Day 7--Oh My God, That was Hard!

Once again we had rain this morning. Plus, the wind was whipping pretty good. On the positive side, I finally was warm sleeping last night! I put my wool jacket under my sleeping bag at my shoulders and hips. That provided enough insulation from the ground.

Today we had to go over Galton Pass. But, before we even got to the pass, we had a fair amount of climbing to do.

Getting higher.

It was a pretty good road to start with. We had gone around a gate onto this decommissioned road. That meant no cars, so the road wasn't chewed up.

So, this road was okay until we got to a rock cairn.

This was the sign to turn onto a "rough singletrack". It "meandered along the river" (which means it twisted and turned and went up and down--I walked much of it). Then we had to climb up away from the river. I heard Derik before I caught up to them. It didn't sound good. I took one look at what we had to go up and thought, OH. MY. GOD. How are we going to get up that! It was not a hill, it was a mountain climbing trail! Connor even said there was nothing that steep on the whole PCT! First we took the bags off the bikes. The first trip, Derik took his bike, I took a front and rear pannier off my bike, and Connor took his bike (after only taking the dry sack out of the back). It was crazy! It was just short of hands and knees climbing. I would heft the pannier up, then pull myself up. Then we had to come back down to get another load. The going down was just as hard as going up. It was loose and slippery, with patches of mud. Derik went back and got his panniers, and came back down nearly in the time it took me to come back down. I also took my tent and chair off. The second trip for Connor and I, he carried his dry sack, my tent, and my chair. Derik took MC. I really don't know how he did that! I took my other two panniers, but Derik came back after getting MC up, and took my rear pannier.

I can't even imagine how one person would get everything to the top! 

This is looking down. It doesn't do justice, and this was not the hardest part.

This is the view from where we were able to load the bags back on (notice I didn't say this was the top). We had been down along that river. It was a quarter mile climb.

Once we got the bags back on, we still had to push the bikes up more. MC is not easy to push up a road, let alone a trail! Then I came around a corner to this.

Derik said we might have been premature in putting the bags back on. But, he took the front, and I took the back of MC, and we pushed her over the log, and up the hill. It was very hard too!

We finally came out to a clearing where the road we would continue on dead ended. There was this rock.

Someone scratched "GDMBR". We ate lunch here. Of course, as soon as we started to eat, it started to rain. We didn't have much lunch food. We had one tortilla (for the three of us), and a tiny bit of cheese. We spooned out Nutella and peanutbutter. 

Now we had some more rollers before we started the main climb to the pass. The climb to Galton was 5 miles of mostly unrelenting climbing. There were a few flat spots where I could take a wee breather, but otherwise it was mostly up, up, and up. I listened to music to distract me from the fire in my legs.

Finally, just as the song Defying Gravity (boy, I wish I could have defied gravity!!!) from Wicked was finishing, I crested the top. The guys were, of course, waiting for me. 

From the top, we had an awesome descent! It was about 8 or 9 miles. Connor put the Go Pro on. Once we have an outlet, and time, we'll upload the video, and I'll post the link. It was pretty steep in places, and...we had to watch out for cattle. I wasn't too worried until I started seeing cow pies. Sure enough, there were cows. At least they weren't in the road.

We popped out onto the highway that took us to the border crossing at Roosville. It was just two miles away, but there was a nasty headwind. Still, we made it, and we're now back in the USA!

The border guy only asked us where we were staying tonight, and if we were going all the way to Antelope Wells. 

Welcome to Montana!!!

We had another 8 miles or so to Eureka. First order of business upon reaching town was to find something to eat. We ended up at a teriyaki restaurant. It was delicious. My eyes were bigger than my stomach, but, no worries, Connor finished mine. 

Now we are at the city park. Camping is allowed here. Unfortunately, by the time we arrived, the Town Hall was closed, so we couldn't check in, and get them to unlock the restrooms. There's a gas station across the road open 24 hours. 

We were going to combine two of the book days tomorrow, but we've decided after today's workout, we are only going to do the recommended 30 miles.