CO Trail Segment 3 and 4

It's been almost a week now since I got back from the start of my planned two week trip. I started with something rather nasty that just finally started clearing up in the last two days. So with another 30 miles of the Colorado Trail done, I'll make a post.



We set out on Saturday morning for our 3 day weekend of hiking. It's the longest I've spent out before, and it was enjoyable for the most part (the being sick wasn't enjoyable, it made things a good bit harder.) The main part I didn't like on all of Segment 3 was the bikers. It seemed like every 10 minutes we were getting off the trail to let a group of 4 or 5 pass in one direction or the other.





Due to the weather, most of the days weren't worth taking pictures on. I still managed 245, but, some didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped. The weather is also part of why I came home early. It rained/drizzled/sleeted for the better part of two days, and rained off and on at night.

We managed to pull off about 9 miles the first day, which was definitely more than I wanted to do, but wasn't too bad. We set up camp near a large rock, and gathered some firewood. This fire was pretty easy to get going and maintain. The wood wasn't too wet, dried quickly and burned nicely.





A while after we'd eaten dinner (which consisted of hot dogs, apple cider, and s'mores, carried up by Mike) by the fire it started to sprinkle again. We got our gear thrown in the tents and zipped them up, and got under the tarp just in time for the three or four minute downpour. Fortunately, the kept going through the rain, and we got to go back out and sit by it again, although the ground was a slight bit wet.

I turned in early that evening, around 8:00 or so. It was starting to get dark, but not quite there yet. This trip I'd decided to try my air pad instead of the one I had been carrying. I woke up a few times during the night, but not nearly as many times as usual on the other sleeping pad, so I'd say this one is a keeper for the rest of my trips.

We got out of camp about 9:30 the next morning, after a breakfast of eggs, cheese and pepperoni. Mike still claims he can't cook, but the eggs were good. We got off to a good start and got most of the way to segment 4 before noon. We ran into some people filling their water bottles at a stream and decided to fill up some for ourselves, and had some pleasant conversation with them.

We started Segment 4 about 11:300 that morning, and it seemed to be all up hill. Probably because it was all up hill the first day. The last 750 feet in gain was the worst for me. We finally worked it out that I could do 1/10th and take a 1.5 minute break. It's really hard to do any kind of work when your lungs are working at half capacity, at best. Add on top of that that it was sleeting and drizzling up through the trees, and there were a few flashes of lightening that got to about a 7 count before the thunder, it was quite miserable.






After we crested the ridge (at about 10,640 ft,) it was much easier. Except for walking through all the rain that had come down, and was still coming down a bit. Most of the time we were walking in a stream that followed the path through the forest. We came out of the forest and off the trail and joined back up to the old logging road we'd followed before. We didn't have to worry so much about the stream anymore, and the rain and lightening had stopped.

It was getting late, pushing on about 7:15 when we finally got camp started, after pulling out a 12 mile day. We put up the tarp and tents, and Mike took my folding bucket (new for this trip, worked great) down to the stream to collect water for dinner and breakfast, while I put the stakes in for the tents. We spent some time gathering firewood, which turned out to all be wet from the rain earlier, and I got a small fire going. It only lasted a couple hours, and didn't do enough to dry our clothes, but it was still a fire.

During the night, we heard the coyotes calling up and down the valley we were staying beside. We'd hear them at one end, then it'd echo the entire distance. We even heard them get a kill that night, though we never saw it the next day.



We broke camp and got out to a little earlier start, around 9:45 the next morning. That day I decided to try the Camelbak Elixir Tablets, and I've got to say they helped me a good bit. I'm disappointed I couldn't get my hands on the Camelbak Filter Adapter I was looking for for this trip. No one seems to stock it anymore, even though they claim they do (Permanent back order status.)



The last day of this trip flew past, it was almost no vertical elevation change (600 ft over 7 miles is almost nothing.) We ran into 4 other hikers that day. All of them had spent the night out in two different groups, both apparently lost, and hiking somewhere different than they thought they were, due to a broken compass. Two of them had seen our truck the day before, and one went with Mike to get it and bring it back for the rest of us.

We got to the end early, at about 2:00, only to find out the directions for leaving the truck were to the wrong spot. Luckily it only cost us about an hour of time to get to the truck.

All in all, it was a great trip. Tiring, but great. I hope to get my two weeks in sometime later this year, sooner rather than later.