted through all of the Wyoming slides and have sent them off to be digitized.  So, (assuming coronavirus doesn’t hold them hostage), starting next week I will have a much better assortment of photos to go along with the stories.  And if you’re reading along, Thanks!

---

     August 15th & 16th                  West Yellowstone                  (Go to Pt 1) 
​
That night in Buffalo Meadows I started to think about how many ways this plan could go haywire.  What were we supposed to do if they didn’t show up?  How long were we willing to wait around for them?  And if they did show up what were we going to do with them, then?  

Craig and I were on a hard schedule and we needed to move fast through Yellowstone, but how many miles a day would these two greensticks be able to do?  Not nearly enough, that I knew for sure.  I went to sleep wondering why this had all sounded like such a great idea a few weeks ago.

Early the next morning Craig and I packed it down a good trail to the Upper Firehole Geyser Basin, crossing over the river to the boardwalk leading down to Old Faithful.  For the next while we meandered along a mile or so of other-worldly, geothermal spectacles so fantastically bizarre as to seem virtually unreal. 

Click on Map for a larger image

The spouting witches brew of the geyser basin seemed a fitting place to come out following the alien, zombie plateau we had just trekked across and I regretted not having the time to really stop and take it all in the way the features, colors and extraterrestrial landscapes deserved.

As Craig and I ambled along the boardwalk with the flow of tourists, we were repeatedly asked about ‘the backpacks’ to which Craig finally replied “Well, we are backpackers and right now, we’re out backpacking!” So, there ya go, and at that moment it was like the funniest thing I’d ever heard, and I busted out laughing.  Rude, I know.

We followed the boardwalk down to the Old Faithful Geyser then out to the Old Faithful Lodge and around to the main parking lot where if I’d made a bet on this, I would have lost money.  

Leaning up against a wood railing along the edge of the parking lot, in their brand-new hiking shorts and boots, with their brand-new Kelty backpacks all packed-up and ready to go were Dave and Murry, right on que, like no big deal.  After all, this was the plan, right? 

Well, as improbable as this rendezvous actually working out was, I don’t recall spending much time slapping each other on the back.  Craig and I did a quick inventory of their food and equipment to make sure they were prepared (they were) and then the four of us saddled up and started off for the Divide.

As for Dave and Murry, they were coming off of three days of exhausting travel with only bus-sleep to go on, and right out of the parking lot, under a blazing-hot sun, Craig and I marched them for almost 2 hours, up three-and-a-half miles of steep trail in a hot, dusty forest with me setting pace and Craig in the rear as the ‘cattle prod’.  

Finally reaching the top of a high plateau, the trail worked its way down to a small creek where we took a packs-off break.  Dave and Murry dropped their loads and melted into the reeds next to the stream, looking like a couple of glazed donuts. We lingered about the creek for a while, waiting for the boys to recover enough to resume the march, then made our way for camp.

We set camp in the upper meadows of the Firehole River and didn’t have to coach Dave and Murry too much through their initial, camp set-up since they had both been backpacking before and this wasn’t completely new to them.  They managed to put their supper together then crawled into their tent, leaving dirty dishes for ‘later’.

It was the next morning when I had to coax them through pretty much everything, from getting their asses out of bed to just generally pulling their shit together so we could go.  Craig was patient and gave them a few tips on how to put their packs together a little more efficiently while I paced around offering ‘suggestions’ on how to speed the fuck up.

The sun was glaring before we even left camp and the push ahead was a repeat of the day before with 1,000 feet of elevation gain over five miles to reach Grants Pass in more hot, dusty lodgepole pines.
 
As we approached Grants Pass, still another five miles from camp, I could tell Dave and Murry were starting to feel it, but they plugged away and topped over the pass without a single complaint. If they were rubbing up blisters or needed to stop and take a leak they didn’t say, they just kept going until we said it was okay to stop.  

They understood by now that they were walking the Continental Divide, and this was not summer camp. I think they were genuinely concerned that if they didn’t keep up, Craig and I would leave them behind for good, and at some point, they would have been right.  So, the boys dogged out the miles and acted like they did this sort of thing all the time.

On the way down from Grants Pass to Shoshone Lake, we walked through the Shoshone Geyser Basin which is fascinating, to be sure, but pales to a pittance in comparison to the grandeur of the Firehole/Old Faithful Geyser Basin that Craig and I had walked through and which Dave and Murry never saw because their bus let off on the wrong side of the building.  

By going through the Shoshone Geyser Basin, Dave and Murry would at least get to see some geothermal activity while in Yellowstone with the only kink being, they were ready to make camp. They were tired, sunburned and struggling with their pack loads and as far as the ‘scenery’ was concerned they could barely give a shit, but hey, what’re you gonna do?

---

Go to Part 40

---

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.

---