(8/10/16 was a zero day in Creede, CO) 8/11/16 Thursday started off fine but became a crazy 28 hour excursion lasting through 8/12/16 Friday!

After securing a ride to the trail from a Creede trail angel we started up into the mountains for 4 days of hiking to Silverton. Not 3 miles into the hike Peggy's tooth began to send nasty nerve pain signals whenever she bit down on anything. Since we were so close to the highway we decided the best thing to do was have it checked out before finding ourselves miles from nowhere.  We hiked back down to the trailhead hoping to catch the lady from Lake City shuttling hikers to the trail between 12:30 & 1:00 pm. We ended up chatting with a family coming back from a day hike to Snow Mesa who were vacationing in Lake City, they agreed to give us a ride so we could explore options for a dental appointment  somewhere.

No dentists were available in Lake City but we were given the name of a Dr in Gunnison, CO. 50 some miles away. We tried calling but got no answer. We decided to rent a Jeep since ATV, Dirt Bike & Jeep rentals were big business there.  Soon we were driving a Jeep to Gunnison which we found had no dentists that were open or willing to work Peggy in. We had something to eat at 4 pm since we'd last eaten at 7am and were starving, meanwhile I called my Dr at home & arranged for a medication refill in Gunnison (how could I have forgotten to put my meds in my resupply box?? duh. )

An hour and a half later we were on our way another 50+ miles to Montrose where Peggy had located a dentist able to work her in the next day. She'd also gotten us a hotel room via hotels.com.  Connectivity is a wonderful thing! 

We arrived at Montrose at 7:30 pm, ate our supermarket deli dinner and went to bed (catching Michael Phelps on T. V. winning more gold medals in Olympic swimming!)

The next morning the dentist examined Peggy, no cracked tooth, no infection. She was cleared to go hiking. One hour and 45 minutes later we were back in Lake City having lunch, returning the Jeep and standing on the side of the road hitchhiking back to the trail. A great couple, Danny & Bonnie, from S. Carolina picked us up and we talked about hiking, hunting and their time in Colorado all the way up to the Pass. We meet the nicest people hitchhiking!   By 3:45pm we were back on trail after 28 hours of crazy running around!

We hiked about 5 miles and set up camp on Jarosa Mesa a treeless expanse of grassland at 12,000 feet. We tucked into the low growing willows to shelter from the wind and hoped to catch the last of the Persaides comet tail in the night sky. It was a cold night.