History

Lately, I’ve been lucky enough to get some steady work in Salida, Colorado. Salida is a quaint and charming place with beautiful, wonderful people and vistas abound. Known by the slogan “The heart of the Rockies” or its literal Spanish translation, exit, as named by some conquistador of old times, the Arkansas river exits the Rockies here to make its journey to the gulf. Salida is surrounded by glamorous mountains and the highest concentration of 14,000 ft peaks in North America for me and many others I am sure this is the prime reason for spending time here. As cute as Salida can be, my main purpose in settling here for a minute is to enjoy the vast vistas and wilds of Colorado.

As a kid I was lucky enough to spend a couple of summers at an amazing camp called Bear Pole Ranch just outside of Steamboat Springs CO, I was young at the time 7 and 8 so the experience made some impressions. First, it exposed me to the mountain wilderness of the Rockies and second, taught me about camping. I live my life recalling all these idealizations of my life and in Salida I am hoping to rediscover my fond memories and experiences of the Colorado wilds.

Having recently arrived in Salida, I found my self milling through maps at the local outdoor store considering the hiking options of CO. Admittedly, I have a thing about maps and tend to accumulate them at an alarming rate, I don’t see it as an issue and maybe being able to clarify where I am at any moment enriches my feelings of security. As I mill, a conversation is struck up with a salesperson looking to help me out of course. Our discussion leads through the changes in Colorado over the past decades, the rising populations and the ever greater influx of tourists into the wilds. I relate my sentimental feelings about the mountains, the ideal CO trail and my desire to be alone in the wilderness. He looks at me and asks, “Have you ever heard of the Weminuche Wilderness?”

“Nope” My response, as he reaches for a map of southern CO.

There it is, a vast area of south central CO west of Creede and Pagosa Springs east of Silverton and Durango. The Weminuche Wilderness, I’m hooked, line and sinker.

The Weminuche is the largest wilderness in CO at 488,000 acres or about the size of Rhode Island. Additionally it is one of the only Wildernesses with no bisecting roads, the only way to cross it is by foot or horse. I’ve been throwing this wilderness term around a bit; maybe it’s time to explain just what that means:

In 1964, our nation’s leaders formally acknowledged the immediate and lasting benefits of wild places to the human spirit and fabric of our nation. That year, in a nearly unanimous vote, Congress enacted landmark legislation that permanently protected some of the most natural and undisturbed places in America. The Wilderness Act established the National Wilderness Preservation System ” … to secure for the American people of present and future generations the benefits of an enduring resource of wilderness.

From the US Forest service website (I want to mention but wont go into detail about how most of these lands were taken or bought at bargain rates from native tribes or indigenous people) just saying. That quote sheds a little light on things and I’d like to expand on that premise a bit. If you would like to go somewhere and not be affected by the precepts of what humanity is, go into a US wilderness. Granted you might have to go a few miles, my experience is that not many people go more than one day in. After that mark provided your not on one of the popular trails or in high season you should be pretty good and the people who venture beyond that seem to understand what this wilderness is about and how to respect it. Once that far in you’ll stop seeing the marks of uneducated trekkers, scraps of litter, undistributed fire rings and my personal pet peeve the used wet wipe. Which will be the subject of a torrid and rage full sidebar about how to shit in the woods. I’m feeling a little cumbersome here looking for a statement which encapsulates what going into the wilderness means, so bear with me. Ya know what this is gonna be a long essay and I am sure I’ll come across some brilliant encapsulation later.

Here, I have discovered the Weminuche or the idea of it at least and now have a focus to direct my energy and a goal. Let’s get to work Seese.

Day 0 Prep

Still in Salida I woke up round 8:30 felling kind of anxious, I wanted to get going. I’d procrastinated a couple of days already, I don’t want to admit it but it is kind of a big deal to pull the trigger on a 9 day camping trip into a wild place. So yeah, I was kinda freaking out, which happens to me pretty much before I start any journey. Tim the barista at sacred grounds talked me off the edge. I am going out in the woods to get away from all this anxiety anyway, right! I took a breath and chilled.

100 feet of cotton clothesline, a small like 4×8 tarp and something orange, bow hunting season had just started, my errand list, once taken care of I could get rolling. At the local Ace hardware I found the clothesline, an orange vest and some intel about a sporting goods store on the way out of town. Said sporting goods store, closed. Shit, I didn’t really want to drive into town to Mountain Sports but I did and that outrageously overpriced $99 dollar tarp (we will have a little essay later about outrageous camping gear) which at the store last week, gone now. What a waste of time, I’m over it at this point. Not happy about going to wall mart though, every thing that place represents makes my skin crawl. And of course they have everything I need the tarp, orange duct tape and an orange ball cap. Lets go.

285 south through Poncha Pass for like 70 miles, a weird right turn in Del Norte onto 149 west, which follows the Rio Grande river, up to Creede, 20 minutes past Creede left onto some county dirt road towards Rio Grande reservoir and about 15 miles past the lake I arrive at thirty mile campground. It’s around 4:30. The campground is empty, it was closed on Sept 15^th doesn’t mean you, I, can’t camp there, they just shut off the water and lock the outhouses, except for one. I get my tent set up and cook some dinner. Brown rice, kale, andouille sausage and white beans I cooked up a batch last night and froze it in meal size portions, enough for three nights, delicious. Although boiling it in a ziplock bag didn’t work out to well. Cracking a beer I start going through food and sorting stuff for my trip.

Food, backpacking, heavy food, light food, the good food heavy, light food bleah, yep that’s the deal. Those Campbell soups that come in a bag taste great with instant mashed potatoes they weigh almost a pound. Dehydrated food, even though I am not that experienced with it had some Mexican something or other while in Devil’s Staircase, not good, crunchy rice and corn but light. Hesitant as I am about the dry stuff I will give it another chance. Going out for 10 nights so just in case I will take 14 days of food. Perhaps a blizzard will roll through and bury me in. Three oatmeal packets get me two breakfasts, fruity flavored drinks mixes, two bags of dried fruit and nuts, aka gorp. l jam it into the backpack along all with the other stuff I think I might need, it’s a tight fit. I climb into my tent for bed and t morrow I hit the trail.