Mileage: 34.5 miles (1826.2-1860.7)
I woke up at 4:30 and it was raining. I slowly gathered my things together hoping it'd stop. It subsided briefly and I retrieved my food from the bear locker and packed everything up. It wasn't quite light as I left the campsite, and the drizzle had returned. The trail was muddy and and all the grasses and shrubs were wet from the rain and hung about knee-level on the trail trail, so my pants immediately became soaked.
It stayed gray and rained on and off all day. I crossed the Yellowstone River and its tributaries many times, keeping my eyes peeled for wildlife. I had a big day trying to meet Pat, one of my best friends from back home, and I couldn't doddle.
I spotted a Sandhill Crane early morning flapping by in the meadow and it reminded me of Laura and home. Each spring we'd go to see the hundreds of thousands of cranes that gather in the Platte River to fatten up before heading North to breed. Now I was alone, just like the crane. It was the first time I'd ever seen just one. Maybe it was a sign of our solidarity. When he saw me he took off and made the squawking call so unique to the crane.
I took lunch on a log under some trees to hide from the rain. As I cooked up my Teriaki noodles something extraordinary happened. A huge, wild-looking dog came over the hill. He looked up at me and I thought, "oh, there's a dog, but where's his owner?" And then, "wow, that's a very big dog." And finally, "holy shit, that's not a dog - it's a wolf!" That's when he pretended not to see me, turned around slowly, and gently pawed back the way he came. I followed his perfect and massive prints along Yellowstone Lake for the next five miles.
The high of seeing the wolf only lasted so long before the aches and weariness came back from the endless mud and rain, but I kept pushing. After a few more hours, seeing some grizzly prints and singing to make any aware of my presence, I finally got to the trailhead where I was meeting Pat and his family. Looking back where I had walked I couldn't even see the other side of the lake where I'd come from, only seeing dead and tangled trees of the forest which had been ravaged by fires years ago.
Pat, Katie his wife, and his mom and dad pulled up and I gave them all a big hug. I'd gone through high school doing homework at Pat's house almost every night, with his mom providing us with endless snacks, and nothing had changed. The second I got in the car Renee, his mom, gave me corn nuts and a bottle of water and after a shower they took us all out to dinner at the restaurant in Canyon Village. There was soup, salad, hot bread, quesadillas, bison burger and fries, and beer. It was amazing.
I went to bed, Katie fashioned an ice box to save leftover burgers since there was no fridge (or TV for that matter) in the room. It was probably a good tactic to get people to actually go outside and interact with one another. I went to sleep around ten in my own, dry bed, so good!
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