When the Forest Service closed northern New Mexico they started a chain of events concerning the CDT. They closed about 250 miles of trail from Grants to Cumbres Pass. Everyone on the trail in New Mexico in that length of trail at that time had to get off, and for many it meant enter Colorado at Cumbres. This creates a bubble of people. People that might have been dispersed across Northern New Mexico now coalesced at Chama and started hiking from Cumbres Pass. I was included in that group. Today we saw the effect first hand. At one point there were 13 of us gathered at a bottle neck in the trail. In the middle of nowhere.
The wind did die down at night. Where yesterday afternoon it was yanking my tent stakes out of the ground, the night was calmer and my tent held. Nico, Enigma and I were packed and ready to go at 6:00am and started the climb. Once in top the trail undulated over brown meadows. We are too early in the season for the flowers and green grasses that will come later.
From where we camped it is 10 miles to a Elwood Pass and 17 from Elwood to Wolf Creek Pass where I hope to hitch a ride to Pagosa Springs to get my resupply box.
The alpine scenery was gorgeous. At one point we caught up with the group of 4 that had left camp about an hour before us. They were trying to go up and around a steep patch of snow. This proved fruitless as it cliffed out. The snow was not terribly steep, had softened with the morning sun and was sun cupped enough to provide good footing. I led the way onto the slope and around a rock corner, angling downward. I checked FarOut and found I was just below the trail. When Nico, Enigma and I clambered back up the rock we found the trail was snow free-you just couldn’t see it around the corner. The rest of the traverse was mostly exposed trail with a few snow patches across it.
We stopped for lunch at sunny, fairly wind free spot with a nearby creek. Enigma had stopped for a potty break and was a ways behind. He caught up as Nico and I were finishing.
The trail had now dropped to 11,300ish feet and we were back in the dead pine forest and that means blowdowns across the trail. That coupled with the lingering snow patches makes the hiking feel more like an army training course.
I noticed that from our position on the trail we had a clear view down a valley that I supposed led to Pagosa Springs. I took my phone off airplane mode and soon had two bars of service. Text messages and emails started pouring in. I uploaded a blog. Also, I checked the weather. Thunder storms were predicted between 4 and 8 along with snow. We still had a ways to go. We headed back down the trail with new intensity. Those white clouds that had playfully blocking the sun were now menacing.
With the wind howling and the sky getting ever darker we stopped at Bonito Pass, the lowest ground we could find. Loft the trail to the east 50 yards were some nice level places to set up tents . . . Surrounded by dead trees. What are we to do, set up tents in the open meadow where the wind will whip them to shreds or park them beneath dead pine trees and hope they don’t fall on us during the windy night. We chose death by crushing over death by exposure.
Once snuggled in my tent and ignoring the dead trees surrounding me like towering dominoes waiting to fall I cooked dinner and wrote in my blog. Soon thunder boomed above and ice pellets the size of peas rained down on us. The hail turned to snow during the night and we woke to half an inch on the ground. Enigma prefers a tarp and usually cowboy camps. Tonight he set up his tarp to keep the predicted snow off. He pitched it low to avoid the wind but this meant the snow’s weight collapsed the tent onto his sleeping bag causing it to get wet during the night.
My new tent performed exceptionally well both with the wind and the hail and snow. Very pleased about that.
The valley we camped in to avoid climbing up into the wind and exposure.
The trail is buried beneath all this snow. I emerges again over at the skyline ridge.
A snowy entrance onto the trail carved into the cliff.
Enigma and Nico on the trail/ledge.
Groups got condensed by the closing of Northern New Mexico and again by the tricky ledge.
Nico and a trail marker.
You need to camp In the trees for protection from the wind but all the trees are dead and potentially deadly. What would you do? That’s my blue tent next to the dead snag.
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