Yellowstone

Leaving Idahontana and entering the Yellowstone area, there is a dramatic shift in the scenery. From the top of Targhee Divide (9,998ft), the view to the east is a sea of low, undulating forest. Yellowstone is one of the three national parks on the official CDT route and also bears the distinction of having been our country's first designated national park. It's not known for its mountains though, but for its wildlife (especially bison, bears, and wolves) and for its geothermal activity. Jonathan had never visited before and we were both excited to check out some new and more remote parts of the park.

Before entering the park, we stayed near the town of West Yellowstone with longtime friends of Molly's parents, who she has known since she was a kid. At Dave and Jill's, we were wined and dined and took a much-needed rest day. They regaled us with some tales from Molly's parents' past lives and we were easily reminded of why they'd all remained friends for so many years. We laughed, we cried, we drank huckleberry mules and ate smoked elk meatloaf (yes, as good as it sounds).

Look out, Dave!!

We also did a little town touristing. We visited the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center (a research and rehab center for the large predators) and there we met Jill's favorite local bear, Bo (from a safe distance). We also checked out the Earthquake Lake museum, which overlooks the namesake lake created by a large earthquake in 1959 that resulted in a massive landslide. It's always special for us to learn more about the land we're walking through and having local guides for the area was an absolute treat. Jonathan and I may have also eaten more waffles than was right or moral. We apologize. We won't do it again if you let us come back to ski.

This is Coram, another resident of the Grizzly and Wolf Discovery Center who was relocated there after becoming habituated to human trash and dog food

While passing through the park, we also happened into a ridiculously unlikely meetup with some of Molly's friends from college. Friendship creates the loveliest serendipity! Through some combination of coordination and luck, we landed in Grant Village with Kimmy, a backcountry ranger in the Park, and Laramie and Jeanne, two friends on a cross country road trip from New Jersey to Portland, Oregon. Hitchhiking from the trailhead, we managed to land in town just as Laramie and Jeanne finished registering for a campsite. Kimmy joined after arriving home from work (via paddling, hiking, and driving, I might add). The five of us spent a merry night catching up, reminiscing about old times, and learning fun facts about the park from Kimmy before we headed for Heart Lake the next day.

As for the geysers…

We don't usually do a play-by-play of every day of hiking because, well, usually all we do is hike. It doesn't always make a great story. But to give you an idea of what it was like to thru-hike through Yellowstone, we'd like to share the story of a single day, one that felt like a whole complete day in addition to the 26 miles we somehow also hiked.

We woke up at 5am. It was still dark. We packed up our bags and the tent as quietly as possible, because another hiker was camped about 10 feet away. When we were packed up, we turned our headlamps from red to white and started to walk. There was no sound other than our trekking poles clicking softly against the rocks.

We walked for about an hour in the dark. The trail was forested and the sky was overcast. But by the time we reached out first waypoint, Biscuit Basin, it was sunny and warm. We'd hiked about 8 miles and had just begun to see little columns of steam popping up in the distance. The boardwalk at Biscuit Basin was closed, with signs cautioning that geothermal explosions could occur (yea, you pay attention to the signage in Yellowstone). So, we took an alternate path and rejoined the trail at the trailhead for Artemisia Geyser.

Immediately, we began seeing the wild geothermal activity of the park. Bubbling wells and steam vents lined the trail, along with multicolored pools fading from bright orange around the rim to deep green in the center. Small geysers erupted nearby and we saw spouts of steam rising up all over the valley beneath us.

The Blue Pool, our first geothermal wonder of the day

The Morning Glory Pool

We made it to the Riverside Geyser about 20 minutes before the next eruption was predicted (which was lucky, because they only occur about every 6 hours and 5 minutes). It was worth the wait. From bubbling about a foot high, the geyser suddenly began to pump water 20 feet, then 40 feet, then 75 feet into the air! We were thrilled, and headed on toward Upper Geyser Basin.

Riverside Geyser, mid-eruption

The boardwalk through Upper Geyser Basin is like a little romp across Mars, if 5 million people visited Mars every year. It's extremely crowded, but it also just feels like another planet. The geysers leave mineral deposits after erupting that look like brains and turn wild colors. A burnt orange stream runs across a pure white rock or an electric green slime coats the edges of a sky blue pool that bubbles gently in the center. We saw several more geysers erupting as we threaded our way through the increasingly crowded boardwalk. The crowd thickened even more as we drew closer to Old Faithful and the parking lot.

At one point, a man stopped us to ask if we were hikers, said he had some trail magic and handed us $20 for lunch (this was a first for us and is really a pinnacle of hiker trashdom). Shortly after, we ran into Smokebeard, who'd just had the exact same experience.

We arrived at Old Faithful Village a little bit wide eyed. I sat down to call my parents while Jonathan procured some coffee. We waited for Old Faithful to erupt with about 300 other people, kids cheering, one hundred phones pointed at the geyser. Then, of course, we went to the buffet. We weren't planning to go to the buffet. We had plenty of other food. But the buffet called us in. (Future me would like to go back and not go to the buffet, which is — we think — likely where Molly got COVID… but that will be a story for a future post.)

Having eaten altogether too much, we walked back out into the sunlight and contemplated the fact that we still had 15 miles left to hike. We had a permit for the night at a specific campsite, so onward we went!

It was hot after lunch and our feet were heavy (full of elk bratwurst, possibly). We stopped by the Lone Star Geyser (unfortunately not in time for an eruption) and eventually found ourselves in Geyser Basin, which rivals the Upper Geyser Basin in geothermal activity but has no crowds and no infrastructure between you and the boiling pools. Geysers erupted feet from the path and we stopped to admire it all, though it was already getting a little toward dinnertime.

Minute Man Geyser, just starting to erupt

After the second basin came the bog. We walked through about a half of a mile of trail that was completely underwater, up to our knees in muddy stew. I took a misstep onto what looked like a creek bed only to go right through it and find myself waist deep in the swamp. When we reached the beach at the end of the bog, the view of Shoshone Lake was stunning. And I was grateful to have a place to get the mud and sticks out of my only pair of shorts (and also grateful that no one else was around for that experience). We both also cleaned our shoes and socks, then hiked with soaking wet feet the last three miles to camp.

We finally reached camp around 7:30pm and made dinner as efficiently as we could. We set up the tent with good sky viewing for the impending meteor shower, hung our food bags, and went to bed. About 5am we woke up again to watch a huge meteor streak across the sky.

Wildflower Season

As we head into mid August, we're starting to see signs of the summer coming to an end. It's cold, sometimes frosty, when we wake up in the morning and we've been hearing crispy dry leaves rustling in the breezes. Up high, the tundra is just starting to turn reddish and the wildflowers that coated the hillsides just a few weeks ago are fading away. We have seen so many new wildflowers along the CDT! Molly has tried to photograph each new variety she has noticed and has developed quite a collection. We wanted to celebrate all of the beautiful colors and forms of the wildflowers of Idaho and Montana, so we collaborated on these photos to share with you.

We hope they bring you as much joy as they've brought us!

Scenes of the Pintlers

After leaving Butte behind, we rejoiced at heading back into the wilderness. The Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness covers a big swath of the Anaconda Range in southwest Montana. Everyone calls this range the “Pintlers”, perhaps in part because the name appears everywhere. There's an East and a West Pintler Peak as well as a Pintler Peak, a Pintlers Peak, a Pintler Creek, Pintler Lake, and Pintler Pass. You name it, it's called Pintler. But any which way you call these mountains, they surprised the heck out of us! The Pintlers may be a lesser-known range, but we found them to be absolutely spectacular.

Warren Lake, Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness

A classic day in the Pintlers included at least 5000 feet of climbing and at least 4 different kinds of weather, all packed into 12 hours on the trail. On a single day, we had rain in the morning, intense heat midday, high winds and thunderstorms in the afternoon, clear skies again, then a full on hailstorm as we got into the tent. The mountains are steep and rugged and the valleys are huge U-shapes carved out by long-vanished glaciers.

Rainbow Lake from above with moody skies

Heading up toward Rainbow Mountain

It was apparent to us that we'd entered a Wilderness as soon as we stepped inside. It felt a little more untouched, a little more removed from the roads and ATV tracks, and a little more alive with creatures and undergrowth. The forest was thick and lush as we started up a climb, with dense groves of spruce and firs.

Beautiful, soft trail through the forest

We climbed up past a pristine mountain lake and found a magical forest of soft, green larch trees filtering the afternoon light down to a golden glow. Each day, we climbed up and over multiple passes, skirting the divide, with nothing but mountains anywhere in sight. The valleys were deep, cool, and shady and the water was plentiful.

Upper Seymour Lake with trail switchbacks just visible high above (top left corner, just below the ridgeline)

Jonathan along the switchbacks above Upper Seymour Lake

An unnamed pass above Upper Seymour Lake (and our lunch view for the day)

Glowing, golden larch forest lining the trail

Here are some more scenes from our four days walking through this majestic range:

More switchbacks! More lakes! More beautiful peaks!

Another view of Rainbow Lake from above

Looking down on Martin and Johnson Lakes from Rainbow Pass

Morning light filters through the dense forest along the valley floor

Lovely trail with trees curving upward from the steep slopes

A gnarled old pine, high on the slopes near Pintler Pass (8736’ elevation)

An old burn area where wildfire raged along the edge of the Anaconda-Pintler Wilderness

We made it to mile 600!

As we left the Pintlers, we saw a pair of Sandhill Cranes and heard their haunting calls echoing through this broad valley. It was truly a special experience and one we will never forget.

Our "Pay it Forward" Account Balance

As we close in on one month on trail, we wanted to reflect on some of the amazing love and support we've received along the way. Here are just a few of the incredible moments of kindness and generosity we've experienced so far.

Part I: Magic!

On day six in the Bob, we headed toward the edge of the wilderness where a hunting ranch about 3 miles off trail offers package services for a fee. As we left the wilderness, we crossed a big sturdy bridge over the South Fork Sun River and headed toward a small campground. Lo and behold, Shaun — who we hadn't seen in over a week — came stolling down the hill calling out, “Trail magic!!” He told us to head toward an RV parked in the campsite closest to us.

Wandering into the campground, we found Tripod sitting under a canopy with Disco and Sparks. He called over inviting us to the party and as we walked up, Sprinkles handed us paper plates with hot blueberry pancakes smothered in butter and syrup. Heaven! We sat down in chairs for the first time in days and let ourselves be overwhelmed with delight.

Tripod is a triple crowner and a retired veteran who drives his RV around the country (a triple crowner is someone who has hiked the AT, PCT, and CDT). He'd come to Montana to see Sprinkles, a current CDT hiker temporarily held up by an infected blister (risks of the business). They gave us the lay of the land: feel free to camp anywhere around the site, charge phones from their power bank, leave trash over here, and oh, the neighbors are heading to town soon, so you can catch a ride to the ranch! Hikers know what hikers need. We were thrilled!

After picking up our package at the ranch and paying $10 for a shower, we walked the three miles back to the campsite where we ate hot dogs, hot off the grill. Trail magic is a part of what makes the thru-hiking community so special and part of what holds it together. Over the course of the day, more and more hikers showed up, ten more in total, some who we’d met before and some new faces, too. We sat in the shade and swapped stories with everyone, compared and traded food, discussed plans for the days ahead, and commiserated about blisters, pack chafe, sore feet, and failed attempts to keep our feet dry through the “Bog Marshall Wilderness” (as another hiker jokingly referred to it).

With so many hikers gathered in one place, we were astonished by the demographic shift from our previous hikes. Eleven years ago on the PCT, I could count the women I hiked with on one hand and the openly queer people I met on the other. Yet there we were: thirteen hikers (Sprinkles included), eight of whom were women and at least five of whom were openly queer women (me included). What a joy!

Through it all, Tripod and Sprinkles cooked, shuttled hikers to the ranch, and told everyone where to find what they needed. As new hikers arrived, the hikers already present would give them the lay of the land. Tents over there! Hiker box over here. Grab a soda from that cooler!

We all shared a spaghetti dinner at the end of the day. Cooking for 12 hungry hikers is no simple task! I handed Tripod a donation to support the next round of hiker meals, but it will go toward so much more than that. Creating spaces like this allows hikers to meet and gather, share important information, and build friendships along a trail known for being lonely.

Part II: Family

Not all trail magic is from the hiking community. Molly's aunt Margaret and uncle Andy live in Helena, Montana, which happens to be a trail town. It was not Margaret and Andy's first rodeo with hosting thruhikers, which was clear from the moment we got into their car, when they handed us an entire pizza to split on the ride home.

After picking us up from the Rogers Pass trailhead about an hour north of Helena, they brought us home to meet their 7-month-old puppy, Zoey. We showered, put on some clean loaner clothes, and slept in a real live bed for the first time in 21 days.

We woke up to coffee and breakfast, then put in a load of laundry and got to work. Zero days are days off from hiking, but they're not exactly days off from hiking logistics. Here are some of the other things we do on our zeroes:

• Grocery shopping

• Washing our pots and spoons

• Repairing or replacing broken gear

• Stretching and body maintenance

• Discarding trash

• Paying our credit cards

• Charging electronics

• Writing this blog

• Buying fuel

• Replacing used first aid supplies

• Cleaning gear

Margaret drove us all over Helena, picking up supplies and shipping gear home that we no longer need. We normally have to walk everywhere for these chores and the mileage adds up, so it's truly a luxury for us to have everything at our fingertips.

Margaret exceeded all our town-food dreams with her incredible home-cooked meals. We are so, so grateful for all of the delicious meals! We had salads with smoked salmon, chicken tikka masala, tofu stir fry, and pancakes loaded up with butter, syrup, whipped cream and fresh raspberries, straight from the patch out back. We'll be dreaming of these for hundreds of miles to come.

It was also a joy for me to get to spend a little time with Margaret and Andy, who have been so kind to open up their house and fit us into their schedules. We ended up heading back out to hike for a few days and coming back to stay again when we hit MacDonald Pass, closer to Helena. They tolerated a whole new round of all those same chores and we even got to celebrate my cousin Zander’s birthday with the family. Thank you all from the bottom of our hearts!! ❤️

Part III: The Llama Alt

Water is heavy — 2.2lbs per liter — and we normally carry about 1 liter per 5 miles, plus extra for an overnight. Just north of MacDonald Pass, we started hearing from hikers in front of us that the water sources on the official trail were drying up fast. We were hiking with two other couples and one pair heard through the (surprisingly active) hiker grapevine that we could take an alternate route that would shorten a long water carry and also take us to a special place: the Llama Farm!

Intrigued.

After some group discussions, we all decided to go for it, hiking six miles off the main trail down a dirt road toward... Somewhere? We didn't know what we were looking for, exactly.

The day was hot and sunny, and all of us were running a little low on water when someone saw it. There! A giant symbol of a bicyclist painted on the roof of a barn.

As we got closer to the barn someone called out from the porch of the house: "You're in the right place!" We were warmly greeted by a couple of previous-year thru hikers and their adorable hound dog. There was a mini fridge on the porch stocked with sodas, beer, and chocolate milk, as well as homemade sandwiches. We sat and chatted with the folks already there including a cyclist who rode up just as we arrived.

The Great Divide Mountain Bike Route is like a thru hike, but on a bike. The GDMBR riders follow a similar path to the CDT and one that frequently parallels ours, but on slightly more rideable terrain (and terrain outside the wilderness areas where wheeled transport isn't allowed). The Llama Farm started out as a hostel/oasis for GDMBR riders, but over time they've begun to welcome CDT hikers, as well.

We met one of the owners, John, who told us the rules of the place, gave us the lay of the land, and stressed that they don't accept donations. “Whatever value, joy, or love you get from this place, we just want you to pay it forward.”

We did get quite some joy from this place and certainly felt the love. We took cold, refreshing showers in a small converted silo and we even got a tiny cabin with bunk beds: Bleu Inn. We played Bananagrams with our friends in the lawn.

The next day, we hiked out with 5 liters of water to cover the rest of the 27 miles dry stretch. We felt so much gratitude for our community on and off of the trail. These three stories can't begin to cover all the generosity, kindness, and love we've received so far. Thank you again to all of you who have been following us and supporting us along the way!

Scenes of The Bob

At just over 1 million acres, the Bob Marshall Wilderness is one of the largest wilderness areas in the continental US. Not only is “The Bob” huge and remote, it’s also surrounded by even more Wilderness. This includes the Scapegoat Wilderness and the Great Bear Wilderness. Together, this grouping of public lands, known as the Bob Marshall Wilderness Complex, spans over 1.5 million acres. It’s massive! It is managed by 5 separate Forest Service ranger districts across the Lolo, Helena-Lewis and Clark, and Flathead National Forests.

As a reminder, Wilderness areas are the most protected of all the kinds of public lands in the United States. This is where you go if you really like to experience the mountains in way that is fairly untouched by humans. You can’t have motorized equipment or even wheels in the wilderness. (Unless, of course, if you have an exception for a small grass airstrip, a special case we touch on briefly in our last post.)

The CDT has a lengthy section through The Bob, running for 177 miles without crossing a road. It took us nine days. That’s a lot of time to go without real town services, with the exception of a single package pickup (full of food!). When you are in The Bob, you are acutely aware of just how far it is to any services at all. 

Rather than give you a history lesson or tell you stories about our time in The Bob, I’m just going to show you some cool pictures that show the different sides of this place. 

Mountains, as far as the eye can see

Dean Lake with a reflection of Pentagon Peak (right)

Trilobite Peak with the trail visible in the valley below

If there was one special highlight of our time in The Bob, besides Molly’s awesome adventure from the last post, it would be the Chinese Wall, which is a 12-mile-long escarpment. The CDT follows along the base of the Chinese Wall for the majority of its length. We had really hyped this thing up in our minds as we prepared for the trail months ago. 

You know when you go to a restaurant that you’ve been stoked about for months and it’s actually not that good? This wasn’t like that. This was awesome. Boy oh boy. It did not disappoint! We hiked along this thing for an entire morning, gawking in amazement at the scale and beauty of this rock feature. I am well aware that what follows is a gratuitous number of photos of the Chinese Wall. I don’t care. I love these photos. I loved walking underneath that rock feature.

Looking south along the Chinese Wall

From a saddle along the Wall

Looking north along nearly the full length of the Chinese Wall

Looking south from the halfway point at a saddle

Once we passed the Chinese wall, we weren’t done with the beauty of the Bob quite yet. Here are a few more photos of The Bob after the Chinese Wall.

Some well manicured trail as we got to the edges of the Bob – you can tell when you’re approaching a trailhead because the quality of trail increases dramatically.

Walking through a forest that burned in recent years – huge swaths of the Bob are affected by fire each year. More to come on this, since it has played a big part in our trip so far. This particular day was rainy and dreary, but not so much so that you couldn’t still get some interesting views.

More burn area with dead trees laid down by extreme winds and mountains extending off into the distance

A classic view of the Bob with the Chinese Wall just visible, far in the distance. This photo is best viewed on the biggest, widest screen you can find.

A Return to Schafer Meadows

A quick note: These CDT posts are usually from both Jonathan and Molly, but this one is a little different since it's about a place that's special to Molly, in particular. She'll tell it from her perspective for this one.

Molly in the northern part of the Bob Marshall Wilderness

Fourteen years ago, in 2011, I worked for a summer with a Forest Service trail crew in the Bob Marshall Wilderness. I was flown in to a remote backcountry ranger station with a quarter-mile grass airstrip and spent the summer hauling rocks, building bridges, and wielding a six-foot-long crosscut saw. By September, I'd hiked over 600 miles.

I learned a lot that summer, the summer before I hiked the Appalachian Trail. I had some experience backpacking and working on trails, but this was a whole other level. It was physically brutal. And it was also a pretty lonely time for me. When I wasn't working, I spent hours in the shade along the Middle Fork of the Flathead River, looking up at the delicate green Aspen leaves and reading every book I could find in the ranger cabins.

Over the years, Jonathan and I have talked so much about Montana and about this remote place that shaped my imagination of wilderness. When we started planning for the CDT, we found it on our maps and started scheming about whether we could get there. The Schafer Ranger Station is not on the official CDT, but Jonathan searched through maps and map layers to find trails to connect us there and back. He found a potential route and created a GPX file for us to upload into CalTopo (one of our mapping apps). We weren't certain the trails were still there at all.

When we arrived at the junction to the first of these mystery trails, there was only a faint path that petered out in a meadow 20 feet off of the CDT. We tromped through a couple more meadows seeking out faint use trails and discovered an overgrown, but clear path leading out the far end. With a deep breath and some crossed fingers, we ducked under the first brush and into the tunnel.

For several hours, we followed the same trail, sometimes clear and open, sometimes fully hidden in the thick undergrowth. Once in a while we saw old shoe prints, but we could tell that the trail was still in regular use by deer and elk. We climbed up a ridge in meadows filled with wildflowers and eventually reached an open burn area where the fire had completely destroyed the trail. We did our best to track it, but ended up bushwhacking down a steep field of thimbleberry bushes and deadfall, trying not to break our ankles. There was a massive sigh of relief when we found our little path again at the end, following a creek down toward the valley where we'd rejoin a major trail again (we hoped, anyway).

After 17 miles or so, we came through a bright green meadow and found we'd reached the junction to a major thoroughfare. Rejoice! We celebrated with a picnic dinner in the meadow, then hiked a few more easy miles to camp.

The next day, we woke up early and strolled the four miles to Schafer Meadows, arriving at the far end of the wilderness airstrip. A tiny plane landed just as we arrived, then another. They were ferrying rafters to the Middle Fork to start a float trip. We stayed to watch for a bit. The airstrip was built before this land was designated as a Wilderness and so has been preserved and its maintenance grandfathered into the management of this area.

A plane landing on the Schafer airstrip, with the one that just landed parked in the foreground

I saw the whole place again through my 21 year old eyes, jumping off that plane full of anticipation and blown away by the mountainscapes around me. I walked over to the station and peeked in the front door. A Montana Conservation Corps trail crew leader came out to chat. She let me come inside the station and even go upstairs to the little room above the kitchen where I lived that summer. It all looked just the same. Even smelled the same.

A portrait of Molly, arriving at Schafer Station

Molly posing in front of the Ranger Station where she lived and worked in 2011

We walked down to the river. When I got to the waters edge, the view out over the valley was exactly as I remembered. The same snow streaked peaks and bright green aspens glittering in the breeze. I cried with joy to see it again and to share it with Jonathan, who did so much legwork to make sure we made it there. I felt an immense gratitude for him and for how he shows me love in such beautiful, personal ways.

The view from the banks of the Middle Fork behind the Schafer Ranger Station

Molly fords the Middle Fork of the Flathead River, just after leaving Schafer Meadows

Back at the station, we pulled out lunch supplies and our MCC friend, Sarah, brought out a grapefruit and an apple that she'd cut up for us. She stayed to chat for a while and even offered to take our trash (a true gesture of friendship for a thruhiker). We learned that there wasn't a Forest Service crew stationed there this year due to the federal budget cuts. She and two other MCC members were doing the work of 6 Forest Service employees – they would cover less than half of the territory normally maintained, which she knew would make it harder next year and beyond. Her warm reception made our visit exceptional, but I was sad to hear that the station wouldn’t have the same life as it had in years past.

Heading back to the CDT, we forded the Middle Fork and walked up the valley from Schafer up to Chair Mountain for one of the most spectacular views out there (though you do have to work for it). You can see the Schafer Meadows airstrip far below and then just mountains all around, as far as the eye can see in every direction. It's so remote that it's hard to imagine the developed world existing beyond the horizon. Like maybe the mountains just extend on and on forever. We followed the ridge up and over to Trilobite Mountain then back down to meet the CDT.

Schafer Meadows and the Middle Fork as seen from Chair Mountain

Jonathan in a field of wildflowers below Trilobite Peak

Molly heading back toward the CDT near Trilobite Lakes

Glacier NP

Back in March, when we were still just dreaming about the CDT, we signed up for a lottery to win a spot in line for permits to camp in Glacier National Park. There are a lot of rules around backcountry permits in Glacier. You can't book sites more than 16 miles apart, you must pick them up in person the day of or day before, and if you don't win the lottery, you have to show up and just pray that the ranger can patch together an itinerary for you.

We won the lottery! We got a great time slot on the very first day bookings opened and mostly managed to get the itinerary we’d hoped for (they go fast!). We booked permits for four people (the maximum allowed), because we’d heard other folks sometimes get stuck without.

Thru-hiking is an exercise in flexibility. You make a plan. You change the plan. You make a new plan. You scrap that plan too. Then you basically just wing it and hope it all works out. And most of time, it does. You'll often hear hikers say, “The trail provides.” But I think it really means the community provides. We put in love and care to the hiking community and we get love and care out too. These first few days have reminded both of us how much we love this community.

When we arrived in Kalispell we were greeted by old friends (including a hiker Molly met on the AT) who gave us a cozy room in their hotel, made us dinner, and dropped us at the train station once we'd all caught up and swapped tales from our travels. (If you're ever planning a trip out here, go stay at Switchback Suites!! Joe and Katie are just the best).

Old friends getting to hang out in new places

We took the train over to East Glacier and arrived at Luna's (AKA Looking Glass Basecamp). Luna's is a hostel. For $20, CDT hikers get a place to sleep, a shower, town clothes (for doing laundry), a kitchen to cook in, a place to charge electronics, and an incredible resource to the whole trail community. Luna herself is a gem of a human. She's brash, disarmingly kind, and uproariously funny. She regaled us with tales of bear spray gone wrong, including cautioning us in all seriousness not to jump in a creek if we get sprayed in the face. “It washes down,” she said with raised eyebrows, “And it hurts worse in the bits than in the eyes.”

We slackpacked from Luna's two days before our permits began and started meeting all of the other hikers. With permits scarce, hikers were crisscrossing all over the Park, hitching and slackpacking, trying to cobble together a path through Glacier. We felt lucky to have planned ahead and soon found two other hikers who wanted the additional permits we'd purchased back in March. And so with Smokebeard and Shaun, we formed our merry crew for the trek north.

The Glacier crew en route to Two Medicine (from left to right): Jonathan, Molly, Shaun, Smokebeard

Looking out across Glacier National Park with Two Medicine Lake in the background

The crew headed out from Two Medicine and immediately climbed up and over Dawson Pass to Pitamakin Pass. The scenery was straight out of a fairytale and the weather was perfect.

Hiking up from Two Medicine toward Dawson Pass

The view from Dawson Pass

Jonathan posing just after Dawson Pass, heading toward Pitamakan Pass

Molly and Shaun crossing a snow field just below Dawson Pass

Molly hiking down toward Seven Winds of the Lake (left) and Pitamakan Lake (right)

As we descended from Pitamakin Pass we encountered about a mile of on-again, off-again snow. Usually, snow is heinous to thru hikers. It can be steep and treacherous. Or if it’s too soft, you might be post-holing up to your thigh. This snow, however, was mostly low angle. It held up to our hiking over it, and it was soft enough to slide across. This meant that we got to sort of cross-country ski/slide on it in our trail runners. As people who love skiing of all kinds, this brought ridiculous amounts of joy. It added an ease and playfulness to our descent that we relished. Between the weather, scenery, camaraderie, and “skiing” this day was one to be savored.

The next day, we climbed over Triple Divide Pass. The neighboring peak is the hydrological apex of North America: it separates watersheds that flow to the Pacific, the Gulf of Mexico, and Hudson Bay. How cool is that?!

Shaun heading up beautifully graded trail to Triple Divide Pass

After Triple Divide, we wandered down a lush valley overflowing with waterfalls.

A waterfall after Triple Divide Pass, unnamed on our map

Midday on the following day, we got some cell service near Saint Mary Lake and received a weather alert that up to 24” of snow were anticipated up in the high country. A winter snowstorm on the summer solstice. And a bit of a hitch in our plans, which would have taken us over another high pass the following day. We decided to head down to Saint Mary's and make a new plan.

St. Mary Falls, Glacier National Park

At Saint Mary's, the rangers went out of their way to help us shift gears. Kristen and Todd made our day by pushing out our permits and helping us find a way to wait out the worst of the weather down low. Federal employees don't exactly have the easiest jobs right now, so we appreciated their efforts and expertise even more than usual.

Once the weather clears, we'll head up toward Piegan Pass and Many Glacier. We can't wait to explore more of this incredible park. Onwards to Canada!

Our CDT 2025 Gear Lists

One of the most common questions we’re asked about thru hiking is what we’re bringing with us. My favorite iteration of this question is, “How many sets of clothing are you bringing?”, because it brings me a tiny bit of joy to watch the wave of emotions that occur as someone realizes that we do not, in fact, bring any spares.

On a thru hike, your gear is your life. For every item in your pack (or on your body), you have to decide the right balance between the item’s weight and its function, durability, and cost. Between the two of us, Jonathan and I have 5 thru hikes under our belts now. We have a LOT of feelings about what we put in our packs.

Scroll down to peruse our gear lists in full – we wrote down every single non-consumable item in our packs (plus a couple of key consumables) as well as the clothing we’ll be wearing during the day. The lists should contain every single item we are responsible for on the trail apart from food, water, and some consumables like sunscreen or ibuprophen.

Overall our gear lists for the CDT look a lot like they did for Te Araroa, but we've each made a couple of tweaks. Both of us switched our hiking shirts to the sun hoodies we practically live in at home, and we both picked up some cheap wind pants (technically, wind resistant dance warm up pants). We opted for 3/4 length base layer pants along with the wind pants to make our cold weather gear a little more modular without adding weight. I also picked up a new pack after struggling a little with my SWD bag, which was just slightly too short in the torso. So far, I'm loving the fit of my new Durston Kakwa pack, but we'll see how it holds up on trail.

One other big change we've made was that Jonathan will carry his own pot this time. We've been together for over ten years now and have gained enough wisdom to know that a little independence is well worth the weight. We don't particularly fight about money or politics, but if you eat more than half my dinner… Let’s just say we have to live together 24 hrs a day out here.

Finally, we made a few updates that are CDT specific. We're carrying head nets for the infamous mosquitos of Montana and Ursacks for the larger predators. Glacier National Park, where we begin the journey also requires we carry 25’+ of cord for hanging all of our smellables. This is grizzly country!

Each and every item on these lists has been discussed, agonized over, debated, and finally made the cut. What's not here is perhaps as important as what is (maybe more so). And with that, here goes nothing! Next time you hear from us, we'll be on trail.

Jonathan’s gear list. View in LighterPack

Molly’s gear list. View in LighterPack

Embrace the Brutality

When you’re 21 and leave college to hike 2200 miles alone, I have it on good authority that your parents might be ✨unamused✨. And when, in your late twenties, you quit your job, sell everything you own, and fly halfway around the world to play in the mud, you’ll get a few raised eyebrows and not-so-subtle suggestions that you’re “ruining your career.” But it says something distinct about the present moment that when Jonathan and I, now in our mid thirties, announced that we were leaving our established careers in a wildly uncertain economy, renting our condo to strangers, and heading to the woods for five months, y’all were 100% on board.

Frizz and Pedi getting back in hiker trash mode

Jonathan and I are beyond excited to assume our trail personas (Frizz and Pedi) and begin our next adventure, with 3000+ miles of wild, rugged, beautiful trail ahead of us this summer. We’ll be flying to Kalispell, MT on June 15th to start our thru-hike of the Continental Divide Trail (CDT). The CDT has been a dream for us since we completed the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) in 2014. In some ways, I’ve had it splashing around in my brain since 2012 and my first steps on the Appalachian Trail (AT).

There is a very specific appeal to leaving daily life behind right now, though it is a complicated time for us to leave. We have a lot more stuff than we used to, including a home and two cars. We’ve built an amazing community of friends and neighbors in Colorado. And on a larger scale, we’re seeing what you’re seeing: historic levels of economic uncertainty, war, famine, and genocide abroad, a constant barrage of hateful political speech, and a broad devaluing (and defunding) of science and education. It is also a complicated time to travel on public lands: layoffs among federal employees and massively reduced funding will mean Parks are understaffed, trail maintenance will suffer, and it may be harder to get updates on closures, wildfires, and other hazards.

And yet.

Last year was a tough one for us physically. I had hip surgery in May and Jonathan badly broke his ankle in July. The idea of thru-hiking again one day was a powerful force pushing both of us to stay diligent with PT and stay positive during recovery.

Recent news has also made us think twice about how long these trails will be as accessible to us as they are today. How long will Glacier National Park still have glaciers? And for how many years will long stretches of trail remain as protected land? There are constant reminders of this in the news, including a bill passed by Republicans in the House this month that – if it passes the Senate as is – would expand options for mining and drilling for oil and gas on public lands, including in our National Parks. The original version of that bill also proposed selling off huge swaths of public lands and approved building an industrial road through Gates of the Arctic National Preserve in Alaska. It was only through an uprising of public criticism that those measures were struck from the final version.

Prepping a 4-day resupply to send ahead

And so, it is time to go. Taking the first steps on this trail will absolutely be a dream come true. Thru-hiking has changed me – shaped me – in so many ways that it has fundamentally become a part of who I am. And the CDT? Well, it’s the big one. The CDT is not only the longest of the three American long-distance trails, but it’s also by far the most remote and most logistically challenging. I’d tell you more here, but I wrote a whole other page about it so go read that one!

Jonathan and I are ready to find what the CDT has in store and be moved and changed and challenged by all of it. We’d love to have you along for the ride. Subscribe to the blog for email updates when new posts are published or follow us on Instagram (Jonathan or Molly) for more bite-sized updates.