Wednesday, July 3rd, 2024, 1530-2030
Waterton to US/CA border, then back to Waterton town campground, mm 4.2
9 miles (technically only 4 that count), Gain: 1470′, Loss: 1470′, elevation 4325′
I did a lot of prep work on this blog before I began the hike, and I thought it would be nice to provide a synopsis of each section. The maps and descriptions are borrowed from the GDTA website, giving readers a sneak preview of what’s to come. I added these details to the corresponding posts at the start of each section. Here’s the first synopsis, followed by the events of Day 1:
Section A – 145km / 90mi, Alternates: Mt Rowe-Sage Pass, Barnaby Ridge -The GDT’s southern terminus is also the CDT’s Northern Terminus, on the shores of Waterton lake. The area, including Waterton Townsite, is encompassed by Waterton Lakes National Park. Waterton is just north of Glacier National Park in Montana and about 3 hours to the southwest of Calgary. The border can be accessed by a boat or the trail. Waterton is a small town with shops, restaurants, gear stores, and a campground.
Section A is one of wild extremes, in that it starts with maintained and popular trails in a national park but also includes what many consider the single hardest day on the GDT – La Coulotte Ridge. Shortly after is the Barnaby Ridge alternate. Both sections are very steep and have long waterless stretches. Some cell service can be found along the way and there are several points that are accessible by vehicles, making bailouts far more possible than other sections. A Parks Canada Discovery Pass and backcountry camping permits are required in Waterton Lakes National Park.
Day 1: I woke at 3:30 am with a killer migraine, one of the worst I’d ever had. It took a while for my medication to kick in and I couldn’t fall back to sleep. Instead, I just laid there in excruciating pain, thinking of all the chores we still had left to do. I knew everything would be great once I got outside and on the trail, I just had to get past this last bit of prep.
We all had breakfast together again and finished the last of our packing. I still needed to buy flat rate boxes…they weren’t free like in the US but the price included the shipping… about $25 CA for a medium box. Everyone but me had bought the boxes the day before, so I was able to trial and error my needs by borrowing Woody’s boxes for reference. The hotel was nice to lend us a cart to push all our boxes and my bags of food the 3 blocks to the PO. I wish I’d gotten a picture of this. We got there before they opened and I also wish I’d gotten a picture of the poor PO employee’s face when he arrived to see us with all our boxes. At least things were slow on a Wednesday morning, 2 days after a Canadian holiday. Things went smoothly, even though most of our boxes were over the weight limit of 5 kgs. The boxes said: ‘if it fits, it ships’, but then also had a weight limit? Weird. We all crossed our fingers they would make it.
Our shuttle driver arrived plenty early as did 2 other hikers that were joining us. I arranged the shuttle, and was pleased it all came together so well. We were a bit crammed with 6 people and all our stuff but luckily Chantel had a soft top carrier to put most of the packs and boxes. She lived in Coleman, our next town, and generously agreed to hold our resupply boxes so we didn’t have to ship them. She also brought a few extra cans of bear spray to give us.
We got to Waterton by around 2:30 pm, just in time for the rain to start hammering our campsite. We delayed setting up and Woody had to go in search of some tent stakes, since his hadn’t found their way into his pack…even after all the extra he brought for me. We all went into town to grab some stuff to eat and met up with Alex, the 5th element to our tramily.
It’s kind of a long story that I forgot to mention in my earlier post. Basically I found him on the FB page when he posted his Jasper campsite schedule. Our booking hadn’t gone as well and so we were looking for someone with a more reasonable schedule. Luckily, Alex’s lined up perfectly. I reached out to him to see if we might share and found that he was starting the same day and pretty much had the same schedule as us all the way through. I also came to figure out that we’d shared a bad shuttle ride from Etna the year before. I noted that he was Australian and had also hiked the PCT in 2023. Even though I’d met heaps of Australians that year, I recalled one in particular being on the shuttle. He was pleading with the driver to either crank up the AC or roll down the windows because there were 9 people crammed in the back and it was 100 degrees. Wouldn’t you know it, that was indeed Alex.
Over time, we started to coordinate some of our planning and I invited him to join in entirely if he wanted to…the more the merrier. From a bear safety standpoint, this was better for him too. We joked that we needed a token non-American in our group to help us with the metric system conversions. We didn’t yet know any Canadian hikers, but an Aussie would do just fine. Plus we all loved his accent. We didn’t know why, but Americans are suckers for it…must be the Steve Irwin Crocodile hunter pop culture.
We went back to the campsite to grab some stuff for the hike to the border and back, since it wasn’t enough that we had to ship all our boxes, pack, travel 3 hours from Calgary to Waterton, get a late lunch, and set-up camp. We also had to hike 9 miles round trip, no big deal. It was either this or do a really big day the next day. Of course, it started to hammer rain again, along with some thunder. We hid under a shelter for the worst of it and then started the trail, wet be damned. Alex hit the nail on the head, pointing out how the friends he’d been hanging out with over the past weeks would have been too deterred by the rain and cancelled the hike. But he was back in his element with other thru-hikers, who boldly marched out into the rain because, well, we had to get those miles done!
The rain let up after a few miles, by which time our feet were soaked. Couldn’t even make it 1 day with dry feet, oh well. We got to the border just in time for some nice light, taking all our obligatory starting photos. I already had a similar photo from when I’d visited during the PNT. But I wasn’t starting or finishing the hike back then. I didn’t feel much emotion, other than being very happy to be outside and around a seemingly awesome group of people. I thought it was funny that I was the one person we all had in common, since I wasn’t usually at the center of social groups. I always felt just on the periphery. I felt some pride about bringing all these great people together. We were going to have some fun times together, I could just tell.
It was already almost 7 pm by the time we headed back. I fell behind on the return, just taking it easy. I guess I already needed some alone time, but not in a way that I was desperate for it. I hoped things would progress as easily and fluid for the rest of the trip. I had a lot to figure out in starting with such a big tramily. For Vince and Georgie, they had to figure out how to hike with others that weren’t their actual family members. Woody had done such an amazing job with all the planning and campsite reservations, it was easy to forget that this would be his longest thru-hike to date. We all had similar backgrounds but knew very little about each other’s hiking styles. I felt confident that a lot of the differences I’d come to see and experience when groups didn’t mesh well would be negated by our fixed schedule. We had pretty clear objectives for each day, alleviating stress over someone wanting to hike too far or pushing the pace too fast (like I was inclined to do).
We all got back to the campground by 8:30 pm and I got a ricebowl from Subway for dinner. I had my first bear sighting on the way into town…a large black bear that was cruising along the river just outside of the campground. There were also deer galore, just casually walking past. I could have reached out and touched one, they were so tame. I crashed hard just after 10 pm, right as the rain started again. My new Zpacks tent was being tested quite a bit this day but I slept soundly to the white noise of the rain, confident I would stay dry. And I did! Thanks Zpacks…the Plex Solo is awesome!
