Travel: Hiking the divide

What happened when Jennifer Hanson decided to walk from Mexico to Canada

The best advice we heard before backpacking 2,414 miles from Mexico to Canada along the Continental Divide Trail was that thru-hiking follows the 80/20 rule. Twenty percent of the time the hiking conditions would be perfect; we would be on a well-defined trail winding through a mountain pass on a warm, summer day. But 80 percent of the time we could count on it being too hot, too cold, too dry or too wet. Knowing this ahead of time made all the difference.

Three miles north of the Mexican border we turned off the highway and plunged into the desert flats at the base of the Florida Mountains. The temperature climbed into the 70s as the sun rose in an azure sky. Prickly Pear cactus, Mesquite and Old Man Saltbush were scattered across the desert floor. Hours later we were heartened by the sight of 'our' windmill breaking the horizon: long blades spun lazily above a large, rusty tank that captured the pumped water. My husband, Greg, climbed to the top and pried open the hatch.

Water!  Warm, greenish, wonderful water.

Five weeks and six hundred miles later we had visited the Gila Cliff Dwellings, hiked past the inactive Bandera Volcano, and chatted with a Navaho sheepherder. We had climbed to 9,000 feet in the Carson National Forest when we hit the snow-line. We weren’t prepared. Having just left the desert, we weren’t yet carrying our snowshoes, warm clothes or tent.

The deepening snow

We trudged through the deepening snow with low-cut boots; swept it aside to light our stove; and packed it down to lay out our tarp. The next day, the snow lay in deep, wet blankets everywhere. By late afternoon, the morning drizzle had become a steady rain and we were sloshing through streams of icy water that covered the top of Mogote Ridge. We were exhausted and drenched. That night we made the difficult decision to leave the mountains and hike on the road to our destination Chama, New Mexico.

North of Chama lay the Colorado Rocky Mountains, which in mid-May, had over a nine-foot base of snow with more to....

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