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Tim Mathis

The Wind River High Route: A 7 Day Traverse

This is the story of my hiking experience in Wyoming's Wind River Range with my friend Six2. We primarily followed Alan Dixon's route. If you're interested in more technical "how to" information, my logistical write up on the Wind River High Route is here.


Six2 on the Wind River High Route Traverse
Six2 starting the Wind River High Route Traverse

The Wind River High Route Traverse is an isolated week in the mountains in Wyoming, navigating off trail, crossing rugged passes at 12,000 feet. Few people attempt the route, but it’s legendary among long distance hikers. There are no road crossings or civilization. It’s hard to get to. It’s a pain in the butt. There are rocks and glaciers and afternoon thunderstorms. Its beauty is legendary and mysterious. It’s a route with Mana, as they say in the Pacific.


My own quest towards the Wind River High Route started in 2015 when my wife Angel and I met a hiker named Six2 on the Pacific Crest Trail. We were thru-hiking. He was section hiking, but in a grand way. He’d been picking off sections of the major American long trails for more than a decade, having completed the Appalachian Trail and sections of the Continental Divide. He was on the PCT for about a month our year, and his ultimate goal was to finish the Triple Crown. We watched Mad Max and cached water outside of Tehachapi. He finished his section shortly after. We carried on, but kept up over the years as people living weird lives. Angel and I finished the PCT and never really went back to normal life, working part time and as little as we can afford as nurses. Six2’s never really lived a normal life either, making a living off part time and tech work. We all do a lot of international travel and prefer to focus our lives on things other than our jobs. 


Across the years, Six2 finished the PCT and kept chipping away at the Triple Crown. Angel and I did some smaller stuff, and started ticking off sections of Te Araroa in New Zealand. Six2 and I hiked thirty miles together on the Wildwood Trail in Portland to finish off a self-designed Portland thru-hike he put together. Covid and life conspired, and we hadn’t seen each other since I think 2019. Maybe 2018? 


A year ago, he sent me a message and asked if I knew anyone who’d be interested in doing some hiking in Grizzly country. After 24 years, in 2024 he was planning to finally finish the Continental Divide Trail, and therefore the Triple Crown. He’d saved what he considered the best for last, and had organized a route of alternates through the (mainly) Wyoming wilderness based on a hiker named Famous’ experiences. He’d start in Big Sky, Montana, walk through Yellowstone and the Tetons, use an ambitious off-trail alternate through the underappreciated Gros Ventre Wilderness, and finish in epic fashion by completing the Wind River High Route, a legendary and remote section of mountains that very few CDT hikers attempt due to its difficulty and general inconvenience.


I thought about it for a day or two. I hadn’t spent time in any of those areas, but had always heard people speak of the Winds in awed whispers. It was a chance to see one of the best stretches of scenery in the US, and from Six2’s very experienced perspective, maybe the best month of hiking on any of the US long trails. He’d already done all of the planning so I could attach myself on like… whatever those fish are called that I saw riding around on sharks at the aquarium when I was a kid.


I signed up. 


Angel was less convinced given the potential challenges in the Gros Ventre and Winds, but she eventually decided to give it a go as well. 


It’d be the biggest hike we’d attempted since the PCT, and our hardest ever. It’d be the culmination of 24 years of work for Six2. It was gonna be an event.


Entry to the Wind River Traverse at Green River Lakes
Entry to the Winds at Green River Lakes

Getting to the start of the Wind River High Route Traverse


When we made it to the Green River Lakes Trailhead about six months later, at the northern terminus of the particular version of the Wind River High Route we’d chosen, there’d been a lot of water under the bridge. We’d all met up in Bozeman, Six2 having just arrived from France where he’d attended a few Olympic events. Angel and I had just spent a week in San Francisco on a trip with my mom. We stayed just outside of Chinatown, where Kerouac hung out. I read Dharma Bums, thinking about how obnoxiously narcissistic Kerouac was - the patron saint of white guys who “practice”  Buddhism in order to sleep with yoga teachers. 


In Bozeman, we ate big, meaty sandwiches at a place called The Pickle Barn. Then, we walked rolling hills from Big Sky through Yellowstone, into the Tetons. We hitchhiked with families and bathed in a natural hot springs called “Mr. Bubbles.” We descended back into our hiker trash identities after years away. We ate piles of enchiladas and stunk up the rich-people-cowboy-dress-up party that is Jackson Hole. Angel decided two weeks and 200 miles of hiking was enough, and left us to rent a van and enjoy her life while Six2 and I continued hiking through the Gros Ventre Wilderness and practiced our off trail navigation skills.


By the time we got to the start of the Winds, we were starting to feel like real hikers. We’d acclimated to the altitude and gotten into trail shape. That was by design - Six2 had arranged the route to start easily and work up to hard, start low and work up to high. 


We’d developed our daily routine. I would let the sun wake me up, then I’d deflate my air mat. I’d try to remember where I hung my Ursack, a few hundred yards from camp so the bears wouldn’t eat us. I’d find a place in the sun to make coffee and eat breakfast and start to take down my tent. Six2 would eventually get up and do the same. I’d dig a cat hole and then poop in it. Then, we’d hike all day. We’d talk about politics or travel, or we'd turn on our phones and listen to ‘90s college rock. Then, we’d talk about listening to ‘90s college rock. 


Six2 did most of the talking. We established that he’s an external processor. He figures out what he thinks by saying it out loud. I’m an internal processor. I have a hard time talking things through unless I’ve had some time to think about them. 


We’d take occasional breaks for meals and snacks and photos, then we’d eat dinner an hour or so before camp. I was on dehydrated meals mostly. Six2 cooked strange, preplanned trail concoctions. Chili mac but maybe throw in some dried fruit and wash it down with a shot of olive oil? Most times we’d set up our tent near dusk, but occasionally we’d hike into the night. Then, we’d hang our bear bags and pans, crawl into our sleeping bags and crash in our tents. I’d jot a few notes to turn into this sort of writeup, and Six2 would read maps so we wouldn’t get off track the next day. 


The Wind River Range was our final proving ground. I would be the toughest week of hiking either of us had done. It was his last real challenge before finishing the Triple Crown. It was my first big challenge in years. We were both in our mid-40s. We both wondered if we still had what it takes.  


Green River Lakes TH on the Wind River High Route
Green River Lakes - calm before the storm

Day 1: August 26th: Green River Lakes Trailhead to some spot in the woods.


There are a lot of options on the Wind RIver High Route. That’s the idea. It’s not a trail - it’s a corridor moving roughly north to south, which keeps you in the alpine for a week. We primarily followed Alan Dixon’s suggested route, which is probably the most popular, and the most intuitive to access from the Continental Divide Trail. (Andrew Skurka designed another, higher, tougher, longer version, which didn’t quite fit our itinerary.) Our route started at the Green River Lakes Trailhead at the northern end of the range.


Angel drove us to the trailhead after a zero day in Pinedale. It’s real, strange Wyoming there. The cowboy bar has a “The Storm has Arrived” QAnon banner on display out front, but there’s also a good, bougie little coffee shop, and a few decent family Mexican restaurants. 


The day before we were meant to head into the Winds, there’d been a snowstorm in the mountains. Six2 was packing his stuff in the morning, when a CDT hiker came in to his bunkroom at the hostel. She’d hitched to the trailhead early that morning, but had come straight back. There was snow on the ground - the first of the season.


“Screw that,” she said.


I probably would’ve done the same, but we weren’t getting started until later in the day, when the forecast improved and initiated a week with no predicted rain - a rarity in the Winds. It’s August. Between blue skies and snowstorms, clearly the weather does what it wants here.


There was light rain on our hour’s drive to the trail, but we didn’t leave town until after lunch. By the time we got there, the clouds were clearing. The reported snow on the trail was entirely melted off. 


Green River Lakes is idyllic - with Squaretop Mountain looming over, and more big granite peaks behind. We’re at the source of the Green River, which flows hundreds of miles down to Moab, then joins the Colorado below Canyonlands. It feels like an important place - a gateway to big things. The scenery is reminiscent of Yoho in Canada, or Yosemite without the crowds. It was water and granite everywhere.


Angel joined us for the first few hours of our hike before turning back. We saw a moose eating in a pond and ran into a couple of older Wyomingites. They asked us about how much food we were carrying and whether we had bear spray (we did). In deep red Wyoming on an election year, we didn’t want to raise the specter of political discussion, so we told them we were from uncontroversial places - Ohio and Maryland - even though neither of us have lived in those states for decades. Six2 said something about being from the D.C. area at some point though. 


The guy says, “What’s that stand for? District of Criminals!” 


Hahahahahahahaha.


Soon though, we were into the wilderness, away from humanity and all of its stresses. The trail stayed flat for miles. That was the last time that happened for a week. We finished our day with a thousand feet of climbing to take some of the sting out of the next day’s ascent to the high alpine, which would be the biggest single climb of the whole route. Because of our late start, we decided to keep moving into the dark. The next morning we’d be ascending to Knapsack Col at 12,225 feet - the highest point on the entire Dixon route. We eventually carved out a spot amidst scattered branches above 9,000 feet. This was the lowest we sleep, by quite a bit, for a week.


Alpenglow in Titcomb Basin, Wind River Range
Alpenglow in Titcomb Basin

Day 2: August 27th: Knapsack Col and Titcomb Basin


The next morning we woke to clear skies, but my rain fly was sheathed in a thin layer of ice. It was the result of condensation vs. rain overnight I think, but it was frozen solid. My fingers ached untying my bear bag to access my breakfast. I’d stayed warm enough over night in a 20 degree bag with a liner, which was reassuring, and I hung my fly in a patch of sun while I made my coffee and waited for Six2 to wake up. 


I’d come to enjoy my routine of getting up a half hour or so before Six2, making coffee and having the moment to myself in the morning. It was frigid though, tucked in amongst the trees in the shade. My fuel tank was cold and burning slowly, so I detached the stove to warm it up against my skin. The tank off-gassed a bit, blowing freezing fuel against my skin.


It was a familiar sensation. When I was a teenager in the country in Ohio, my friends and I would buy these little propane canisters, set them in front of a bonfire, and shoot them with a .22 rifle. If the fuel ignited, it would create a fireball 30 feet in diameter. If it didn’t, it would spray freezing, choking gas around the yard. 


Hiking triggers a lot of those sorts of memories for me. The friends I used to shoot propane with were also the friends who talked me into my first attempt at long distance hiking. Spring Break when I was 16, we drove to Clingmans Dome/Kuwohi in Tennessee, on the Appalachian Trail. We were meant to walk 100 miles but we only made it 11 before spending 36 hours in a shelter in a rain storm, my friends both claiming to have some sort of viral illness. We hiked back out, spent all of our money on a hotel and a buffet, and had to drive home in shame, stopping to sleep in our van in a Wendy’s parking lot.


I’ve come a long way baby.


Day one was a real grind - the real Winds. The long climb to Knapsack Col was gorgeous but steep, with tricky talus to ascend and trail that petered out. I was glad that we got some of the climb out of the way yesterday. 


When we made it to the Col, it all felt like the High Sierra on the John Muir, but without the trail or the people. Our view into the Titcomb Basin was massive rock walls and expansive lakes.


To get into the basin, we had to rock hop down a field of boulders, bigger than us, and we’re both pretty tall. Six2 got his trail name because people would ask him his height on the Appalachian Trail: “I’m 6’2.”


Six2 was having a great time, blaring music and laughing like a kid. Me, less so. I needed a snack. I was rationing food because we had 5 more days, I’d packed light, and I didn’t want to worry about calories at the end.


Titcomb Basin, Wind River High Route Traverse
Wind block, Titcomb Basin

It was early evening by the time we made it to the basin floor. Six2 raised the possibility of pushing over another pass to access a northern portion of the Skurka route under Gannett Peak - the highest point in Wyoming - where there’s meant to be a spectacular glacier field. I was already dragging and solidly against it, particularly because it seemed like it could add another day to our trip if we continued at our current pace.  


We walked Titcomb Basin instead, a long valley full of famously beautiful lakes. I’m still happy with our decision. 


It was only day two, but the route was already living up to billing. It was hard, and it was stunning. Once we made it to Knapsack Col, it felt like we’d entered a different world, and were on our own. Titcomb basin is supposedly a popular destination, but we hadn’t see more than a tent or two since starting the climb from Green River Lakes.


View north, Indian Pass, Wind River High Route
View north, Indian Pass

Day 3: August 28th: Titcomb Basin to (almost) Camp Lake. The Hardest Day


On the elevation profile, today didn’t look bad. There were a couple of low passes, but less overall elevation gain than yesterday, and a walk around a lake followed by a descent. It seemed like it should be fine. I’d read someone’s trip report who’d done 18 miles on day one but only six through here. I wondered what that was about, assuming they’d probably overdone it and worn themselves out early. 


We woke up surrounded by beauty and blue skies, with our tents resting gently on a grass patch amidst the boulders above a lake. 


I collected water, the icy temperatures giving me a shock. I thought about how easy it is to romanticize long hikes as these grand experiences that change your life. It’s true, but reality is a lot rougher with all the stink and the suffering and the freezing fingers. Also, thru hikers don’t fit the traditional image of the pious pilgrim with their pot and their ‘shrooms and their degeneracy.


I was drinking my coffee, thinking about this, when a Pine Marten peeked its head from behind a rock - just the two of us awake here in the mountains. He reminded me of that meerkat Scrat from the movie Ice Age. He ducked back under cover, popped out a few more times, then ran off. 


Six2 got up a few minutes later - hanging his sleeping bag from his pack to dry in the sun as we started our day. 


The climb up Indian Pass was okay. It was steep and long, but just hiking. The rest of the day was different. 


Indian Pass was patches of green and gray on the west side, but over to the east it was a massive basin of bare rock and ice and water. We’d crossed the Continental Divide, and it felt like it.


In order to get down the pass, we sidled for what seemed like hours on loose, large talus on a high angle - obnoxious detritus deposited by a melting glacier in decades past. The sidle was necessary to get to the remnants of Knife Point Glacier, crevassed and melting out in the sun. I was sketched out, not seeing a clear line onto the glacier. Six2 has more experience, and led us between a couple of crevasses and onto solid ice. There’d been several ice patches on the descent, so we’d already donned and doffed our microspikes multiple times, but here we walked for maybe a half mile on ice. I’d heard stories of people crossing Knife Point without them, but the crossing is a high enough angle on the runout to be really dangerous if you fell. With spikes it was probably the easiest half-mile of hiking that day.


Knife Point Glacier, Wind River High Route
A view back at Knife Point Glacier

After the glacier, when we needed a rest, we heard someone shouting and whistling in the distance. We scanned the scene, but couldn’t see anyone amidst the rocks. We continued on, assuming the worst. We talked about a plan to text Angel and Six2’s wife on the InReach to let them know we were okay and were activating the rescue beacon for an injured hiker. Eventually we spotted a guy in a bright yellow jacket, standing and waving his arms. We shouted and waved back, unclear if he saw us, and jogged as quickly as we could over boulders and melting ice. As we approached, we saw that the waving hiker had gathered with a group of few others, and they all seemed to be laughing and relaxed. 


One party was ascending Alpine Pass, the other descending, and they were exchanging beta. 


The ascending party was a couple of guys from Tennessee in ultralight gear, looking trail fit and beardy, like seasoned thru-hikers, and a third, older hiker in heavier gear. The third was clearly annoyed, and confronting the group: “You guys just left me and I don’t have maps - of course I got off track! You don’t just leave someone behind like that!”


Six2 Is from the East Coast so he interrupted their bickering: “Are you guys okay? We heard you screaming and we thought someone was in trouble.”


“Oh, really?! Sorry. We just lost our buddy. We didn’t even see you back there!” 


We were happy that we didn’t have to set off our rescue beacon, but undeniably annoyed. We sat and ate our lunch, and let the parties carry on. 


Six2 checked the InReach, and he saw that Angel had sent us a text that morning. She said she was heading out on a four day hike up to Titcomb Basin and maybe over Indian, “if I feel like it.” The combination of exhaustion, an empty stomach, and annoyance sent me into a spiral of worry. If she came over Indian, she’d be doing what we’d just done, but solo, and without the gear that we had. It was brutal and scrambly and sketchy and I imagined her, injured and alone out here. I texted back, but by that point she was already on trail and out of cell service. We got no reply, and I knew I wouldn’t hear anything for four more days at least. 


On Alan Dixon’s website, he talks about this section as his favorite part of the route, which is ridiculous.


At the top of Alpine Pass we caught up with the group from Tennessee - first the older guy who was slowly picking his way up the hill, and then his younger partners who were waiting for him at the top. They asked us if we know how to get around the lake, which looked to be surrounded by cliffs, hundreds of feet below us. From route research, you just stay on the right side and scramble where you need to. There’s a note in Skurka’s guide that points to a particular cliffy section and reassures you that “It goes.” (We sorted out that if he has to reassure you, it’s going to suck.) 


Alpine Lakes Basin, Wind River High Route
The view down to the Alpine Lakes Basin

The way down the pass was more granite and snow. The descent was easier than Indian, but the terrain hadn’t changed much. It was big, loose rocks. This continued throughout the Alpine Lakes Basin, which is miles long. The going was very very slow, bouldering and scrambling relentlessly. A few clouds had gathered, but the day was cool and the wind was whipping, and it didn’t come to rain. Around the lakes though, the wind was persistent and intense. In heavy packs, we had to time rock hops between gusts to prevent being blown off course. By the end of the day, my lips and face were chapped, cracked, and burning.


When we had a minute to stop, it was easy to appreciate how stunning the scene was. Again, we were in an alpine basin, with massive, clear lakes surrounded by towering peaks. The lake were whitecapping below us in the wind. You feel so small in the midst of this, and so at the mercy of nature. There was no one around but us. We hadn’t seen the guys from Tennessee in hours. Last time he’d looked back, Six2 saw one of them trip and fall down in the rocks. 


As we approached the head of the lake, we started to do a few calculations. It was already pushing dusk, and we had more than three miles to go until Camp Lake, the place we were planning to spend the night. In normal conditions that would be an hour’s hike, but at the pace we’d been moving, it was going to be well into the dark before we got there. We decided to postpone dinner so we could maximize the daylight and continue moving. 


We could’ve pulled up early, but camping options are very limited all the way to an unnamed lake before Camp Lake. It was a remarkably windy day, and any options we saw would’ve left us completely exposed to conditions that might break tent poles, or at best make for a miserable night’s sleep. So, we carried on. 


Night fell, and we made it to a ramping drainage that we knew eventually would lead us to the lakes and sheltered camps.


The terrain became slightly more forgiving, thankfully. After a day of battering wind, we finally dropped into a descent with a bit of shelter. Because it was dark now though, our pace stayed slow. We were completely reliant on GPX tracks on our phones to determine the line down the ramps, and the best route wasn’t always evident.  


Eventually we made our way into a narrow chute, scambling  between steep rock walls. We knew there was a way down, but we weren’t sure that this was it, and we spent an hour in the dark worried about being cliffed out. We’d come to a step, shine our lights into a void, and downclimb hoping for the best. 


It wasn’t the route we should’ve taken, but after a lot of scrambling, somehow we picked our way through. At 1030 PM the chute dumped us out, exhausted on the side of a lake, sheltered and surrounded by a wide green lawn.


We made our dinner by starlight. After 13 hours of movement, dehydrated chili mac never tasted so good. I didn’t want to know how much ground we’d covered, but by Six2’s measure, it was less than 10 miles. I’m sure that’s the slowest 9 miles I’ve ever hiked.


I set up my tent on a suboptimal slope, because by this point, screw it. Physically, I’d felt good through the day - better than the previous two days even - but it reminded me of back when I was running ultras. You keep moving because you know you don’t have time for a break. The pressure keeps a steady supply of endorphins in your system, and if you snack through the day you can keep yourself going. But I knew from experience that when you do that one day, you’ll pay for it the next. I felt fit and capable, but I wasn’t sure I could keep it up if the final 50 miles of the route were going to be like today.


You have to trust the beta though. I thought back on that trip report from the hiker who’d done six miles in a day through this section. She’d ultimately made it through in a week, so I tried to silence my ruminating mind. Physical exhaustion made that easy enough. I imagined those guys from Tennessee, probably miserable and bivying in the wind by the lake, and fell asleep.


Unnamed lake, near Camp Lake, Wind River Range
Waking up near unnamed lake, near Camp Lake

Day 4: August 29th. Unnamed Lake near Camp Lake, to the south end of Long Lake near Europe Pass.


Today I woke up with aching muscles and complicated emotions. It felt like we were fully immersed in the Winds now, and yesterday was an initiation. We were nowhere near halfway by distance. Also though, it seemed like things would get easier the next few days, based on the report from Alan Dixon’s website. I’d saved his guide on my phone back in Pinedale. I re-read it, looking for reassurance that things would be okay.


I drank my coffee on a rock in the sun in front of a clear lake, surrounded by grass and pine and peaks. Through our descent in the dark, we’d exited the rock and ice, and entered a landscape that was positively hospitable. This route is relentlessly beautiful, and it made me wonder what we’d missed the night before. 


After three days, I thought I was starting to understand the nature of our fate in the Winds. The route ahead would be consistently very steep, but the uphills would be doable enough. An hour or two of rock hopping and leaning on the poles and sweating and heavy breathing to get to the top of some spectacular pass. We’d stop talking on the ascent because we were out of breath. Six2 would turn on some upbeat ‘90s dance music. Sometimes he’d push ahead. Sometimes I would. We’d Pump Up the Jam


At the top of a pass, you feel a sense of achievement for having made it. Usually on hikes the hard part is out of the way. In the Winds, at the top of each pass, we’d look down and see grand views but also steep, gnarly terrain. Maybe there’d be a dropoff into a lake that it wasn’t clear how to pass. We’d be picking lines and navigating and trying to stay off of rocks that wobble or fall underneath your weight. You’d rock hop, thousands of times, hoping you won’t misstep and break an ankle. Going down would be just as slow as going up. 


The first days I was in a bit of denial - hoping things would slip back towards more normal hiking standards, and our more usual pace. Getting started on day four though, I was resigned to averaging a mile an hour, hiking 10 - 12 hours to make modest daily progress. It’s better to accept reality than to fight against it. I’d need to think about rest of my time in the Winds as work, not vacation.


This was the stuff I was thinking about while we worked our way down and around Camp Lake, which - I have to admit - was actually pretty pleasant. 


Passing Golden and Dennis Lakes was straightforward. Climbing to Hay Pass was mercifully simple. Afterwards was a comfortable descent - not that steep, and relatively good tread.


Detritus, Wind River High Route
Civilization?

We hadn’t seen other humans since a couple walked through our camp that morning, but in the afternoon we found a relic of civilization near an unnamed lake - a metal Safeway basket sitting rusted and out of place in a field. Someone must’ve hiked it up here decades ago, to use for fishing I’d guess? It felt so out of place in this big, empty place.


Long Lake, Wind River High Route
Long Lake

We ended the day skirting the edge of massive Long Lake. We could see it coming for miles, triggering flashbacks to the Alpine Lakes Basin. There looked to be a tough traverse around the edge. When we got there, it was actually unremarkable. A few easy scrambles, but it was mostly hiking, with clear routes, good tread, and even hints of trail in places. In the evening light, the scenery was striking with little inlets and bays with steep peaks behind.


It was a relief that the day had been pleasant, and it gave us some emotional distance from the previous day’s anxiety-provoking grind. 


Six2 and I were even joking in the evening, “We’ll be insufferable by the time we start to see day hikers near Big Sandy. ‘Sure, a weekend of camping under the Cirque of the Towers is nice and all, but you haven’t really seen the Winds until you’ve rock hopped around the Alpine Lakes Basin.’”


Photo Pass, Wind River High Route
Photo Pass, meeting expectations

Day 5: August 30th: Europe Pass, Photo Pass, Sentry Peak Pass


After making progress yesterday without major stress, we woke feeling rested and relieved. Six2 seemed to be developing foot issues - his sole was red and angry for reasons he couldn’t entirely discern - but otherwise we were optimistic. We made a decision to follow the Skurka route for a portion of the day, which would be more elevation gain but also more scenic - climbing Europe Pass, then Photo Pass, then into the Middle Fork basin and ultimately aiming to get over Sentry Peak Pass.


The weather was stable. Wildfire smoke had rolled in even from the north, or the west, or maybe both. The morning was cold enough that water froze straightaway when Six2 accidentally spilled his bottle in the grass. I’d stayed warm enough overnight, but I’d slept in all of my layers for the first time on the trip - tights and hiking shirt and wind gear and puffy jacket. I’ll take a bit of chill overnight if it means clear days. So far, really, the heavy winds on Wednesday have been my only weather complaint.


The day was consistently beautiful, like all the others. After spending so much time on rock, it was surreal descending into the Wind River Indian Reservation between Europe and Photo Pass. It was a bushwhack, winding through pine forest on elk trail. We were still above 10,000 feet, but it felt as far below Alpine as we’d been since Green River Lakes. 


We talked about how you become a different person on trail. From our start in Big Sky, we’d been out for a month now. We spent our days rock hopping, climbing mountains, reading weather, washing our armpits in the occasional frigid lake, navigating at night through the woods. We’d been out for long enough that it felt normal. 


That morning we’d been reflecting on the change: 


“It’s a liberating feeling, pooping in an open field, in full view of whoever is unlucky enough to walk by.”


It’s why the trail becomes home for some people, and a long hike is more than just a trip. When you’re out for long enough, you start to think of yourself differently. You become a different person. You poop where you want.


Six2 has been doing this for decades, and that identity has become a regular part of who he is. Six2 on trail, David at home. I have a trail name too - it’s Darko, as in Donnie Darko - but my trail identity is less a part of how I conceptualize myself, I think. For me my hiking career has been a month on the Camino, 5 months on the PCT, then a series of shorter trips. Between hiking and trail running, I added it up in my head, and I’ve surely spent more than 5,000 miles on trail, but Six2 must have at least double that. It’s been 24 years now that he’s been doing these trails, a month or two at a time. It’s enough to keep that identity cemented.


Middle Fork Lake, Wind River High Route Traverse
Middle Fork Lake

Towards the end of the day we dropped beside a steep creekbed through thick brush to Middle Fork Lake. We found a lost pair of earbuds soaking in a puddle in the middle of the bushwhack. Middle Fork was within a day’s hike of a parking lot.


Around the lake there were tents and campers - dogs even! To this point everyone else we’d encountered had been doing some variation of the High Route. Some were more ambitious than us. Some were bailing because they’d underestimated it. Today though, normal folks were out having a nice overnight. It felt like we’d made it back within reach of civilization.


After Middle Fork, as night was approaching, we kept climbing, pushing through low willow, past small lakes, and towards Sentry Pass. The scenery was the sort that absorbs you, with Pronghorn Peak’s granite walls rising a thousand feet beside us, summits all around. With wildfire smoke in the air, dusk was yellow-orange, like light through stained glass. 


Ascending Sentry Pass, Wind River Range
Ascending towards Sentry Pass

We’d planned to descend into the Bonneville Lakes basin, but at the top of the pass, in the shadow of Sentry Peak, we found a perfectly flat patch of soft dirt, the remains of a dried pond of snowmelt. We pulled a weather report on the InReach (they cost $4 on Six2’s plan). We were above 11,000 feet, but the spot forecast looked perfect. Clear, with temperatures above freezing overnight. We decided to take advantage of our good fortune and camp here, at one of the most scenic spots on the whole trail.


Sentry Pass, Wind River Range
Camping on Sentry Pass

Six2 stayed up late, trying to get the best shot of the Milky Way his camera phone could produce.


Raid Peak Pass, Wind River Range
Raid Peak Pass

Day 6: August 31st: Sentry Pass to Shadow/Billy’s Lake


Today was a very slow start. I’d been waking with the sun, normally around 6:00, then laying in bed until around 7:00. In the shadow of the peaks this morning, I didn’t even open my eyes until 8:30.  In part, I think we were starting to relax. It was our second to last day and it seemed like we’d made it through the worst of it. 


Six2’s feet were getting more tender. He removed his firm insoles, and started slowly down the talus descent to Bonneville Lake. At the lake, we spent the morning doing first aid, eating breakfast, and chatting. 


While we were ringing out our socks in the lake, I was thinking that a month is how long it takes to go feral. I’d seen myself in my camera that morning, and I looked like a different person. My eyes were puffy and my hair was matted. My white shirt was stained brown, and I could smell my own stink. I looked like a 19th century prospector. The mountains turned me into that, and it only took a month.


Us on the Wind River High Route Traverse

Six2 says that’s why he tries to plan trips that are around a month long. It goes back to that thing, that it’s long enough to become a different person. It’s hard out here, but at home something feels missing. People become more of who they want to be out here I think, which is why they keep coming back to it. Six2 said he’s gone through it so many times now it feels normal.


Six2 will be finishing the Triple Crown this year. After we finish with the Winds, he’ll go north and hike his last few days through Glacier National Park to the northern terminus of the CDT, and he’ll be done. But he’s not planning to stop doing this sort of thing. He’s already planning a walk across Oregon next year, with the intention of connecting that into a walk across the United States from west to east.


I’m pretty happy with a more scattershot approach to the future. I’m not sure when I’ll go out for something as big as this again.


All this talk, it gets you distracted from the actual job at hand. Our conversation had somehow drifted to the enduring legacy of the Ottoman Empire when I looked at the clock. It was 11 by the time we really got moving on our day. Night hiking again tonight?


We’d be done soon, but it didn’t feel like we should assume that we’d made it. We still had two more days on the high route. 


After our descent to the lakes, we took a circuitous route around and over the shoulder of Raid Peak. On the ascent we had a view out to the Wyoming plains - the first flat land we’d seen all week. We had a spot of cell service. I couldn’t bring myself to check email, but I did send a text to Angel, hoping she’d made it out of the WInds safely. A few minutes later I got a reassuring response.


”Just got out! I had a good trip. So good. Can’t wait to swap stories. Eating Mexican. Send me food orders for tomorrow! I love you.”


I was so relieved to hear she’d had a good trip and made it out safely. The thought that she was out in this terrain solo had been stressing me out since Indian Pass. Also, town food, just a day away!


After descending Raid and picking through more Talus, we got on grass and then actual trail after a bushwhack to Skull Lake. 


We started seeing people more frequently! Near Skull Lake, I wandered into someone’s camp because it seemed like the most direct route between points. I’d forgotten that it’s rude to wander through someone’s camp, but their uncomfortable stares reminded me.


Shadow Lake, Wind River Range Traverse
Towards Shadow Lake and the Cirque of the Towers

Shadow Lake sits in a stunning spot on the back side of the Cirque of the Towers, a day‘s hike from a trailhead. As we approached the lake we found swarms of people - parties even - tucked into campsites. We could smell the soap and the cleanliness. When you’ve been out for a while, day hikers all look like dancing snacks and beer. We could’ve regaled them with stories of our achievements and Six2’s impending Triple Crown in the hope that they’d offer us treats. We carried on though, and cooked our own dinners like responsible adults. Night fell. 


We put on our headlamps, winding through a labyrinth of trails around the lake. Eventually we emerged onto the main trail heading up towards the base of Texas Pass. We carved out a spot among some low willow and set up camp, near a smaller body of water called Billy’s Lake. It was unnerving to be surrounded by other campers’ headlamps in the dark. It was the first time that had happened in weeks, since the Tetons.


At some point we realized that it was Memorial Day weekend, which explained the crowds. It was another perfect weather day, and it felt like the Winds were lightening up on us. Tomorrow we’ll go up and over Texas and then Jackass Pass, and we’ll be done with the High Route.


Texas Pass, Wind River Range
Texas Pass

Day 7: September 1st: Billy’s Lake to Big Sandy Trailhead


We woke up to the rustle of weekenders tearing down camp and making breakfast. I layed on my air mat wondering where all of these people had even come from. The closest towns were all small, working class places with no more than a few thousand residents. There are less people in all of Wyoming than in Louisville, Kentucky. This section of the Winds was hours from anywhere, but it was swarming with young, outdoorsy urban types. 


There were a good number of BYU hats, and a couple of square-jawed hikers greeted us as “gents,” so I’m guessing most people were up from the Salt Lake City. Even that was a 5 hour drive away. It’s a bit of a mystery. 


Coming over Texas Pass in the morning, we walked by a pretty young hiker from New York, on a trip with her mom. Six2 had what he described as a “trail struck “ moment when she went wide eyed - starstruck - when he mentioned that he was on the cusp of finishing the Triple Crown. She’d hiked the Colorado Trail the previous year, and was enthralled with the big, strange thru-hiking universe. At this stage in our hike, we smelled like barbecue and looked tattered and manic. In a very small part of the world, that affords you real street cred.


It’s not just about the walking and the scenery - it’s about the identity. It’s about who it makes you, and how it makes other people see you. It’d been a theme of this hike, for me anyway.


The views from the top of Texas Pass are worth the climb, and for the first time since Indian Pass, we shared them with other people. We passed a train of hikers on the steep drop to Lonesome Lake, where crowds were shouting, laughing, and swimming. On a snack break, we screamed back at them incomprehensibly from the bushes because we’d gone feral. We made our way to the trail up Jackass Pass - the last pass on the High Route. The relative proximity to civilization and the presence of actual, maintained trail made it feel like we were already done, and we were moving at a normal hiking pace for the first time in a week. 


Jackass Pass, Wind River High Route
Jackass Pass

A few miles before the trailhead, we tucked between a few bushes and rinsed our butts in Big Sandy Lake for a final moment of trail life. We washed the last week in the wilderness off, while a day hiker floated towards the middle of the lake on a pool toy.


We hiked out of the High Route on dusty trails in the afternoon, with clouds gathering in the mountains behind us for the first time in a week. 


How I looked after the Wind River High Route
How I looked after the Wind River High Route

After the High Route Traverse


As soon as we approached the trailhead, Angel popped up from behind a bush, startlingly clean and happy. After hugs all around, we took a short walk to the Big Sandy campground. Angel opened the bear box at our site, and it was overflowing with food - a thru-hiker’s dream. She pulled chilled beers out of a cooler bag, and we toasted our completion. 


Angel had scoped out the only restaurant within an hour of our camp, at the local lodge. Despite the well-stocked bear bin, I have a firm commitment to always buy restaurant food if it’s available on a long hike, so we took a short drive and ate burgers surrounded by taxidermy and Western kitsch. Afterwards, we immediately went back for second dinner - fajitas and nachos and more beers on the picnic table - itself a luxury we’d missed. The detritus spread on the table afterwards was a damning indictment of what the Winds had turned us into. 


The remains of dinner #2
The remains of dinner #2

We swapped stories about our experiences in the Winds. Angel had bought herself a tent and gone out alone on a loop to Titcomb Basin. She had to do a bit of navigating, and forgot the charger for her phone, so things got dicey for a moment. It all panned out in the end. She didn’t go up Indian Pass.


Six2 and I felt shell-shocked and exhausted from the constant vigilance and effort that the high route required, but finishing felt like an accomplishment. Both of us agreed that it was the hardest, best week of hiking that either of us have done.


It was a week that marked bigger things. It was the crux of our month-long hike through the Rockies - maybe the most varied and beautiful four weeks of hiking possible in the Lower 48. It was a capstone on Six2’s decades of work finishing the Triple Crown. For me, it was a comeback of sorts - my longest outing since the PCT almost a decade earlier. For both of us, it was proof that we could still do hard things. Getting old, but still got it.


Over nachos and guacamole we agreed that the Wind River High Route was a hike that felt worthy of all of that. 


Temple Pass, Wind River Range
Temple Pass

The next morning, we left camp to finish our last three days before Six2 headed north to Glacier to complete the CDT at the northern terminus. We hiked over Temple Pass for one final goodbye to the high country in the Winds, and descended to the official CDT - the longest stretch we’d spent on the actual trail on the whole trip. We weathered a final rain storm and walked through a blowdown hell in the dark to camp near Little Sandy Lake. From there it was just two days of walking on forgiving trail to a highway crossing where Six2 joined his previous footsteps to complete the CDT in Wyoming.


To me, it felt like exiting the portal - walking back towards normal life. I thought back on the thermal features in Yellowstone and the grandeur of the Tetons and the excitement of scrambling in the Gros Ventre and the transcendence of the Winds and knew I'd gone through something significant. These experiences stick with you, and you're never sure how they'll affect you across time. Even as I'm writing this a month later, it's not clear. Fundamentally, though, I was ready to be done. I was ready to go home and let the processing and reminiscing start. I wanted to change my clothes, throw out my shoes, and take two showers to rinse the filth out of my beard.


For Six2 it was a final step before going back out on his own for five days in Glacier. 


Blowdowns near Little Sandy Lake
Blowdown hell, near Little Sandy Lake

When we hit the highway, Angel drove us to town and a day of recovery in Lander. We drove Six2 to Riverton, where he caught a shuttle to the airport. He flew to Montana and rented a Uhaul to drive to a train station (there were no other vehicle rental options available). He caught a train to West Glacier and hitched to his last portion of trail in Glacier. Five days later, he finished the CDT at the Canadian border.


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One of the hikers from Tennessee asked Six2 and me what we do for a living that allows us to get out for these long hikes so often. It’s not just about your job. It's about the way you organize your life. If you’re curious too, everything I know about the subject is in my book, The Dirtbag’s Guide to Life


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