[Day 114] Fox of Two Medicine

I slept terrible. The old biker fellow at the basecamp — which is a former restaurant turned into a lounge and sleeping space with some adjacent dry cabins — asked everyone if they snored yesterday night. Of course, he was the only one who snored. This morning, he approached me in the kitchen, saying, “The jury is in. You snore.” I wanted to rag on this guy, but I was not going to waste my energy. I probably did snore — my throat is sore, my nose is stuffy, and I’m catching something.

After literally running to the post office and the trading post about a mile away in the town center, I returned to the “basecamp” with my resupply. I quickly packed up and did some errands before heading out. It was raining all morning, but I’m addicted to the trail — no days off. I wanted to get my permits sorted, and I needed to get to Two Medicine to do that. Why not just walk the 10 miles of trail rather than hitch back and forth?

It was a bitter ten miles. The overgrowth soaked me through immediately as I exited the Blackfeet Reservation. I soon hit the Glacier National Park boundary and climbed straight up for four miles to Scenic Point (quite a generalized name for a mountain peak in a scenic national park). It wasn’t too scenic today. On the descent to Two Medicine, I met a friendly fox. We played a game of cat and mouse for a while. He was very curious about me.

I cruised into Two Medicine and attended the ranger station first. I hoped this wouldn’t be like Yellowstone. It wasn’t. The ranger helped this petulant Frenchman first with his permits, then graciously and courteously set me up with the campsites I wanted — at least, I planned these to be the least busy campsites. These will be considerable mileage days, but campsite availability is tight in the national park, so I’ll take what I can get. Also, these Europeans… sometimes they aren’t the most agreeable, especially the French. The Frenchman was want to argue with the ranger over whether he could eat huckleberries in the park, even though the ranger told him multiple times he could. After sitting like a child in the ranger station watching a safety video, I was awarded my permit. I camp at Two Medicine tonight, make 25 miles tomorrow to Red Eagle Lake Campsites, then 30 miles to Many Glacier, then 30 miles to Ghost Haunt. After Ghost Haunt, it’s four miles to the border, followed by four miles to Waterton Townsite.

I am carrying three times the food I need to finish this trip. Why? I overestimate. Two Medicine has a camp store with a food stand. I sat there for many hours charging my stuff and eating numerous items — donuts, tomato soup, bratwurst, ice cream, pizza. They were throwing free food at me once they knew I was a CDT hiker. I shivered my way through consumption of a self-serve cup of vanilla ice cream.

My camp was in Two Medicine tonight per the itinerary of my permit. I waited out in the camp store to no avail of better weather. Why should I even camp here? There were hourly shuttles between East Glacier and Two Medicine. It was an easy decision — I’d shuttle back to East Glacier, sleep at Looking Glass Basecamp, than shuttle back and hike out tomorrow morning with hopefully better weather. I made it back in time to grab cold medicine from the store. My sinuses run with milky mucus making for quite the sore throat.

After a shave and shower, I took to chatting with a fellow from India who just completed his Triple Crown with the PCT this year and was headed out on the PNT. We shared in common some philosophies for this odd sport we engage in. He, however, was done with the world — job, family, relationships — and living a life off some millions of dollars he made and inherited to hike the continent. I’m certainly not in such position, neither sitting on a goldmine or ready to throw away the world.

The NyQuil put me to sleep with Mike Tyson-style knock out aggression. I awoke in the middle of the night to my phone flat on my face with the screen on.

Signing off,

Zeppelin / fReaK (ON a leash)