Day 18 - Pie Town
Date: Sun May 5
Start Mile: NA
End Mile: NA
Total Trail Mileage: NA
Highlights: pie, laundry, rest
Today was mostly a day of rest in Pie Town. During the night I had felt a bit meh and was very glad we had decided to abandon the trail. By morning I was feeling much better, thought still not 100%. I was still happy to not be hiking.
Having slept in the living room, we could hear as others got up, packed up, and headed out. We would not be leaving today. We had sent a boxes of food for the next section to the post office here and today was Sunday. The post office would not be open until Monday morning. Originally we would have hiked in on a Wednesday, which would have worked out better.
So today would be a day to take care of other town chores - mostly laundry - and rest. I needed more rest anyway.
We also determined that we are not going to make up the miles we missed having hitched into Pie Town. There was a lot of road walking and nothing terribly exciting and it wasn’t worth the trouble trying to get back to where we’d left off (it would actually be quite difficult). We are unbothered by this. Moving on.
We chatted with Mash and Cinnabun a bit as they finished up breakfast and did their final packing before hitting the trail. As he prepped to leave, Mash looked out the window to see a guy walking by in bright yellow camo patterned ski pants. “You guys are about to meet one of the best people on trail,” he said sarcastically. “There are few people that truly creep me out, and that guy creeps me out.” And with that, he and Cinnabun made their exit.
‘That guy’ was Pesky (his trail name) and minutes after entering the house and dropping his pack, he began rummaging through the hiker boxes, pulling out any worthy items for his supply, chatting a bit about the items as he did so. Upon inspecting a baggie of electrolyte mix, Aimless, who was bouncing between the PCT and the CDT with his large wolf-mix dog, started talking about how he makes his own electrolyte mix. This would not be the last time today that Aimless waxed poetic about his many skills.
We decided this was as good a time as any to head out. Walking up the highway, we made our way to The Gathering Place, one of Pie Town’s two restaurants, and the only one that was open for breakfast. Choices made easy.
Not having a lot to accomplish today and certainly not wanting to sit around the Toaster House all day, we took our time eating breakfast and drinking many many cups of coffee. Pesky had also wandered up to the restaurant and proclaimed that he could spend just enough to get a Coke Zero and breakfast. And then another Coke Zero.
He sat at the far end of the table we were at and we chatted with him about the trail and hiking gear that he had some questions about. We aren’t sure what kind of interaction Mash had with him to label him creepy, but we found him pretty normal. Hot Mess ended up sharing half the pie that he ordered with Pesky since the pie servings were quite large and I am not much of a pie person. Pesky was very grateful and thanked Hot Mess several times throughout the day.
While we ate, another group of about six hikers came in, arriving straight from the trail (which is just the road into Pie Town). One of them came over and introduced himself - Owl, a man probably in his late 40s or early 50s. We chatted with him about the Toaster House for a bit before his breakfast arrived and he rejoined his group.
Our next order of business was laundry, which was three miles down the road. After overhearing us get turned down after asking a local heading that way if we could get a ride, the woman that had been serving us said, “Oh don’t worry, we’ll find you a ride that way.” And about 5 minutes later we were climbing into a pick up truck with Cheryl, the owner of the restaurant, heading to the Top of the World.
The Top of the World is an eclectic mix of businesses - in addition to a small convenience shop with souvenirs, basic (but expensive) groceries, and a small laundromat, they also specialize in land sales and operate a ‘horse motel’. Diversification at its finest.
Despite having about six washers, three of them were out of order and the other three had just been filled by another woman. We were in no particular hurry, so we waited. Throughout the late morning we would do our laundry and chat with the other locals that came to do the same.
One of these locals was Hollywood. Hollywood had a long white beard and mustache and wore dark blue jeans with a giant belt buckle, work boots, and a t-shirt that said ‘The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government’, the lettering set over an image of the American flag. His own arms were bared in a holster on his hip in the form of a 45 caliber pistol, not an uncommon scene for New Mexico, though the choice of weapon varied. A knife and set of keys were clipped to either pocket.
He chatted about his wife, who had passed 11 months ago today, his four dogs, and the many motorcycles he had owned over his life. The 18 times he had been to Sturgis. He also asked us all about the trail, coming and going from the laundry room to check on one of the dogs in his truck. “Have to make sure she doesn’t eat the groceries,” he said.
We also met Michael, who we chatted with off and on. Hot Mess asked him if he had served in the military after seeing the way he rolled his clean clothes. He had been in the army, stationed at the Mountain Warfare Training Center in Bridgeport, California. Oddly enough, we had heard about this station from Pungo on the first day of the trail. He had been stationed there as part of his time in the Marines. Hollywood had also spent some time in the military, so Hot Mess chatted with them about their service as well as his own time in the Navy.
At this point, everyone was finishing up their laundry and Michael offered to give us a ride back up to Pie Town. He had moved here just a week ago and was still waiting for his well line to be hooked up, hence the trip to the laundromat.
We spent the rest of the afternoon around the Toaster House. “You guys want to get baked?” Aimless asked, looking for company. No thanks. We did sit around on the patio for a bit, listening to him talk about his time in pest control, the life of Mitt Romney, and trail angel drama on the PCT. He always had plenty to say. Later in the evening we would hear him tell others about his work building airplane hangers and his time as a forest ranger. So many storylines to follow.
Around 4pm, we head back up the road with a few other hikers to the other restaurant in town - the Pie-O-Neer, which - in addition to pie - also had a set menu of sorts on Sunday evenings. This consisted of whatever they could make you with what they had left at the time you arrived. For us, this was a bowl of rice, beans, and green chili with pork with some nacho chips and corn bread. Hot Mess and I ended up sharing after the waitress had a little snafu counting people. Luckily full on hiker hunger has not kicked in, otherwise this would have been a problem.
We sat with WillyWah, another hiker that had arrived that afternoon, and Pesky, whose name had started to prove more fitting as the day wore on. Like Aimless, he had a penchant for getting his two cents in. Both nice guys, just lots to say.
The larger group of hikers we had seen at breakfast had been here all day, playing games and using the incredibly fast WiFi which, had we known about, we likely would have changed our local for the day as well. Now they all filtered out to either to the Toaster House or the primitive camping area across the street.
There was a good group at the house tonight. In addition to several already mentioned - Aimless, Pesky, Owl, and WillyWah - there was Kez from Sydney, Seven from Germany, and Johnny Cash - dubbed so because he wore all black - from Switzerland. Given his moniker, he was teaching himself to play Ring of Fire on his harmonica. He had just started learning how to play so encouraged us to check back with him on his progress sometime in Montana.
There was also Buck Fifty from Reston, VA and Pork Rind, who was originally from Iowa City but now lived in Bethesda, MD - not far from the NOAA headquarters where I would work on my trips to DC. Overall it as a fun crew and we sat around in the living room, learning new games to play to pass the time on the trail, telling bad jokes, and recounting experiences on other trails.
All of this until hiker midnight - sunset - when everyone dispersed to go to sleep. Tonight Hot Mess and I were able to procure one of the small rooms, setting our sleep stuffs up on the floor. I’m still feeling a little meh, so hoping a good night’s sleep will have me feeling better in the morning.