WalkingCarrot

Greetings from Butte, Montana! For you non-westerners that’s Butte, like the “beaut” part of beauty, NOT like “butt” as in the butt of jokes.

We are a little over 400 miles and a a little over 4 weeks into the hike – by most measures about a third of the way done. It’s all gone so quickly and yet the trails, and snow, of Glacier National Park seem so distant.

The roughly 100 miles from Helena to Butte has been a mixed bag. Some proposed wilderness, with real solitude and great grizzly and wolverine habitat. The highlight was a breakfast shared with Elk cows and calves wandering through our camp. But there was also a lot of road walking, powerlines, cows, cars and ATVs.

We’ve continued close to the crest and far from water. And water sources are far from certain, so we find ourselves carrying too much, or too little. We’ve also been increasing the miles, averaging almost 20 per day. We had to. Arriving Saturday, we needed to make sure we got to town early enough, before the post office closed at 1pm.

Many CDT hikers, especially those trying to do the trail in one season, do not walk the CDT, or the Continental Divide, as it winds its way around Butte. Instead, they take the “Anaconoda Cut-off”. The cut-off is shorter by a bunch of miles and a few days. The cut-off also avoids the CDT sections around Butte which were routed for years on roads and OHV routes (and sometimes still are). And Anaconda is an easier town for resupply – Butte is large, spread out and cumbersome.

So, why did we choose to follow the CDT’s “Butte Route”?

Because it’s there, and we wanted to see it. We also wanted to stay close to the crest and see IT. And we wanted to avoid walking 20 miles of highway 1 into Anaconda and another 15 miles on Highway 1 out of Anaconda. Also, there have been a number of segments of trail newly built in the last several years, improving the Butte Route.

The Butte route mostly follows the crest, which means it continues it ups, downs and round about ways. And despite some new trail tread, there’s still a substantial amount of walking on roads, ranging from long lost, deeply rutted and eroded, mining roads to well maintained forest service gravel roads. Roads = repetitive motion = blisters and tight muscles.

Town is time for errands and chores; for putting the feet up and putting beer down. First though, we must head to the “Suds and Fun” a laundromat/casino and get clothes clean enough to be presentable for town.