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Northern Colorado

I prefer to buy my groceries at Safeway or Whole Foods, but I suppose maybe this is more convenient for some people.

A Badlands-like wash with a sedimentary outcrop. This is some harsh country.

Hiking conditions remain difficult south of Rawlins, until the CDT climbs up into timber in Medicine Bow National Forest. There is hardly any drinkable surface water (what is available is often extremely salty) so I was appreciative that someone had placed a few informal caches along the road.

I watched this storm front move across the prairie directly towards me or about an hour. It was preceded by a 30mph wind gust and then a soaking-wet-in-5-minutes rain shower than lasted for about 30 minutes. The weather then temporarily cleared; a blustery thunderstorm moved in a few hours later and lasted about 18 hours.

An hour after the thunderstorm moved in I reached the historic Battle Townsite, where there are some pit toilets (clean and not horrible smelling, no less) that I could make a "privy bivy" in. It was far better than getting soaking wet all night in hypothermic conditions.

A fitting hiker-made message welcomes me to Colorado.

The Divide has historically been used as a stock route for cattle and sheep, to move them between grazing areas and to market.

The driveway is still used today, though not nearly with the same intensity as it was back in the early- and mid-1900's.

The view from Lone Ranger Peak, the first big mountain in Colorado.

An alpine lake in the Park Range. For the first half of Colorado the air was laden with smoke -- though not nearly as much as it was in Montana -- due a fire in the western part of the state.

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