The CDT is certainly hard work and some technical know-how about being out there for extended periods of time. At the same time, it’s all become quite predictable after the wealth of information we have at our hands, including on line updates about important aspects like trail conditions or water availability. You typically leave town knowing how long it will take to get to the next.
Water in the dry grasslands
There’s little room for any real adventure, in the sense of some unpredictability. I know this is not exactly true but you get the picture. This is not necessarily bad, in fact it’s an environment that I like so I can concentrate on other aspects of the trip like the changing of the seasons or my internal musings for which the act of walking is a real booster when all I have to do is to follow a trail.
I guess, and this only a guess, I was still missing some challenge or maybe it was the cool factor about completing not only the CDT but also the main trail in a single season, something not necessarily meaningful but that I somehow fancied, or so I think. South of Grants, New Mexico, the CDT becomes a mess of options with the main trail apparently the less popular among hikers. I decided to go that way.
I come from spending two of the toughest weeks of my live while hiking Southern New Mexico and certainly what’s been the hardest sections of the CDT for me. From rough trails to no trails at all, onto the uncertainty and subsequent mental pressure of not knowing where water would be found because nobody seems to hike these trails in the fall and there’s no hints of previous hiker experience information. It’s been tough to the point that many times I wondered whether it had been a good idea.
This is 6 kg
Somewhere through the Black Range of New Mexico I felt I was actually doing the right thing and, let me say this, I felt rather proud of myself. Not for doing it but for daring to do. I’m not the adventurer kind but sometimes there’s something about pushing limits, get off you comfort zone and all that stuff that seems to make life worthwhile. It feels good now.
I’m in Silver City, New Mexico. Roughly one week to go and finish the Continental Divide Trail.
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