Day 28 - Leadville and a Dead Elk

June 16th

23.4 Miles

Near Some Invisible Guard Station

While packing up this morning I met another thruhiker who is actually able to wake up and get hiking early, unlike myself, who motored on by and is doing the Butte route which is roughly 100 miles longer than the Anaconda route that I am taking so I'm sure I'll see him again and maybe even get his name haha. My morning head fog is thick and when he rolled up I was barely able to think let alone make small talk in the morning.

The trail today gave way to car trail which was steep and rocky leading up to Leadville, an abandoned mining community. I was excited to check out all the old remnants of the village and when I got up there there was a small assortment of run down cabins with random rusting mining equipment. It was pretty neat.

After Leadville was more steep car trail and ontop of the hill was a special surprise:

An elk lay covered in flies and it looks to have been killed I'm guessing by its rear judging by the back leg being ripped off. Now it could have been killed by bear, human, or wolf. My guess is a solo wolf because a bear would have eaten more and a person wouldn't have field dressed it that sloppy (and out of season). Needless to say I didn't hang around long to find out what was around besides it.

Continued on rocky car trail downhill until reaching a trough fed by a spring where I had lunch. The car trail became more serious and became dirt road after a while until turning off onto brand spanking new CDT trail. The trail dipped off the road only to cross it a few hundred feet later to get past a fence and I shook my head at its uselessness. The trail continued on and got better after Champion Pass but a serious lack of water in the afternoon left me a good bit dehydrated. Came upon the Four Corners intersection where strait would take you on the Butte route and a right onto a dirt road would take you to Anaconda where I'm headed. After a couple miles Spins and I were confronted by a small heard of cattle which we successfully hollered off and we actually saw the playfully running in the grass field. I don't think I've ever seen cows run before. It was a pretty funny sight. A little bit later I crossed an abandoned  boarded off mineshaft which I would have loved to explore if it were earlier in the day. It started to drizzle a bit and we hustled a couple miles more before finding a side road which had a stellar campsite where a guard station is marked on my GPS but I don't see one so who knows where it is. Tomorrow's hike entails 22 miles of road walking strait into Anaconda. Hopefully I can get up early so I can roll into town at a decent hour and get some town chores done.