Day 25: Coyotes at night, lightening in the afternoon

CW-5, ~13 miles

It's after midnight. I wake suddenly and hear coyotes outside, yodeling. Granite is asleep. I fumble for the headlamp and shoes and step out into the darkness. They coyotes were so close before and now they're silent. I imagine they're watching me from the inky darkness as I pee and hurry back to the tent.

Morning comes cold and bright. I'm very slow to leave the tent and Granite pokes his head in, saying something about a long day and how happy we'll be if we head out early.

I throw my things in my pack and leave the tent. It's a bit after 8 and I am filled with frustration, even as I drink a bit of tea and eat a tiny breakfast bar. Granite packs up and leaves and I follow, walking by 8:30.

I'm frustrated because we don't actually have a long day. Under 14 miles today, tomorrow, and then the next day a 7 mile day—then done. We have less than 50 miles to Cottonwood Pass, and today is Tuesday. One week from today I'll be walking into the office, checking email.

Don't get me wrong, I love my job. I love that I get to do my job at all, and that someone pays be for it makes it doubly amazing.

But I'm not done with this trail.

I don't just mean in the thru hiker sense—I've done around 300 miles, or will at Cottonwood, and there are maybe 200 to go to finish all of the Colorado Trail. I mean that I'm not finished. There's more I want from this rugged, mountainy trail. More nights in wool socks. More perfect mountain streams to drink from. More that I need to learn from the trail, about the world and life and myself.

The hike up Fooses Creek is steep and painful. But the view from the top is worth it—hazy green hillsides cascaded into the distance on my left, craggy, pointy mountain peaks for miles on my right.

Granite is on the ridge. He has signal and he manages to call the Dawn Cafe in Salida. They found his fancy camera and the Rocky Mountain Taxi Company will bring it up to the Monarch Crest Store for $50. He's thrilled and I'm glad as well—all our trail photos, returned.

He hurries ahead and I take my time, enjoying the wild and heart-rending views in both directions. The day stays cool even though it's sunny, and there are mountain bikers galore to dodge.

I keep thinking, I'm not done yet.

Granite and I reconnect for the descent down to the Monarch Crest Store. I catch Granite just as he is stopping to converse with a hiker named Mellow. Mellow had picked up Granite's journal on Hope Pass and had carried it for a few days. Our change of plans brought us into contact with him, and he also slowed and came off the trail because of the storms.

We arrive before noon, long before the taxi will arrive, and walk under a gondola that lifts people in colorful carts to the top of the mountain. We stop in and find an older man manning the machinery. He says it's $10 to ride.

I walk into the Monarch Crest Store alone, Granite doing something outside. This weird little store is right on the Continental Divide Trail, at a junction where the trail crosses a busy road. I've been curious and excited about the store, but tried not to hope for too much.

The store is sprawling with knick knacks and souvenirs, stuffed plush animals and gemstones. But by eyes are pulled to the back—a tiny cafe advertising homemade ice cream and fudge. There's a popcorn maker, rows of chips, a coffee maker. I head back.

"Miss," the woman at the register pulls my attention. I pause. "There's a spot up there where you can drop your back, and an electrical outlet to charge your devices."

I nod thanks and reverse course. There's a wide bench to sit and I take off my pack. I plug my phone into the wall socket and read the welcome note to thru hikers. There's a trail register and I write our names in, and there's a bin of free hiker stuff. Small things, but these little services make a world of difference. This place wants thru hikers to feel welcome. 

I order vanilla fudge ice cream and Granite joins me and orders nachos. Soon my head is swimming; I'm dizzy from sugar. I have every intention of eating all the ice cream anyway but it defeats me and I hand it over to Granite, who happily eats the rest. I order a BLT without bacon and with cheese, and I eat that. Less sugar, less head spinning.

The taxi arrives and Granite is reunited with his camera. It's an especially lucky day because Granite got both the camera and the journal back.

We celebrate by riding the gondola, looking at all the mountains around us. So many and we're only climbing a few. At the top, there's an observation room with windows on all sides and a painted yellow line on the floor labelled "Continental Divide."

We ride down the gondola and see lightening storms in the distance. The man at the controls on the ground asks if we'll wait for the storms to pass, but we say we are pressing on.

When you ride the gondola, you get a ticket for a free bag of popcorn from the gift shop. Granite goes in to get one, but I'm still too full from ice cream.

There are dark storm clouds brewing when we cross the busy road to the trail. It's marked with the cheery double signs—Continental Divide Trail and Colorado Trail. I love those two signs, cozied up next to each other on posts and trees, once even painted on a rock. They're called "confidence markers," and I can think of no better name.

Granite left his trekking poles at the Monarch Crest Store (he is not having luck on this trip), so he goes back for them while I head up. He warns me about lightening; we're headed into an area with little tree cover and the thunder is ominous.

There's a blue-black cloud roiling up just behind me, and I can see the haze of rain shadows to the right and left. The weather matches my mood. I'm still dwelling anxiously on how few miles are left in the trip. We should have been more aggressive, tackling more in these short 4 weeks. Or I should have negotiated for more time. I used all my vacation but maybe I could have taken unpaid leave. But then I remember I have a new employee starting, and another position to hire for. Even though I've taken my work email off my phone, applicants have been finding my personal email account and sending me notes. I need to go back.

But like a tooth that's loose or a mosquito bite, I work at it, coming back again and again in my mind. I'm not finished.

Granite catches me and I'm annoyed at the ease with which he always catches me, which I attribute entirely to his long legs because of the two of us, I work out about 7 more days a week than he does. I'm frustrated at how easy things are for him, when it doesn't feel like he earned it.

And I know I'm not really annoyed at him at all. I'm sad the trip is ending and I'm so unfinished. He asks me what's wrong and I tell him. He tells me there are countless places to backpack in a lifetime, and this isn't really an end. And he tells me the Colorado Trail is entirely arbitrary, it's just two points and a line in between.

But I think he doesn't understand. He left his job a year or so ago to write and teach and explore the world, and the only things stopping him from completing the CT is his own whim. He doesn't want to be out here longer.

I let him go ahead and I follow when I can't see him anymore. I climb through Monarch Ski Resort, looking at all the strange slope names marked for skiers when there's no snow. I pass other thru hikers going the opposite direction, wave, say hello, make small talk.

It's beautiful. For all my mood is brooding and dismal, nature opens up here. There are wide valleys, curved mountain tops, and sky that make you realize how tiny, how utterly insignificant we all are. It works at my mood slowly, like the ocean pulling sand off the shore.

Granite meets me at the treeline. Just behind us, the blue-black cloud is building and it crackles with lightening and grumbles with thunder. Huge rain clouds have built up to the left. All afternoon, we've been hit by scattered showers on the walk. We've got rain jackets and pack covers on.

I ask Granite if we should keep going.

"I'm torn," he says, "If we wait maybe the storms will blow over. Or maybe they'll catch us."

We stare back at the cloud, big as a city. But ahead are a few brighter blue spots to the sky. The storm hasn't caught us yet. And here there is nothing: no streams, no camping spots, not even a place flat enough to throw up a tent.

We keep going and it feels like we didn't make a decision so much as accept an inevitability. We have 4 miles exposed over treeline, a thunderstorm on our heels, and we lost several hours of precious daylight at the Monarch Crest Store so we can't dally.

The miles are breathtaking, green and rocky and alpine. We move quickly—for backpackers, anyway—and meet no one else. We walk close together for the first two miles, analyzing every seam of rock or distant stand of trees. Could we hide there if this storm catches us? Could we run down the mountain to those trees? But truthfully, there's almost nowhere to go. There's lightening behind and to the left of us, but somehow ahead it's sunny in spots. We move as fast as we can, headed toward those glints of sun on granite.

After two miles, we look back at the storm. It seems to be moving over the Continental Divide to the East, rather than following the mountain range up to the North and engulfing us. There are two huge rainbows on the edge of the storm.

Now we settle in for two more miles and we separate a bit, still on edge and listening to the distant thunder but less afraid for our lives. I want to be alone—the sound of Granite's labored breathing and the clacking of his poles on the rocks set me on edge. So I let him go ahead and walk a bit slower, drinking in the green mountains and the hazy, distant storms.

We weave our way down the mountainside to an alpine lake. It's already growing dark. There's little camping at the first lake so we move on another half mile to the next and here we find a sloping bit of dirt with a fire ring and tree stumps to sit on.

Granite sets up the tent while I fetch water and pee. My underwear is rust colored with blood again. I just finished my period, but apparently my uterus wants to bleed again. Maybe it's a weird reaction to altitude; spontaneous bleeding over 12,000 feet? Or maybe my uterus hates me. If nothing else, it may explain my dismal mood.

We make a quiet dinner—vegetable korma that we split, from a freeze dried packet we bought in Salida, and then I crawl into the tent. It's brutal cold. I heat a couple cups of hot water in the vestibule and put them in my gatorade bottle, then tuck it warm into the bottom of my sleeping bag.

We sleep without reading John Muir, saying little, not touching. There's lightening in the distance, and I can see it flashing through the walls of the tent.