It begins!
I have arrived in Lordsburg New Mexico! Today has consisted of two flights and two greyhounds, starting at around four am, so needless to say I am very, very tired.
Overall 10% of me feels terrified, 10% insanely excited and the other 80% doesn’t think it is actually happening. Pretty hard to comprehend than I am walking 3,000 miles from one imaginary boarder to the other for no tangible reason. But alas, I am. Maybe sometime it will hit me.
I have already met the driver or the shuttle that will take me to the trail head at 6am tomorrow. He sold me some fuel and gave me info about water sources, so that made it seem somewhat real. Other than that, I have yet to meet any other hikers, but I hear the shuttle is full so that means I will start with nine other people! I am excited and a little nervous to meet the others.
Things I am excited for:
- Potentially meeting a javelina
- Getting to experience the desert
- Cowboy camping (camping under the stars with no tent, easier to do in the desert than other places I’ve camped)
- See a rattlesnake!
- Getting a trail name
- ACTUALLY DOING IT
Things I miss already:
- Friends, the sparkle, and my besties (DUH!)
- My magic bullet
- Hot102 (aka the best radio station of all time)
Days 1 – 4
I made it to Silver City!!! What an adventure it has been already.
I hopped, on the shuttle to the trail head. It just so happened that I started with six other women, the most solo women to ever start the CDT in one day! It was pretty exciting. The first day was pretty straight forward but pretty darn hot! We all made it to the first water cache, 14 miles from the start. I decided to camp a little bit away from the group to have some alone time and journal. The next day was one of the more difficult days. The trail took us up and down arroyos (gullies) and it was insanely hot! I also got a thorn stuck all the way underneath my big toenail and my toe. It was HORRIBLE! So I sat under the horrible sun and did some minor surgery. I then hiked on for a total of 15 more trail miles, even though my hiker buddy’s pedometer said we actually walked 24 miles. Extra miles were added on because we were looking for the trail markers. Day three through five were pretty uneventful, apart from terrrrrrible blisters only on my right foot (shout out to my left foot for being blister free!!!) and a huge wind storm on night four. I was camped alone and could not for the life of me get my tent up, I felt so defeated. I was worried it would rain on me so I slept in my sleeping bag under my rain fly. It was one of the worst trail nights I’ve ever had!! But alas I woke up and had a long day to Lordsburg and stayed in a hotel with my other trail mates.
Lordsburg to Silver City was great! I ended up leaving the group I started with… It just didn’t feel right to be traveling with them for some reason. So I have been hiking alone for three days and it feels awesome. I have bumped into an older couple here and there, but I’ve just been doing whatever I want whenever I want! It is exciting! I am happy with how confident I feel hiking and being alone. The landscape from Lordsburg to Silver City has changed dramatically! It is higher elevation and there are trees!! And lush plants! AND SHADE! So exciting. I have loved the beginning of the Gila Forest and I am excited to hike the next section to Pie Town, NM and see what more changes are to come.
Exciting moments:
- Reaching mile 100!
- SEEING JAVELINAS (it was better than I ever could have dreamed. It was a pack of about 6-8 sprinting across the path away from me! They looked like mini pig dinosaurs)
- Three minutes after getting to Silver City someone handed me a burrito from their car. It was an incredible moment.
- Riding a horse! (I really don’t know how this happened. I was stumbling through a conversation with two Spanish speaking ranchers and I think they said they would give me a ride on their horse so I hopped on!)
One time in the first couple days of insane heat a cloud went over the sun!
Days 5 – 16
Ah yes, traveling by foot is quite brutal and my feet have swollen to a bizarre size, meaning my shoes, that were already one size bigger than I wear normally, are so tight that I have insane blisters, and my feet literally are bursting out of my shoes at the seams. My socks lasted longer than my shoes! I’ll spare y’all anymore details, and don’t worry, I have huge clown shoes being shipped to the next town (only four more days) so I will be ok.
I have made it about four hundred miles! Faster than I thought I would travel, even with 
the torn up feet. Right now I am in Pie Town, New Mexico, a town of under 200: basically a post office, three churches and three pie shops and an awesome hiker hostel. Very awesome people! Everyone wants to talk to the hikers and hear our stories and WE ARE EATING SO MUCH PIE! Yum yum.
From Silver City to Pie Town was pretty amazing. It was one of the longer stretches without a town, so it felt good to take a shower for sure! I traveled through the Gila National Forest. Really, really, really cool! I highly recommend going to Silver City for a vacation and checking out the cliff dwellings and going to Jordan hot springs for an overnight! It was amazing.
The route we took through the Gila National Forest was up the Gila River. The river is in an impressive canyon, and it is so full of life! So many beautiful sycamore trees. The path goes across the Gila River around 215 times, so my feet were constantly wet and numb. Usually wet and numb feet sound awful, but trust me, it was a blessing. The river section definitely made me miss paddling. Hiking is wonderful and I love how true and raw it is to be walking every day, but overall, the Gila made me realize that I am a paddler that is taking a hike.
After the river section, I ended up back in cow country, back to monitoring water sources and blistering heat. It was not as hot as the first week, but I definitely missed the river. Overall, the weather has been colder than usual in the area. Lots of hot, hot days and cold, cold nights. The last couple days have actually been very cold, and it snowed yesterday! One night it stormed when I was on top of a mountain. It spooked me a little, but I got my shelter up with ease even in the high winds.
My big news is that I now have a trail name! It is Polar Bear. It was given to me because I was complaining about how much I missed the Arctic on a very hot day. The man that named me is pretty incredible. His trail name is Elusive and he is 72 years old and has been traveling by foot, boat, or bike since 2014. Get out there whoever you are!
The animal update is more elk, and a baby rattle snake. I am one of the only hikers I’ve talked to that has yet to see an adult, they must be afraid of me!
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