We start to hit snow pretty quickly. The trail is no Sierra PCT… We travel high and higher. Out of Chama, the trail/route doesn’t drop below 11,000 feet for 70 miles. The CDT just kicked it up a notch.

The miles are much slower and more arduous… We’re on trail about 5% of the time. I spend my days carefully dropping from passes, finding the safest way up to ridgelines, kicking steps on steep slopes, clutching my axe, and staring down (and stumbling over) sun cups.

There’s no point in trying to stay on top of the trail, so we pick our own paths into each basin and up to each pass. Nav is a lot easier when you’re in a group of people.

We must plan our camp locations strategically in order to avoid reaching passes at the end of the day. This often means breaking for camp as early as 5 pm… We don’t really know what to do with all of our free time. Our mileage is dictated by the geography – it’s difficult to plan food.

The passes are incredible and it’s hard to believe I’m finally climbing through the San Juans. These mountains are immense and humbling, it takes us hours to traverse each basin.

I’m wearing Altra Lone Peak 3.0 trail runners with 5 mil neoprene wetsuit socks. Aside from a hardshell mountain boot, I don’t know of any other waterproof footwear option in these conditions. My feet will be wet in the snow and the knee deep streams, but they will be warm.

On day four out of Chama we climb to high alpine plateaus.

Eventually the route dips and changes aspect. The snow begins to thin and we see trail again. No, nav, no postholing, no steeps, we start to cruise again.

At noon I plant the seed to my buddy, “we could make it to Pagosa today”. There’s more snow, a ski resort to climb over, and hundreds of blow downs but we make it to Wolf Creek pass at 7 pm.

We don’t even stick out or thumbs, someone rolls up and drives us to the brewery. 15 hours earlier we woke up at 11,500 feet, 29 miles later and now we’re at the Riff Raff brewery. One of those epics… We are so beat up.

There’s a music festival on town so we camp in the park by the river. The next day we’re walking around dazed ad still unshowered when we meet a wonderful couple that offers to put us up for the night. Thank you so much to the Nemeths for my most comfortable night on trail yet. Really amazing hospitality for my first Colorado town, can’t thank them enough!

Looking forward to more San Juan’s in this next stretch to Silverton. More snow yet to come.

I walk out of the desert one last time, climbing for hours above the mesas and slick rock of the Georgia O’Keefe landscape below. False summits as I climb from 6,000 to over 10,000 ft.

The trail turns into meadows interspersed with willow trees. The climbing creates an appetite and I eat all my good food on day one.

I start to hit snow up here, and I have views of snow capped peaks just over in Colorado.

I get to the border on Tuesday. The border isn’t really anything… Just some imaginary line… But it makes me think back to that first day putting my foot into Mexico, the freezing nights, the gallons of sweat, the cow screams, the the gallons of ice cream, the falls, the blistering sun, the ghost towns, the cow shit water, the road walks, the bloody legs, the gas station coffee, the night hiking, the postholing, the sleep deprivation, the people I’ve met etc etc etc.

(CO border!)

After the trail crosses into Colorado, I hitch back to New Mexico (what a tease) to Chama for resupply. My hitch is a couple that belong to “Twelve Tribes”. I Google this group and the first autocomplete result is “Twelve Tribes cult”. Nice folks. Gonna visit.
Where is the trail… Let’s just pick a direction.

My wonderful parents (two of my four readers of my blog!) sent out my snow gear for the San Juans to Chama. Micro crampons, snow shoes, ice axe, warmer clothing…

I hiked most of New Mexico solo, camping solo, and meeting up with hikers in town. I’ll change my style as I enter the San Juan mountains, go in with a group of 4-6, lean on each other for added safety, learn from each other’s mistakes, aggregate our mountaineering experience. Everyone has a mish mash of snow gear, we’ll see who’s got the best kit.

Excited, prepared to be humbled, nervous, fired up, craving the intensity, respecting the mountains. We’re up against a beast. The range is currently sitting at 242% of median snowpack for June 6. People are making it through but we’re aware of all bail out options.

Loving it out here. Talk to me in a week. 🙂

Oh and I’m in town for a basketball game!! Hooray!