John and Sally attempt the Continental Divide Trail

The Bob Marshall Wilderness I’m sitting in a small town America bar.  The town is Augusta MT.  To the sounds of country slide guitar and crescendoing, passionate male vocals I think about the past week.  I think about how to describe the brutal routine and discipline needed to hike 25 miles of mountainous terrain before sunset every day for the past six days.   🎸🎵“So if you have time for a beer or maybe two 🍺 🍺 I’ll tell a short story of blisters, and tea, and how her trail name became Special Agent Sally.” Leaving the one horse reservation town of East Glacier was sad.  Sad to say goodbye to the local people whose lives were dependent on the trade the park brought.  I took a photo of the hostel where Sally and I had stayed and we headed back onto the trail, out of the Reservation and for a while back through Glacier National Park and then onto Summit.   At Summit we took shelter from the wind behind an obelisk, a memorial to Theodore Roosevel...

  Two Medicine to East Glacier At 5:30 we listened to the rain beating down on the canvas of our tent.  The only noise that was louder was the whooshing of the wind as it passed through the camp’s pines.  And it would have been so easy to have made the decision to abandon the day, but the miles don’t complete themselves and the reality outside of the tent is always different.   The rain was light and the wind, unknown in the shelter of the wood.  With three other hikers; Drewby, Beaker (he looked like the muppet) and Gone, Sally and I set off from Two Medicine camp to the small town of East Glacier just 11 miles away.  We were all well rested but nervous about the climb ahead.  But our plan was sound.  If at any point we felt unsafe we would stop and return; either to hike the road or hike another day. The three soon outpaced us and Sally and I made our way up the mountain together.  Once at 6000 feet there was no tree protection and the wind...

Atlantic Creek Camp to Two Medicine Waking up and knowing that the day would be shorter and that the cafe at Two Medicine was waiting caused the aches and pains to vanish.  The climb up to Pitamakan Pass seemed to take less effort and was, despite the low level cloud, the best pass so far.  The reason for this was this mystical lake at around 7,000 feet.  The low cloud, the grey stillness, the snow and ice created a magic that would suggest that the Indigenous Blackfeet Elder we met in Many Glacier was right about the power of this place.  We trudged through snow as we approached and Pitamakan lake opened up before us, and the path ended.  It wasn’t there.  I looked at the map and we  had to walk along the edge of the lake, through the water, to rejoin the path.  Knee deep we walked for a minute through the healing water.  And then I realised thigh deep, with the cold soaking through to my bones that we were going in the wrong direction. ...

  Reynolds Creek to Atlantic Creek The mosquitoes weren’t too forgiving when it came to Sally’s delicious and nutritious blood.  Bravely she sucked it up and we set of at 530 into the morning.  The early start allowed us to fit in a long day.  News of inclement conditions was filtering through and as a precaution we decided to fit in as many miles as possible to put passes and miles between us and the weather.   This morning brought a fast paced walk to breakfast by a waterfall and fast miles through meadows with a long day to get ahead of the coming change of weather.  The pace continued and we walked through meadows and dead forest.  Bark beetle is a nemesis to forests in the park.  The rarer, older trees have packets of pheromones stapled to them to deter the beetle. The proletariat however are shown no mercy. The winners on this morning were the mountain flower and our delight in munching on small edible columbine. At Red Eagle Lake we stopped...

  Many Glacier to Reynolds Creek Because cooking by the camp is not allowed we planned on having breakfast after an hours walk.  This had worked quite well the day before as we had our porridge and protein powder overlooking Lake Elizabeth.  This morning though we were hungry sooner to the point where I was hangry.  Sally had tried talking to me and all I could think as Swift Current Lake dropped below was how much I didn’t want to be here.  We stopped, ate and within minutes we were chatting, enjoying the morning and the climb to Piegan Pass and I proudly told Sally that it was pronounced Pagan. The pass brought a sheltered area that invited a well earned rest, a nap in the sunshine and the entire critter cast from Disney.  And although we didn’t share our lunch of mixed nuts, it was clear that others had as they nibbled on our packs. Our camp that evening was near a creek - a North American word for a fast flowing stream or river tributary.  This one...

  Lake Elizabeth to Many Glacier Today would set the benchmark for our fitness and ability to hike at altitude.  The lake was at 4,900 feet and our climb to Red Pass would take us to 7,400.  I hadn’t expected the effect to be noticeable  as the hike up the mountain would be similar to walking up to Snowdon’s summit.  But as Lake Elizabeth grew smaller and we reached 6,0000 feet our breathing became a little heavy as we tried to maintain our normal pace.  By 6,500 I was feeling decidedly sick so we decided to introduce a break every 200ft rule and by 7,000 our hearts were thudding and our pace very slow.   Red Pass is called Red Pass because it’s Red and the trail goes between two peaks.  Iron in the rock oxidises and this rock was most prominent here.  However throughout our stay in GNP snow patches would have a pink raspberry ripple hue from the red eroded dust that would be blown by the wind across the whole range.  The geological hist...

Beginnings After a poor night’s sleep, (my mattress kept deflating and every hour the cold of the ground would wake me, a gentle nudge to resuscitate my Thermarest) I tended to my behind and set about looking for a puncture.  Failing to find one We packed and were in the cafe for opening.  A lady with a neatly folded flag let us in as she went outside for her daily raising duty. Sally and I headed for the power point and we both had drip coffee and some Oreo’s whilst we waited for the shuttle to take us to Saint Mary. We were the only two on the bus and the seasonal worker chatted as we headed to the small village of St Mary.  In the general store we met the Lithuanian from the plane, it was his first day of work and he was really pleased to see us. There we bought our SAR insurance and did our final bits with our phones before heading out to the road to hitch a lift. We got lucky, maybe within half an hour a lady with a white pick up, travelling to browning, was able to ...

 Two Medicine 15th June 2025 We rode the Amtrak train from Whitefish to East Glacier.  In itself a whole new experience.  The locomotive and it carriages were tired and yet it held onto a charm with capped conductors, lengthy embarkation and a slow majestic rumble as it snaked along Flathead River.  Our time, just over two hours, was short as the engine pulled its carriages from Seattle to Chicago.  Passengers walked by in their pyjamas as they headed from their sleeper car to breakfast in the observation car.  It was very romantic, lacking the refinement and mystery of an Agatha Christie novel but full of pioneering spirit and wheels of steel. After a short transfer we arrived at Two Medicine Camp Ground on the East Side of Glacier National Park.  GNP is home to over 700 miles of trails, numerous glaciers and diverse, protected wildlife.   Quite simply TMC has a campground, a one desk ranger station and a small gift shop nestled at the east end o...

  Onto Kalispell Sally and I woke up at around 4am.  The circadian rhythm affected my digestive system, and whilst the rest of me is totally on board with the time zone change, indigestion from yesterday’s meal has a different plan and although I want to stay in bed the lump in my solar plexus was too uncomfortable.  I got up. Not to worry we had an early plane to catch to Kalispell the gateway to Glacier National Park, MT.  There were a few people we recognised from the afternoon before on the plane and the Lithuanian looked a lot more relaxed, even though he had a managed to chip his front tooth, I didn’t ask how. In the air I looked over Sally’s shoulder, through the window, across and down over the Divide’s mountain ranges.  The hours pass, their snow capped tops a book’s cover of tales and adventures to be unraveled over the coming months.  Hundreds of miles of passes, ridges, lakes, rivers and untouched natural beauty.  A world away from the plac...

The Disruptive John Roberts  My main concern this morning was re loading my WhatsApp.  I had deleted the app and it’s data yesterday afternoon because of the possibility of a second interview at immigration and border control.  I had done a search for ‘Trump’ within my chats and it had produced 230 results 😳 and the absence of wifi 🛜 meant that I hadn’t restored my iCloud back up and it’s 15GB of WhatsApp messages The flight left the gate on time but sadly the guy behind me in 15C was drunk and decided to get up for a wander as we neared the runway for take off.  Despite a call to return to his seat from the captain he became a little disruptive and the decision was made to return to the terminal. The guy sobered up a little and called his lawyer who suggested that playing a race or hate card was the best plan and that he should settle down.  It was a long call as the taxi back to teminal 8 took quite a while.  The smell of weed and alcohol was strong but...

Travel to JFK 12th June 2025 All went to plan.  We returned the hire car that we had been using the past couple of weeks to rental returns at Gatwick dent free and with a battery charge of 80%.  The check in, courtesy lounge, boarding and flight were seamless and smooth.  There were of course a couple of blips.  I had left my headphones at home so bought some new ones, with an old school cable; that would save power on the trail (keeping it positive 😅).  I also hesitated in buying a pair of Oakley sun glasses.  I just couldn’t justify the price, even if it was duty free. The whole flight was fine too.  Norse Atlantic flew 787 Dreamliners with psychedelic jet lag lights which looked pretty and took my mind off the turbulent decent into JFK.  It was 30 degrees and the air was active.  Then the luck ran out on landing and jolts in the temporal force of the Universe began to appear. The gate wasn’t available and so we taxied and spent a lot of t...