5 Beginnings

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 take us as far as Babb.  This was about half of the distance that we needed, but we took the lift.  And the coolest thing was we got to ride in the open flat bed.

This was by far the best part of our whole journey since leaving England - to the start of the trail.  Sat with the view of the mountains to come and the yellow lined road rolling out behind the truck with all of our belongings for the coming months in our packs.

A couple from Washington, Sky and Diane who were on their way to Canada to see a friend, took us off their route to the Chief Mountain Border post.  We were ready to start our first few miles by 1pm.

After border selfies, we did some final checks and headed onto the Belly River Trail.  The official start of the Continental Divide Trail.  We both shared an enormous sense of delight after final arriving here, it was surreal that the months of planning and uncertainty had finally come to this moment.  Our heads could not quite understand what we were about to begin.  And with that uncertainty we began the first steps.

Could I have imagined it to have been as beautiful as it was on that Monday afternoon.  The path wound through flower covered meadows, along rivers, waterfalls and mountains near and far.  We “hey bear”d along the way and enjoyed the blue sky and afternoon sunshine.  There is nothing that could have taken away the beauty of those first few miles to the camp at Lake Elizabeth, just 9 miles into the journey.