Day 5 – South Park

The first thing I thought about when I woke up this morning was cheeseburgers. In 9.5 miles there was a road, and that road led to a town, and that town had a market, and that market had a grill, and that grill was only open until 3:00! So I had good motivation to be up and moving early. I was also hoping that the campground at the pass would have showers, but a day hiker dashed my hopes and let me know it did not.

I made it to Kenosha Pass before noon and was soon sitting in Jefferson with a cheeseburger and fries in front of me. They were delicious! After eating, I hung out for a while charging my phone before heading out to get a ride back up to the pass. Side note: this is in the area called South Park that the tv show is named after.

I did 15.7 total miles and am camped at Jefferson Creek at about 10,000′. The mosquitoes are awful. I had to wear my rain jacket just to cook dinner. H3, a northbound thru hiker I met yesterday (I am southbound), told me that he had bad mosquitoes every night so far. I’d barely seen any so I didn’t know what he was talking about. They were getting me even when I was hiking though, which is unusual. Now I need to make sure the sun shirt I buy is also treated for bugs.

Bogdan, the thru biker, showed up while I was making dinner. I hadn’t expected to see him again but he had to do a seventy mile detour around the wilderness area I left this morning. I learned a little bit about bike packing before he left to make a few more miles for the day. He also told me that a Colorado Trail bike race is starting on Sunday. Apparently the winner does the whole trail in four or five days. Crazy!