Day 91 - raining as I enter the Bob (32.0 miles)

August 8, 2021

Miles: 32.0 miles

Steps: 65,114

I told myself I was waking up at 4:30am but that didn’t happen. Normally I can wake up that early when heading into town but I was just picking up a box. Benchmark Ranch is only box pick up, they offer nothing else. So I slept in until 6am.

Had an easy morning of mostly flat, continued to follow the creek. Once again I had nice blue skies but I could see off in the distance darker clouds moving in and I saw the forecast the other day for 90% chance of rain.

Got in a little over 8 miles when I came to a junction. I noticed by taking the junction I would get to Benchmark way earlier so with the chance of rain I took it as it showed to be about the same trail as the CDT only shorter.

Trail was nice and flat so made it to the road in no time. Once on the road I had 2 miles to the ranch.

While hiking I came across an airplane run away, wasn’t expecting that.

About a half mile from the ranch it started to rain hard. Soon after a trail angel that shuttles people from the CDT to Augusta pulled up. Asking if I wanted a ride into town, about 30 miles. I said I had my box but if they had lost it, heard that’s been happening lately, I would need I ride. He said he would check in on me after dropping the hikers off.

I started back walking in the rain as a truck pulled up and took me the rest of the way to the ranch.

Got to the ranch and was hoping for a warm shower as it’s advertised but no luck, all I got was my box.

The trail angel did come back to check on me and it was tempting to head into town and get a warm meal but knew I would lose a lot of hiking time so I said I was staying.

It was still raining as I was putting all my resupply into my bag. It was still raining after finishing up and decided just to wait it out.

After 2pm it let up enough so I walked the 3.5 miles down the road and back to the trail. The rain stopped soon after I started walking.

Easy walk back to the trailhead. I crossed a bridge and entered into the Bob Marshall Wilderness which most just refer as the Bob.

The first 2 miles were very muddy so I was slipping all over the place. Then left the woods and back into the open where it was less muddy.

The rest of the hike to camp was pretty much the same, in and out of the woods with some muddy spots.

Tomorrow should be a tough day as the trail starts to get hard again with blow downs.