CDT31
25th May Thursday
17miles
Leaving behind our lake side picnic area that gave us a very comfortable nights rest. Just 200 metres into the trail I spotted a porcupine, slowly I approached it hoping to get a good photo, I was surprised how close I managed to get until it realised that I was there and it turned and walked slowly into the tree lines.
porcupine
For two hours we walked through snow, along the way we found Elk and beer tracks, fortunately the beer tracks looked to be a couple of days old but the Elk were definitely of today’s.
As we are coming to the end of New Mexico which is about four days away, Ken says its a tradition to create a Cairn on a new path.
We took things real easy today with the goal to do no more than 18 miles.
We crossed a fast flowing river, at first I was going to cross but soon realised that it was just too strong, in the notes it said there was a bridge, but other comments from others in the notes said it had been washed downstream long ago. Lucky for us, a large tree had been fallen to bridge the river just a short distance where we originally wanted to cross.
It was a slow and careful walk across, there were branches standing up that could aid me, but it looked too brittle so I just used my walking sticks and blocked from my mind the sound of the rushing water below.
We loaded up with three litres of water from dinner and breakfast and in 45 minutes we found ourselves a campsite with a fire pit to do my cooking and coffee.
A log I used to sit on next to the fire was once home for a woody wood pecker, for weeks now I have heard them in the trees sounding like little jack hammers but this is the first home I have seen that they have built.
Part of a tree where a wood pecker made a home.