Tag: female hiker

CDT Day 11: May 16, 2025

Start: 114.3

Stop: 122.1

Today’s Miles: 7.8

Total CDT miles: 122.2

I was awake by 6am, calling the vet-attempting to be quiet. Home is 2 hours ahead, so it was 8am there and the vet’s office was open. The doctor that saw Molly yesterday wasn’t working today, but the doctor coming in at 10 would review everything and call me back. Crap. If I needed to come home, this was the easiest place to hitch back to Lordsburg from.. but, when I called mom and talked with her about it, she said I should just keep hiking today and she’d talk with them and have them call me. Service is looking good, and today was a short day anyway-so, I packed up to hike ahead.

I talked with Aunt Kathy while I walked, Pebbles way ahead of me, since 5 miles of this almost 8 for the day were going to be straight up. I walked slowly, taking little mini breaks every 5-10 minutes. This feels like the first real elevation gain of the whole trail. And, to my surprise, even with the pounding of my heart and the huffing of my breath-I liked it. The trail today had the most trees so far this hike-and man, I’d missed them! 

There were pretty overlooks of the surrounding mountains and valleys, there were lizards and birds galore-but the trees had me smiling, even in all my sadness over Molly. I’d sip my water, stare out at my surroundings from the shade of a tree on trail, then push on. A little before 10am, I decided that at 10am I was going to find somewhere to sit down for a while. To my shock, at 10am I was passing through the gate that signaled the top of the climb! 

I really thought I was moving much slower than that. Less than 3 miles to go! So, I picked up my pace a little bit. The downhill was steep in sections and poorly maintained in others. I walked through a pine forest, making me the happiest I’ve been all day, and then eventually I got to the junction that leads to the Burro Mountain Homestead we were heading to. Pebbles was sitting there waiting for me.

When I asked him how long he’d been waiting, I just knew he was going to say 45 minutes to an hour-but it was only 10 minutes or so. Hmm. Maybe I wasn’t moving as slow as I thought I was-or maybe he took a long break earlier in the morning. Either way, I was just glad he hadn’t been waiting forever on me. 

We walked the last mile together, eventually going through a gate on the back end of this community. The Burro Mountain Homestead looks like a regular RV park, but it’s a permanent community. So, all of the RVs have been winterized and have wooden porches attached, along with garages and gated yards. It looked pretty dang nice! Most of the garages had ATVs parked under them. 

We walked down to the main office, and the woman working there, Heidi, was incredible. She gave us a mini tour: rec room with WiFi and kitchenette, corral with refrigerators/freezers/microwave, and tons of tables, and the bathhouse. She also told us where we could camp and she confirmed that for CDT hikers camping and showers are free! We bought some microwaveable pizzas from her, along with drinks and ice cream, and headed over to the rec room to take advantage of the microwave there, and the WiFi.

I didn’t hear back about Molly until late afternoon. By the time I did, Pebbles and I had destroyed our frozen pizzas, showered, and had been hanging out on the rec room patio in cushy chairs enjoying the internet for hours. 

The vet’s office we use is truly great. The lady I spoke with didn’t think that it was quite Molly’s time yet, although she reiterated many times how quickly this can change. But for now, she’s eating, drinking, peeing and pooping, and doesn’t appear to be in any pain whatsoever. When these things change or stop, then it will be time-and she gently let me know that there was a big chance that it would be a fast decline and making Molly wait for my arrival may not be in her best interest. 

I so appreciate her honesty and the time she spent with me on the phone, even if the things she was telling me what heartbreaking for me to hear. She took her time and answered my questions, sometimes more than once when I needed clarification. There’s a big chance I won’t be there when it’s Molly’s time to go, and dammit that hurts so much. 

 I talked to mom and Aunt Kathy. They both agree that there’s no reason to rush home right now. So, I’m staying put. Actually, Pebbles and I decided we’ll take our first zero tomorrow.. since it’s free camping here, and we’d have to zero somewhere this weekend regardless. 

We have to mail out packages to Pie Town, a small town without a resupply store that’s coming up within the next 10 days. Silver City is 18 miles away from us here, and has a Walmart. With today being Friday, we’ll zero tomorrow, then Sunday hike the 18 miles to Silver City (and get to sleep in a REAL BED!!) and then go to Walmart and mail out our packages on Monday before hiking out of town. 

Yall know I love a hotel, bed, restaurant, wine.. but Pebbles is doing his best to keep me on budget, and camping here is free.. and it does have WiFi-so hopefully I can get up some posts for this blog I write every day! Ha! We’ll see.

We’re camping under some big gorgeous trees, and there are deer all over. This is quite the peaceful place to have a zero, reflect, rest. My chaffed thighs and blistered feet are quite happy to know I won’t be hiking tomorrow! 

Sweet dreams, yall. 

CDT Day 9: May 14, 2025

Start: 83.7

Stop: 99.2 

Today’s Miles: 15.5

Total CDT miles: 99.2

We didn’t wake up until 7am, and then started to pack. Pebbles went down to the continental breakfast offered by the motel while I finished up, and then when we were starting our hike out of town (the trail goes straight through town and then down to 2 different highways before cutting through some huge cattle fields), I popped into the McDonalds to get an egg and cheese biscuit to go, while Pebbles carried on hiking. 

I ate and walked and turned on an audiobook. I also had a 1.5 liter Mountain Dew that I was sipping on-please judge me here, I deserve it-and I was on cloud 9. A biscuit in the morning is my favorite breakfast, and I will choose that every single time. I was so content! 

The road walk through town wasn’t bad, and then the road walks down the sides of the small highways weren’t bad either-although if it were later in the morning, I could see how being next to the asphalt would get very hot, very fast. A potential danger to consider for sure, since the CDT has way more road walking on it than the other 2 long trails I’ve done. 

I had caught up to Pebbles and then got ahead of him a little ways while hiking along HWY 90, when I realized we missed our turn for the big cattle fields.. crap. We had passed it by a good bit-with the road walking being easy and flat, so we decided to climb under the barbed wire fence and walk at a diagonal to meet the trail. I got all kinds of tiny sharp things jabbed into my hands and shirt, thankfully my legs made it out unscathed. 

That several miles through desert scrub brush and soft sand put a damper on my mood. The trail was a pain to find then a pain to follow-we both kept going off in wrong directions on cattle trails or tire trails by accident, only to look at the map in the app to realize we were way off. Then we’d have to meander in the right direction and hunt for the trail. It was irritating. I finished my audiobook and turned on some music, so that gave me the boost to keep it moving. 

Sometime midday, just before we decided to stop for lunch and of course right as we’re bushwhacking across desert sand to find our trail again, my right foot stabs me with the sharpest pain.. I knew instantly what it was.. my tiny blister under my big toe just expanded over the ball of my foot! It was a tearing sharp stinging that could only mean that the fluid trapped in that blister pushed farther through the layers of skin, making the blister grow dramatically. It flipping HURT! 

I limped along after Pebbles, going from a good 3 ish miles per hour minimum to a slow 1.5 to 1.8 miles per hour. I was hurting, bad.  And each limp made me realize that I was just going to be causing more blisters to do the same on the other foot, since it was now taking the majority of the weight burden. My pack is heavy, 5 days of food and almost 4 liters of water.. it adds up in weight fast. Thankfully, Pebbles found a bush that offered some shade, so we stopped for lunch and I was able to get out of my socks and shoes to let my feet rest. 

I had a bagel with Swiss cheese (the only cheese available at the Family Dollar), pepperoni slices, brown/spicy mustard, and some Doritos for crunch.. it was pretty dang delicious. And then I also ate some Doritos by themselves, too. My feet were throbbing but overall, everything was starting to feel better. 

The wind seemed to really pick up during and after lunch.. and even still right now as I lay in my tent and type this. We were in a severe weather advisory for the wind.. but apparently it’s supposed to chill out tonight (fingers crossed our tents stay staked down!). And I was so slow moving, even when the pain started to either subside or I had gotten used to it, I just couldn’t pick up the pace. When we got to the first and only water source for the day, a windmill/cow trough tank thing.. the cows were EVERYWHERE, and the mamas were not happy with us being there!

We had to talk to them and get them to ease out of our way so we could refill our water for tonight and for the first 8 miles tomorrow too, so 4L for each of us. Some of the calves kept mooing at us-it felt like they were tattle-tailing on us. Punks. There were also a ton of yellow jackets buzzing around right by the fence where the trough was, so that was fun. We didn’t want to make any sudden movements or loud noises and scare the cows completely, and maybe have a mama charge us. Thankfully, we and all the cows survived. 

We loaded back up and started walking again, with hopes of setting up camp at the first semi decent flat spots away from the cows. We ended up going another half mile before deciding on where we are now-and it’s pretty nice, minus the ridiculous wind. We were able to get our tents up, but had to put big rocks over all the stakes because of the soft sand and the high wind. I hope they stay put!

I unpacked and made dinner, a peak refuel meal: chicken Alfredo. It was also incredibly good. I’ve had a great day of good meals! That’s always a positive. And the peak refuel remain my favorite dehydrated meals. We still have 30 minutes until the sun sets. Pebbles is doing his stretches so his tendinitis hopefully doesn’t flair back up, and I’m laying here wondering if I should go around and tighten up all my tent guy-lines again. Hmmmm. 

Tomorrow the plan is for 15+ miles again, but we’ll hit a water source around 8 miles and then again around the 15 mark. Yay for toting less water! It’s a little chilly right now, so I think I’ll probably sleep pretty dang good! Which is what I plan to do once I watch this sunset! Sweet dreams, y’all! 

CDT Day 7: May 12, 2025

Start: 14.2

Stop: 0

Today’s Miles: 14.2

Total CDT miles: 82.6

We ended up leaving camp around 6:30 this morning, one of our earliest mornings yet-but today was supposed to get HOT. Getting as many miles in before it gets miserable is always a good idea. 

We made fast miles of the morning, and by the time the sun was fully blazing around 11am, we were on the hunt for some shade. We finally found a little gully with bushes on top that we ducked into, hoping for more shade than we got. 

We propped up our umbrellas, but the wind was relentless. I ended up holding mine over my legs while I ate. It didn’t go so well. And, for the record, while I’m complaining-I’m so sick of PB&Js. 

Anyway-while we sat in our slightly shaded alcove, we watched some of the day’s northbound hikers go by. They’d stop and chit chat for a second, and then carry on, their first day of hiking the CDT- excitement all over their faces. 

I packed up kind of quick, since my legs were still getting too much sun and remained on absolute fire. Pebble’s nice sunscreen had decided to no longer block these devil rays and I was trying my best to not make the rashy welts worse. 

Pebbles caught up to me at the last water cache (he stayed to stretch and whatnot once I started walking after lunch). He pointed out some trees off trail a little bit, so we went in hunt of their shade, in hopes of waiting out the heat of the day. We only had 2 more miles to the border, and our shuttle won’t come until tomorrow at 9:30am.. we had TONS of time to kill.

The trees had very low hanging branches. We started under one, then the sun shifted in the sky and we were roasting, so we moved to another.. when it happened again, I got fed up and told Pebbles I was going to the border and praying the pavilion we’ve heard about meant guaranteed shade. 

I made it there sometime just after 2pm. And thank God almighty, the little “pavilion” had some real shade! I snapped some pictures of the monument and the pavilion, pulled out my ground sheet and plopped down in the cool shade. The wind was only getting stronger as I laid out, feet bare, happy to be hidden from the sun. 

Pebbles showed up within 30 minutes or so. It wasn’t very long of the two of us hanging out in the shade that we realized how bored we were about to be for the next 18+ hours. Holy hell. Zero cell service. A small square of shade. No more water. The only entertainment for quite a while was waving at the very few trucks that passed by on the other side of the border!

Here at the Crazy Cook Monument and CDT “southernmost point,” the border between the USA and Mexico is a short, barbed wire fence, with a broken gate right at the monument. At one point, bored, I was able to step over easily into Mexico. I sort of love that this is how it is here, a fence but not one that felt unwelcoming to either side. The Mexican side of the border looked like a huge agricultural ranch-lots of greenery and water irrigation systems running. Hell, I considered running through one of their sprinklers because it’s so flippin hot over here.

The entire time we waited for the sun to set, not one car came down the USA side of the border. I walked up to where the road turns to see the stone marking “Crazy Cook,” and still- not a soul on our side-every single driver that went by on the Mexico side politely waved back to me when they passed, one tractor trailer even tooted his horn. 

The Crazy Cook stone said something along the lines of Crazy Cook killed a guy named Frank with an axe in cold blooded murder.. wild. I should have looked up more about this-but alas-no service.

We ate our dinner, in the blowing wind, and for some mild entertainment, Pebbles agreed to let me play my audiobook out loud. It’s Freida McFadden’s “The Crash,” and while the main characters of her books almost always make me want to yank out my hair-this one was doing its job of making the time pass. At least Pebbles was on the same page I was when we’d roll our eyes and do an, “oh my god, she can’t be serious.” 

We decided there would be no possible way to set our tents up in this crazy wind. So, we’re cowboy camping under the pavilion. If I get up to go pee, I’m have to put my pack on my sleeping pad so it doesn’t blow away. Bless it. Counting down the hours! One sleep, and then around 9:30am the shuttle will be here to drop off new hikers and to take us back to Lordsburg. I think we both want to stay at the EconoLodge tomorrow night, we’ll see if that changes between now and getting there. We have to pick up our food from there regardless. And since we’re there, a shower and laundry would be heavenly after this crazy wind has done nothing but blown dirt in my face. Ha.

Ok, sorry this one comes off like one long gripe. I bet my mood will change completely after a shower! Goodnight, y’all.