Day 89 - cooler temps and nice trails (32.0 miles)

August 6, 2021

Miles: 32.0 miles

Steps: 70,164

Slept in until 6:30am, another tough morning getting up. My air mattress didn’t hold up over night. However the holes I fixed last night held but not the other ones that used tape on. So I spent the morning patching those up right and seemed to work, I’ll find out tomorrow morning if it worked.

Left Dave’s place around 8:15am which is way later than I normally start but looking at the profile map the day didn’t look too bad. I had lots of climbs but seemed to be gradual. The key was going to be how nice the trail is maintained.

The first 12 miles were pretty easy, just like yesterday. That took me all the way to Flesher Pass and my water stop for the morning. I did have to walk down the highway a little to find the water.

After that I had a steep climb up to the ridge which wasn’t too bad, made great time. Had a nice ridge walk all the way to Rogers Pass where I descended down to the highway. This is the road that goes to Lincoln, MT but I had decided to bypass it which is why I carried so much food out of Helena.

Had a steep climb out of Rogers Pass and up to the ridge. About 3 miles from the pass I came across a yurt which hikers are allowed to use so I ate my dinner inside of it to get out of the wind.

Then it was 3 more miles of uphill to the water source and my campsite for the night.