Total Weekly Mileage: ??
“City Chinese”
Coming into Grants, I was out of food. I’ve lost count of how many times this has happened. Wait—no—I had one ramen and two packets of oatmeal. I bee-lined it to the grocery store. I needed healthy food, so naturally, a quart of whole milk, an entire chocolate cake, and six bananas made for a very nutritious meal.
My spork was broken and I couldn’t find any utensils—also, no napkins. Being the resourceful hiker trash that I am, I used my hands. I sat on the curb outside the store and stuffed my face. Patrons stared and walked far away from me, but in that moment, how I looked wasn’t my primary concern. Calories, calories, calories.
I did laundry, resupplied, and avoided a rainstorm by eating more at a burger joint. Many miles of trail road out of town—I finished at 10 p.m. and camped in some bushes next to a barbed wire fence.
The morning seemed alright, and 15 miles of road walking led me right into the eye of a storm. Lightning was shooting all around with hail and downpours. There was no place to go. The road was the trail, and I was completely exposed. No buildings to hide in. When a bolt of lightning struck less than 50 yards away, I called it.
I had already turned off my phone and GPS, so when the next car came up the road, I didn’t even give it an option. I ran into the road and waved my hands. The car stopped—I ripped the door open and basically threw my trekking poles into the lap of the poor, unsuspecting sap. I jumped in with my pack on my lap and explained why I had seemed so crazy.
The lightning continued as we drove toward Grants. Flash floods had started making rivers across the road, which stopped traffic. After an hour, my driver decided to ford the river and go for it. Barely, we made it. I was back in Grants at 4 p.m.
Safe from the storm, I booked a room at the Motel 6, conveniently located directly across the street from the “Super Asian Buffet” (I’m not kidding—that was the name). After a couple pulls off a joint I’d purchased from the dispensary the day before, I headed over to stuff my face and thank God—not only for the delicious bounty that was about to be splayed before me, but also for sparing my life on this hike yet again.
Thinking back on it later, I still can’t believe how close that strike was. Well, God had other plans.
I arrived at the Super Asian Buffet to find a woman lying on the floor between the spread of food, crying and whimpering. Before I had a chance to assess the situation, the host came right up and said, “One fo’ dinna?” (He was Asian.) Being the ever-consumed capitalist, he wasn’t going to let a crying woman lying on the floor stop the business from making money—I mean, the crab rangoons were getting cold!
And of course, they sat me right in the booth closest to the injured lamb. Now herein lies my dilemma. I was starving—I’ve been starving—and a couple pokes from a professionally rolled jay really had me starving. But how could I, in good conscience, grab a plate and start perusing the spread while someone was writhing in pain at my feet?
This angel/devil debate lasted quite some time. No one else went up to get more food. Then again, they already had theirs—not to mention they got to watch this woman take the digger, slipping on the tile by some spilled egg drop soup.
I gave it three minutes—basically, when the paramedics arrived to take over the scene—I made my move. General Tso’s chicken, goons, wings, lo mein. Sure, I was getting some dirty looks, but when the EMT asked what her pain level was on a scale of 1–10 and she said “10,” I knew this was more of an ambulance-chaser lawsuit move than a seriously injured situation. I continued eating.
The maintenance guy, Jay, from the Motel 6 gave me a ride to my spot on the road the next morning. I was able to walk 35.5 miles even with a late start. Flat road makes for big miles, even where the washouts had been.
It had been a frustrating stretch with the weather. A lot of bikepackers through this area—all chipper, doing easy 50-mile days, smiling and waving as they passed. I would wave back, but part of me wanted to kick them off their bikes. Especially this one lady—singing as she passed.
After making it into Pie Town (yes, that’s the name), and eating a subpar breakfast even by hiker standards, I pushed on—needing to hit the Gila High Route and Doc Campbell’s Outpost to resupply before heading into the Gila Canyon section.
This should have been a stress-free, boring section, but it was brought to my attention by the CDTA and the brain trust over at TrekM.com that you now needed a new permit to hike the final 1.1 miles of the CDT where the monument is located. This was now a military zone, and the red tape to get approved was not something I wanted to deal with. A week out from finishing, and now I needed to complete a form, provide two forms of ID, and wait for approval from a military base. I’d deal with all that in Silver City.
Doc Campbell’s was great—the ladies opened early for me. I charged my stuff, ate a bit, filled my water, and headed into the canyon. Apparently, most hikers take the road for 40 miles into Silver City to avoid this tough section, but I was sick of road walking. I had just done so much in and out of Grants—I needed a change.
I was beat.
Photos and videos to come…