Ninja hitched with me back to Monarch Pass with a hippie couple living in a converted delivery truck. They are collecting rocks for a living and were nice enough to drive us directly to the Trailhead.

At Monarch Pass Ninja surprised me with hiking a couple of miles up the hill before we said our goodbyes. We had agreed to meet in 3 days at the pass and I had to cover 100 miles so I got going.

The section was relatively flat for Colorado and I made good time. It was actually a little weird being alone after hiking together for three months, but I made it in time to the pass on the 3rd day were I found Ninja hiking up the hill and was very glad to see her.

We hitched to Lake City to check the hiker box for free food on the hostel and then find a hotel room, but there was a wine festival and all the hotels were booked out. So we hitched to Creede about 60 miles away and found out that there was a car show and all the hotels were booked out, too.

In the end we hitched to South Fork another 20 miles from Creede were we had an awesome stay and I opted for a rest day, before hitching back to Creede to buy a milkshake for Ninja and then hitch together back to the Trailhead where we said our last goodbye concerning the CDT.

I will continue through the San Juans towards Pagosa Springs and Ninja is hitching towards Denver to catch her flight back to Germany.