i call them bear eyes, but really it’s the bear hour.  there is a certain time of night when dusk blurs to dark. what’s left of the light makes the whole forest come alive.  every tree, stump, rock and log threatens like a bear.  they all seem close, huge, and menacing.  its not a good time to get to your campsite.  especially not after you’ve read the “active bear” sign at the trail head and talked to the ranger about bear activity.  i was spooked.

ps.  the alternate title was : how two grown men are really just scared of the dark.

pss.  the bear update:  the bear rangers in yellowstone told us that 2009 was a remarkable year for the whitebark pine tree.  the whitebark pine cones are a major food source for the bears in that area.  after our night at the lake, we were told that most of the bears were staying up at high altitude for the pine cones and not bothering to come down to camp sites or dumpsters.  oddly enough, the colorado bear report was the opposite.  because of the wet western spring, the berries here weren’t able to develop properly.  all of the bears have migrated down into town dumpsters to make up for the nutrition they didn’t get from the woods.  so in the end, we’ve only seen one bear.  and really, that’s just fine with me.

ps.  greg salisbury is probably the nicest guy in encampment, wyoming.  he’s also the town taxidermist, a welder on a gas pipeline, the only guy who would pick us up hitch-hiking, and the mayor.  he let us pitch our tents in his yard and come in to take showers in his house.  he gave us a tour of the town and a tour of his taxidermy shop.  if you ever find yourself in encampment, you can meet the whole town between 8 and 10 am at the post office.  we had one man give us trail mix, one couple gave us money and one woman who told us, “i love you.”  quite a morning.  quite a little town.

pss.  the half-gallon challenge is the appalachian trail eating contest.  most every AT hiker tries to eat a half-gallon of ice cream in a single sitting at the trail half-way point.  the CDT doesn’t have a proper half-way point or an eating challenge, so as we walked through the great divide basin (the wyoming high desert), we pondered possibilities.  the list of ideas that didn’t make it are just as absurd, but we finally settled on the CDT-TDC.  **the continental divide trail – thirteen doughnut challenge.**  by steamboat springs, we’d completed around 1300 miles of trail which seemed about half of the roughly 2600 miles we are walking between canada and mexico.  we woke up early that saturday morning and went to the local city market.  adam, brett, and i all walked out with a quart/half gallon of milk/soy milk, a box of a dozen doughnuts and a single bag holding the 13th, the baker’s dozen.  there is so much more to this story, but suffice it to say, i am the ‘09 doughnut eating world champion.  i completed the CDT-TDC in just under an hour.  the bellyache lasted most of the next hour.  and the oddest sugar high you’ve ever heard about lasted the rest of the day.  (one day this story will bloom into ‘different strategies for winning an eating contest’ but until then…)

psss.  stealth camping, we’ve had our share.  we slept in the trees behind the driving range at a golf course.  (we filled up our water bottles at the local golf pro shop.  for a minute, we thought the gig was up.  we saw someone walking toward our dinner party in the woods.  we turned off our headlamps and stopped talking.  until we realized it was just someone out for a walk on the golf course.  that night, adam got hit by the sprinklers; i woke up with frost on my sleeping bag.)   we also slept on the cement floor of a warming hut at a high roadside mountain pass.  there were no camping signs posted on both doors and taped on most of the walls.  (the lights in the warming hut were set to motion sensors.  i pulled my hat down and wrapped my neck gaiter over my eyes.  i slept fine.  but adam slept terribly.  every time brett would roll over, every time adam got up to use the bathroom, each time the lights overhead would turn on and keep them awake even longer.  we had two women come in to use the bathrooms in the warming hut.  our hiding spots were so good they didn’t notice us, but they triggered the lights to come on.  and adam and brett woke up.  and i had to hear the story over breakfast the next morning.)

pssss.  i had already passed the roaring fork campground and the grand lake campground.  i was on my way to meet a friend at the big rock campground, and i was afraid i’d missed it.  there was an old log cabin in the middle of things.  i saw folks moving around so i decided to knock on the door.
me – “excuse me, sorry to bother, do you guys know where big rock campground is?”
adam menzie – “yup, just two blocks down the dirt road.”
me – “aww.  thanks.”
adam menzie – “wait, are you hiking the CDT?”
me – “ohh?  yeah?” (most people don’t know what the continental divide is, much less the national scenic trail.)
adam menzie – “great, hey.  come inside.  can we get you a sandwich or some water.  maybe a beer?”
me – “man, i’d love to.  but i’m meeting a friend and i’m a bit late.  she drove from boulder…”
adam menzie – “or maybe a hot shower?”
me – “i’d love to.  but.  i wish i could.  but i’m in a hurry.  i’m sorry.”
it hurt me, but i hurried down the road.  in the midst of that rush, i realized that adam was following me in his car.
adam menzie – “hey.  look.  if you guys haven’t paid for a camp spot already, you should come back and stay.”
me – “wow.  okay.  sure.”
so i finally get to the big rock campground.  i run around to find my friend anna, and even though i haven’t seen her in years, the first thing i say when i see her is, “you haven’t paid for a spot yet, have you?”  she’d just been snoozing in her car, so we packed up, met hiking partners at the trail head, grabbed backpacks, and headed back to the menzies’.  we ate breakfast burritos, fresh from the garden tomatoes, and chips.  we told stories and heard stories (adam’s brother had hiked the CDT two years prior) (the cabin had been in the family for 4 generations.  the old time family portraits were priceless.  the tap water was fresh from the spring).  we all slept in the kid’s bunk room, which was the renovated attic with mattresses thrown everywhere.

got to camp.
put up tent.
gathered wood.
lit fire.
starts snowing.
gather up dinner.
run to tent.
cook in tent.
body heat plus cook stove heat warms tent.
snow melts onto tent.
stops snowing.
slide under vestibule.
eat outside, under stars.
walk through snow.
filter water.
come back to frozen tent.
sil-nylon ice sheet.
scurry under.
headlamp lights tent like a chandelier.
stars sleeping inside my tent.
my tent is going to prom with a sequin dress.

i went to bed cold but woke up warm in an ice cave of a tent.  i sat up and when i bumped the inside of my tent the frozen condensation would fall like snow.  i ate my breakfast dreading.  i knew i’d have to shake the frost off of my tent.  i knew that regardless of gloves, my hands would be freezing again.  back to the feeling from the night before.  my hands were worse.

kevin -slowboat- blackwell.  cdt 09

ps.  in one of my first emails, i talked about making it the best summer ever.  well, that’s all changed.  now, we’re making it the best winter ever.  (we’ve been snowed on everyday for the last three and a half weeks.)  oh colorado.  you look so good in white, but i prefer you dressed ever green.