The Chilkoot Trail 33 Miles

Today with my friend Diane and her daughter, Maria, I completed the 33 mile historic Chilkoot Trail.  There was no running involved in this hike, but it certainly gave me a complete and strenuous workout.  We began the hike on July 15th, with the trek to our first camp at Canyon City.  I immediately knew that I had likely made a mistake by abandoning my typical minimalist style of backpacking in favor of  adding some additional weight to prepare my body for travel on Mt Aconcagua in January.  I used my new 80 liter Gregory backpack and broke my tradition of traveling dry with no stove, carrying only dry food.  I did bring my small stove and small cook set.  I felt that I also likely brought a bit too much heavy food.  It was a painful struggle and I had difficulty keeping up with my much younger companions.

Diane, Me, Maria

We were very fortunate in that the heatwave of the last few weeks had subsided and we were blessed with cooler overcast conditions.  But the trail was still long and arduous.  Day one was a little over 7 miles and relatively flat.  After we camped, we took a little hike to look at the ruins of the old Canyon City town site. There wasn't a lot to see, but the suspension bridge we crossed was very unique..

The suspension bridge

The old broiler

Our second day was more difficult with a gradual climb up up Sheep Camp. The distance was only 5.miles but it seemed to take its toll on me.  I was very tired when we finally arrived. At this point I was a little worried about how I would be able to handle the most difficult part of the trail, the climb up over the pass the next day.  This part of the trail was lush, green and beautiful though.  Clouds still obscured a lot of the mountain view, but at least we didn't have to deal with the blistering heat from the week before.

Diane and Maria in the thick devil's club

We woke up at 5am and quickly packed so we could get an early start to attack the difficult route over the pass.  I was really tired right from the start and struggled all the way to the Scales, where the steepest part of the climb begins.  Once we started up the giant pile of rocks towards the summit, I really slowed down.  Diane and Maria quickly disappeared over the first false summit and I never saw them again.  There were times when I felt hopeless and wondered if I would really ever reach the top.  At one point, I slipped and caught my foot between two rocks.  One of my water bottles slipped out of my pack,knocking its cap off and dumping its entire contents.  I was able to get free and climb down to retrieve it. But my other bottle was almost empty.  I continued on for a couple more hours tripping, falling and bruising my legs.  When I finally had the summit in sight, one of the men who had been guiding another group came down to check on me.  He took my pack and gave me some water.  We quickly reached the summit and I was reunited with my friends.  I was feeling very embarrassed and our 18 year old voiced her discontent with my slowness.  I can't say that I blame her.  But I did the best I could and we still had plenty of time to reach Happy Camp 4 more miles ahead. 

The rocky route to the summit

The US Canada border

Maria, Diane and Me at the summit shelter

After a quick rest we headed down through the very rocky route towards Happy Camp.  We had to cross a few very slippery snow fields and of course I had to slip and fall on every one of them.  I fell in one of the creek crossings too and had to have help to pull myself back out.  At least I was happy my gear stayed dry because I had it all in waterproof dry gear bags, totally protected from such events. It also started to pour rain and continued most of the way to camp.  In spite of the rain, this portion of the hike was one of the most beautiful, with fields of flowers everywhere.  I was feeling much better and managed to stay fairly close behind my traveling companions.

Fields of flowers 

We had a good rest at Happy Camp for the night. In the morning we moved on through dryer and less rocky pathways past Deep Lake and on to our camp at Lindeman City.  Most of the other hikers had elected to go on to Bare Loon Lake so we had our camp totally to ourselves at Lindeman.  We had a beautiful sandy beach right at our campsite.  I spent an hour or more just lying on the beach soaking up the sunshine that finally came out.  This was my favorite part of the trip.  Just to lie there on the sand enjoying the beauty of Lake Lindeman.

Lindeman Lake

It rained hard through the night but cleared by morning.  So our last 8 miles were dry and mostly sunny.  By this time I had finally figured out all the many straps and adjustments of my backpack and it seemed to fit a lot better.  Most of my food was gone by now too so the pack was considerably lighter. I was able to easily keep up with my friends. We walked most of the time along the shores of Lake Lindeman but it was exciting when we reached the rapids that empty into Bennett Lake, our final destination.  We climbed up a rock for pictures of the dramatic scene of Lake Bennett before us.  We had finally arrived.

Lake Bennett before me