Day: 097
Date: Sunday, 11 August 2024
Start: Snake River Backcountry Campsite
Finish: Shoshone Dogshead Trailhead (but staying at Grant Village Campground)
Daily Kilometres: 25.6
GPX Track: Click here for Julie’s Strava & Photos
Total Kilometres: 2835.6
Weather: Very cold early then mild and sunny.
Accommodation: Tent
Nutrition:
Breakfast: Pop tarts/Muesli
Lunch: Bacon cheeseburgers & fries, ice-cream.
Dinner: Bacon double cheeseburgers & fries, ice-cream.
Aches: Dave - the usual niggles; Julie - nothing reported.
Highlight: Heart Lake, which we reached around 9am, was a sublime picture of serenity on a beautiful sunny morning. Very large and backed on one side by rocky mountains with a little bit of snow remaining, there wasn't a ripple on the water, as we walked along the gravel shore apart from the wake of a mother duck and her trailing ducklings 50m out..
Lowlight: The first 90 minutes of hiking was miserably cold. As usual, we got frozen hands packing up the tent on an icy morning, but then had to ford a very cold river, twice, in the first half hour, leaving us with frozen feet as well. On top of that, the undergrowth was wet, making sure our feet stayed wet and cold. Dave was hiking the fastest he has done all trip to try and warm up while Julie was almost whimpering with the cold.
Pictures: Click here
Map and Position: Click here for Google Map
Journal:
There was rain again overnight and the tent was damp and cold as we packed up before leaving at 6am.
Our first 3km was across a treeless flat river valley through dew- and frost-covered undergrowth, with a couple of river crossings thrown in for good measure. We were very cold (see above). We met a couple of southbound CDT thru-hikers around 7am, who were enjoying the same experience and we commiserated with each other.
Eventually, as we knew it would as we climbed away from the river and the sun peaked over the mountains, we gradually warmed up and by the time we stopped at a ranger station for our breakfast break after walking along part of the shore of the beautiful Heart Lake (see above), it had turned into a beautiful day. We chatted with the ranger, who had spent a semester at the University of Tasmania, and some overnight hikers passing through while we ate.
From there we gradually climbed through a geothermal area where steam was venting from the ground in places and some hot pools were bubbling invitingly. One stream was quite warm and some.hikers were already enjoying themselves in the water.
After the climb, our final kilometres for the day were through a pine-forested green tunnel until we reached Hwy 89 around 1:15pm. From there we hitch-hiked for about 30 minutes before we got a ride into Grant Village (run by Yellowstone National Park), about 12km away, and bought ourselves a late lunch at the General Store.
We then walked down to the laundromat/shower block, which was managed by a supporter of CDT hikers who arranged for us to have free showers. He will also give us a lift back to the trail tomorrow morning. Then, while Julie did our laundry, Dave walked down to the campground where, despite it being full, room was found for us as CDT hikers and we got a nice spot surrounded by trees with a table.
Later, we returned to the General Store grill and had a dinner which was pretty much the same as our lunch. Not much choice (and very expensive), but still a welcome change from rehydrated meals.
Internet reception is poor here so, on our way back to the campground, we stopped outside the closed service/gas station and used a contraband wifi password to login and publish the blog.