The Continental Divide Trail (CDT) is a long-distance hiking trail in the US. It runs from the Mexican border along the Rocky Mountains through the states of New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Idaho and Montana to the Canadian border. Alongside the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) and the Appalachian Trail (AT), the CDT Trail is one of the three iconic US long-distance hiking trails, known as the “Triple Crown of Hiking”. This long-distance hiking trail is named after the Continental Divide which, in simple terms, separates the rivers that flow either west into the Pacific Ocean or east into the Atlantic Ocean. Overall, the Continental Divide Trail is quite remote. The five states along the CDT are in total around five times the size of the UK, but only have a population of just under 12 million.
The Continental Divide Trail is approximately 3,000 miles (4,700 km) long. I hiked the entire route from south to north in one go. Unfortunately, I can’t estimate how many kilometres I actually covered. The idea that the CDT is a continuous hiking trail isn’t realistic, as is the case with all long-distance hiking trails. Rather, it’s a network of hiking trails, roads, dirt tracks, footpaths and sometimes even unrecognizable routes. I would even say that no two hikers follow exactly the same route. Although there’s an official route, it changes from time to time, and there are also many good reasons to choose a different route that is more beautiful, easier or shorter, for example.
New Mexico – the starting point of the CDT
My journey began on April 19, 2022 in the small town of Lordsburg in the south of New Mexico. From there, the three-hour drive to the starting point of the Continental Divide Trail on the Mexican border begins. A few days later, Lordsburg would also be the first town stop, i.e. the first supply point. Accordingly, there are many hikers in the small village, which lies at an altitude of 1,300 metres and is therefore the lowest point of the entire trail. Some are still wearing clean clothes and a smile on their faces, while others already show signs of having covered the first 85 miles.
The first 1,200 kilometres of the CDT run through the desert of New Mexico and are often referred to as the warm-up phase. The elevation profile is a little more leisurely than later in the Rockies, but the desert has its own unique challenges. First of all, at the beginning of the hike you’re in the worst physical condition of the entire hike. Then there are the hot days, cold nights, little water and hardly any shade. As a result, you have to carry a lot of water with you, and that costs energy.
However, after my hike on the Pacific Crest Trail four years earlier, this was nothing new for me. I was immediately back in trekking mode and my familiar routine: filtering water, setting up the tent, taking care of blisters and so on. I also know and enjoy the benefits of hiking in the desert. As it rarely rains, you can sleep without a tent with a view of the starry sky. For me as a Central European, the desert also has a special charm. You come across all kinds of interesting plants and animals that you don’t know from Europe. Like the infamous rattlesnakes, for example. Just a few days in, I was able to admire a fully grown specimen.
Early injury – early end to my long-distance hike?
Unfortunately, my initial euphoria quickly faded. After just one week, the first signs of an injury became apparent in the form of shin pain. I had firmly resolved not to start with 20 miles a day straight away. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to keep these good intentions. Time and again, I ended up walking a few more miles than planned in order to get to the next water point, a better place to spend the night or the next village. I ignored the pain for too long and relied on ibuprofen, affectionately known as “vitamin I” among hikers. After 3 weeks, the pain became unbearable and I had to take a forced break. Was this the end? Was all the planning and preparation for nothing? Fortunately not. My injury healed and after seven long days in Pie Town, New Mexico, I was able to carry on.
Nevertheless, my involuntary break had one nice side effect: I got to know dozens of other hikers from all over the world. I would meet many of them again over the next few months but I only know the real names of very few of them. This is because on the long-distance hiking trails in the US, it’s common to adopt a trail name given to you by other hikers.
Route change because of forest fires
After another week through the desert, the next bad news followed. Due to an acute risk of forest fires, access to the forest in many areas around the Continental Divide Trail further north had been banned indefinitely. So after just 500 miles in New Mexico, I had to skip several hundred kilometres. However, a snowstorm had been forecast for the San Juans in Colorado. Without further ado, I decided to take a detour to the Arizona Trail in the neighbouring state and hike to the Grand Canyon for a week. Then I went straight to Chama, the last town in New Mexico, and the part of the CDT I was most looking forward to began.
Colorado – CDT highlights and thunderstorms
The very first day in Colorado took me up to over 3,000 metres and the first, curious view from the first summit of the San Juans made my Alpine Trekker heart beat faster: snow-covered peaks as far as the eye can see! Over the next thousand kilometres, the trail ran continuously at over 2500 metres through the seemingly untouched nature of the Rocky Mountains. Instead of snakes and reptiles, there were now marmots and eagles to watch. Although I now had to conquer steep climbs every day, the melting snow provided an abundance of water and I rarely had to carry more than a litre with me.
Here, the CDT also quickly revealed its wild character. The days mostly started bright and sunny. But as the day progressed, the clouds got thicker and the wind rougher. Especially in the high mountains, the weather is unpredictable and can change quickly. Heavy thunderstorms in the afternoon are the order of the day. It’s therefore advisable to start early and complete the difficult climbs before midday. One day it hailed so much that the surrounding peaks were white afterwards. On more than one occasion, I found out for myself that hypothermia is a very real danger when trekking in the high mountains and should not be underestimated. Caution is also advised when crossing rivers. When the snow melts, small streams can become raging torrents.
It was the beginning of June and there was still snow in the mountains. I sometimes had difficulties navigating when the Continental Divide Trail wasn’t visible under the snow cover. I vividly remember a difficult descent on a steep north-facing slope, where snow was still several metres deep in some places. My fellow hiker and I walked down the mountain for several hours, and every attempt to find a safe way down into the valley ended at a deep abyss.
Snow, thunderstorms and a highlight on the trail
In the end, we decided to climb down one of the cliffs. Looking back, this was one of the few moments on the Continental Divide Trail that I remember as being really dangerous. In general, the snow situation was manageable. 2022 had been a year with significantly less snow in June than usual, and I was able to pass the San Juans without an ice axe and winter gear.
However, neither snow nor thunderstorms could spoil my trip through Colorado. Almost every day was even better than the last and every view was a postcard motif. Even the villages in the valley, to which you descend for supplies, are sometimes at an altitude of 3,000 metres. I’ve hardly ever enjoyed thru hiking this much.
I reached the literal highlight of the CDT at the beginning of July. A breathtaking ridge hike leads from Mt Edwards to the summit of Grays Peak at 4351 metres, the highest point of the Continental Divide Trail. A few days earlier, I had already had the opportunity to make a detour to Mt Elbert, which is not far away and a few metres higher. It’s the highest of Colorado’s 58 “fourteeners”, i.e. peaks over 14,000 feet (4,267 metres), making it the second highest mountain in the US outside Hawaii and Alaska.
In northern Colorado, I had a sense of déjà vu from my PCT hike four years earlier. Back then, mosquitoes had ruined my hike through Yosemite National Park. I now suffered the same fate in Rocky Mountain National Park and my morale hit rock bottom. For a few days, there was no escape from the little pests and the best moment of the day was to zip up my tent at night.
Wyoming – flat variety and grizzly bears
After 93 days and 1,500 miles, I reached the third state along the CDT Trail. With 6 inhabitants per square kilometre, Wyoming is the US state with the lowest population density after Alaska. For comparison: the population density in the UK is around 287 inhabitants per square kilometre. The remoteness of the “Cowboy State” still gives you a feeling of the Wild West. However, there’s one thing in abundance here: cattle. The ruminants and their droppings are everywhere. Sometimes you have to make your way through herds of hundreds of animals.
In the south of Wyoming, I left the high peaks of Colorado behind, and, kilometre by kilometre, I could see from the vegetation that I was heading back into increasingly drier areas. A few days later, my journey led me through the desert in the infamous Great Divide Basin. It’s hot, there’s hardly any shade and the distances between water sources are long. But it’s perhaps the flattest section of the entire Continental Divide Trail. Over the roughly 200 kilometres, there are no climbs worth mentioning.
I met hikers who were doing the whole stage in one go, but I didn’t want to risk further injury from overwork and spread the hike comfortably over four days. I thought I had now put the heavy thunderstorms of the mountains behind me, but I quickly learnt that a heavy thunderstorm in flat, exposed terrain with no shelter is no fun either. I spent the night in a small hollow full of cow dung and watched the lightning on the horizon from my tent.
Amusement park and grizzly territory
On the other side of the Basin, the peaks of the Wind River Range – or Winds for short – tower up, some of them higher than 4,000 metres, and from one day to the next, I was no longer in the desert but back in the high mountains. Large areas of the remote Winds mountain range are nature reserves and, unlike in Colorado, there are very few day hikers here, which surprised me. I experienced the Winds like a small child in an amusement park and couldn’t stop being amazed. Over the course of time, erosion and glacial activity have formed breathtaking, dramatic rock formations that reminded me of the Dolomites.
Entering the Winds brought another change: from then on I was in grizzly territory. Although there were black bears all along the trail, they’re generally a little more skittish and shy than their larger relatives. As a result, I carried bear spray with me from then on and stowed my food (and anything else with strong odours, such as toothpaste) overnight, packed away bear-proof at a safe distance from my tent. Even a cosy dinner without leaving my sleeping bag in the tent had become taboo – much to my dismay.
The Winds were immediately followed by another highlight along the Continental Divide Trail. If the air smells of sulphur and the water tastes of sulphur, then you’ve reached the famous Yellowstone National Park. The geothermal springs and geysers as well as rare wild animals such as bison and grizzly bears attract tourists from all over the globe, and the hiking trails in the oldest national park in the world are therefore very busy.
Idaho/Montana – hiking trail between two states
Although Idaho is one of five states along the CDT, you never actually hike through Idaho. Instead, the trail meanders for around 600 kilometres along the border between Idaho and Montana. This section turned out to be unexpectedly dry and strenuous. I was now in good shape and tried to cover about 30 miles (48 kilometres) every day. Nevertheless, the many metres in altitude and the constant ups and downs were getting to me. To cover my body’s energy requirements of 5000 or more calories per day, I now carried not one but two food bags with me. The “hiker hunger” had long since set in. No matter how much I ate, I never really got full.
Rattlesnakes and forest fires again on the Continental Divide Trail
In this diverse landscape, my journey took me through green meadows and forests, over mountain peaks and through desert-like steppes. At one point, I almost stepped on a rattlesnake, which fortunately made a loud noise shortly beforehand. I hadn’t expected to see these scaly fellows this far north.
I also noticed more and more smoke in the air. It was forest fire season in North America. At times I could see the plumes of smoke rising in all directions and the horizon was no longer recognisable. As is so often the case along the CDT, the trail also led through bare forests that had either burned down in the previous years or fallen victim to bark beetle.
Montana – the grand finale of the CDT
Montana is the largest state along the CDT and is just as sparsely populated as Wyoming. Only around 1.1 million people live in an area that’s larger than the UK. I hardly met any people outside the towns. I changed my shoes for the last time in the capital Helena. I was now on my fifth pair.
I was gradually realising that summer was coming to an end, as the days began with blue skies and sunshine, and as the afternoon progressed, the cold set in in a way I had rarely experienced before. In the evening, my fellow hikers and I made a detour to a public campsite with a toilet block that offered shelter from the icy wind. We then spent the evening and night there. Changes in the weather in the mountains leave no room for vanity. The next morning there was frost and we even experienced the first snow of the season during the course of the day. A storm came up and within a very short time, the ground was covered in several centimetres of fresh snow. We decided to take a break without further ado, pitched our tents and huddled in our sleeping bags, shivering. At this point, we didn’t realise that just a few hours later, we would continue our hike under blue skies and sunshine.
Glacier National Park – finale in the outhouse
After 150 days on the Continental Divide Trail , the grand finale followed in Glacier National Park. It’s not for nothing that the region is considered the crown of the continent. In the wide valleys between the rocky giants of the Rocky Mountains, an unspoilt landscape opened up with a breathtaking variety of plants and animals. Over the course of four days, I got to see bears, moose, eagles and many other rare animal species in the wild.
The last 900 kilometres through Montana flew by. It took me just three weeks and I covered up to 65 kilometres a day. Finally, the 154th and last day of my journey dawned, and it was not a nice day. When I reached the border with Canada, I wasn’t sure which was more important: the relief that it was finally over or the sadness that it was already over. What’s certain is that it was windy, raining and damn cold. Fortunately, there was a toilet block at the border crossing. And so the three of us sat around the toilet, protected from the elements, and waited for our lift. A grotesque, yet symbolic end to an unforgettable adventure on the Continental Divide Trail.
