Tag: triple crown

CDT Day 14: May 19, 2025

Start: Silver City

Stop: Gila Alternate mile 5.4

Today’s Miles: 13.2

Total CDT miles: 153.4

Man oh man, my bed at the Palace Hotel was definitely fit for a queen. I slept so good, even if I did toss and turn a good bit. I think maybe I’m not getting into a deep enough sleep, but I’ve been having this issue for awhile. 

I was up and getting ready by 6:45. We left our packs at the hotel and then walked to a Mexican food truck that serves breakfast burritos. Yall, I FINALLY got my damn burrito. And it was quite good! Chorizo, bacon, potatoes, eggs, sour cream, and cheese. Yum. Pebbles got the same, and we ate them across the street at the bus stop.

A few minutes after demolishing our burritos, the bus came. The driver didn’t even charge us! Then again, he didn’t charge anyone else, either. Sweet! Thirty five minutes later, we were let out at Walmart. We had an hour, exactly, to get our resupply for the next 3 days, plus 4 days of food to mail ahead to Pie Town, and all of the other odds and ends we needed.

When I say we were down to the last second, I was running out of the store and Pebbles was asking the driver to wait for me when I came barreling out with my 3 grocery bags of things. The cashier had zero sense of urgency, and she was struggling with the scanner, lol! I had already resigned myself to needing to Uber back when I saw how long it was taking her to get the barcode of my ramen noodles just right. Haha, bless her though, because she did pack my bags perfectly. 

Anywho-no harm no foul-because I made it! It was the same driver, too. Not sure why I find that interesting, but I do. He was super nice and dropped us back off where we originally got on. We went back to the hotel, packed our stuff and organized everything to ship out-then checked out and walked over to the post office.

A box of small things to send home: my inflatable pillow, my travel eye mask, and a couple other small things that I can’t recall right now. The other stuff, food and extra toothpaste, was shoved into a medium priority box and shipped to Pie Town. We won’t be there for 12 more days (after today), but we’ll resupply at Doc Campbell’s in a few days. Apparently they do have a good resupply, just “pricey,” however, I doubt it’ll cost more to just buy food there than it would to pay $20 to ship it from the post office today. If it is, oh well-we’re supporting local businesses! 

We started walking to the gear shop in town, and thankfully, all of this so far has been a part of the trail, or at least, part of an alternate.. “Little Walnut Alternate.” I ended up getting new shoes from the gear store-Topos-since my Altras are literally already falling apart and my blisters are only seemingly getting worse. These Topos felt really comfortable in the store, a better fit overall compared to the Altras. Fingers crossed tight that they stay great! 

The guy at the store was wonderful, he gave me a tiny tube of super glue and some Velcro so I can make my gaiters stick to my new shoes. (I’m about to do that right now). We left the store and continued on Little Walnut, all the way to the Gila National Forest picnic sight. We had lunch, stretched, froze in the shade and wind and started sweating in the sunshine.. ohhhhh the perks of no humidity!

We had 7.5 miles at least to go, so we hiked out of the picnic area around 2:30pm. The trail hit the official Gila Alternate Trail (pronounced like Heelah) which basically was the continuation of the dirt road we were already on. It meandered through the forest, a few trucks went by us, the wind blew. It was really nice. And then the trail turned onto a forest service road. Whoever made this thing, clearly loved riding his ATV up and down and all around..  because this road/trail was a steep mess. Very loose sandy rocks, big ruts, steep inclines and even steeper declines. 

Once we made it to the spot we hoped our first “naturally running” water on trail would be.. our hopes were smashed as the riverbed was bone dry. The even sadder part: there was great camping right there, too! We checked our app, and according to the recent comments there would either be water in half a mile or a full mile away. Onwards we walked.

At the half mile mark, I decided to go down the bank and check-so many comments said “dry” while others right after would say “plenty of water here.” And there was good camping, too. There was a large pool of water, covered in algae of course. First “natural” water on trail, but definitely not flowing water! I was able to scoop 2 liters into my CNOC bag, even though it was nasty with lots of floaters in it.. and creepily 2 little swimmers. Thankfully, the filter works pure magic, because none of the gross stuff made it into my water bottles!

We set up our tents and had dinner.. potatoes, woo. While we were chatting, we heard some crashing about down near the water. I went to investigate: cows! I think they’re the same cows we scared earlier on trail.. they must have ran up this way. They sure are big ole skittish girls. That’s ok, though.. I was a big ole skittish girl when I first heard their crashing about! 

The sun is going to set behind the mountain, so it looks like we’ll be missing a cool sunset. It’s a little chilly and moths are absolutely all over my tent. I hope I don’t have to get out again tonight. My blisters are still rough, but the new shoes definitely seemed to not make them worse, maybe even helped some too, although I was limping some that last mile of hiking (also the reason I was determined to find water sooner rather than later-I didn’t want to walk any farther!). 

My thighs are also still chaffed, so I’m loaded up on new Destin diaper rash cream. Currently, it’s stinging, but maybe it’ll help here soon! I think that’s all I can come up with tonight. Tomorrow will be a bit over 16 miles if all goes as planned. And I think we’ll reach the Gila River at some point tomorrow, too! I’m excited and also nervous for the 8 trillion times we’ll have to cross the water.. maybe I’ll try to count it. Hmmmm..

Ok, that’s it for real! Good night!

CDT Day 13: May 18, 2025

Start: Burro Mountain Homestead

Stop: 1.5-Walnut Creek Alternate (Silver City)

Today’s Miles: 18

Total CDT miles: 140 

I tossed and turned all night, which was so very frustrating..  there was no real reason I couldn’t sleep, so, I’m assuming it was probably all the caffeine in the sodas I bought from the store Friday. Oh well. I’d drink another one right now if you handed me one.

We were up and out early to start our 18 mile road walk into Silver City. I definitely took advantage of the bathhouse before I left, though. Brushing your teeth with a mirror and running water is seriously underrated. 

We left the Burro Mountain Homestead from a different gate than the one we entered through. We followed an old jeep trail of a road until we met a nicer, well maintained dirt road. 6 miles later, we were walking down highway 90. This would bring us straight to Silver City!

Walking along the highway isn’t the most ideal, but with it being a Sunday, there wasn’t much traffic. We both waved at all the passing vehicles, and judged all 9 people that didn’t wave back. Pebbles played his playlist out loud that his friends all contributed to, which was hilarious and all very random. We sang along, with him doing a full on performance at one point, laughed and walked. The wind was steady, so the heat never got oppressive either. We ate lunch on the side of the highway under a tree. 

We made it to the outskirts of town by 1:15! I had to make a pit stop in a gas station bathroom before carrying on to our hotel in the historic downtown area. Once there, right at 2pm, we had to sit out front and wait about 25-30 minutes for the woman running the hotel to come downstairs to let us in. Once she did, we checked out our new room: a suite with 2 double beds and a separate living room. It was nice! 

The Palace Hotel is a historic landmark and is decorated in old Victorian style. Not sure how accurate that is, but you get the idea: lots of wood, burgundy and gold fabrics, heavy drapes.. old world feel to it. It was perfect for us, too. We were able to sprawl out all of our stuff in the living room and make our plan for Walmart in the morning, and never feeling like we were too dirty to touch anything.  

By 5:30, I was starving. We walked across the street to the Little Toad Creek Brewery. I ordered an espresso martini, only because the bartenders were having some sort of competition with their drinks this month, and then their version of a Ruben sandwich. New Mexico is known for their hatch green chiles, so, their Ruben has them incorporated in.. HOLY HELL it was to die for. I wish I could have eaten two! It also came with homemade chips, which I dipped in homemade ranch.. and I ended up getting a glass of red wine made in New Mexico, too. I enjoyed all of it!

Pebbles got cheese fries with some kind of meat-shredded beef maybe? That doesn’t sound right, but I don’t want to wake him to ask him.. either way-whatever that was-it was also delicious. 

After we ate and paid, we walked to a gas station with an ATM for me to get some cash. The breakfast food truck I’m eyeing for in the morning only accepts cash, and I need to have some on me anyway. 

Now, we’re back and both tucked in our super cozy beds. He’s out like a light when his head hits the pillow-I only seem to be that way at home these days, which is annoying. I used to be such a good sleeper anywhere. Now it’s more of struggle. Oh well. We have to be up by 7am to catch a bus to take us to Walmart. I better tuck in. Goodnight! 

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!