Many visitors to the US take a road trip or two to get under the skin of the country.
Not Tim Voors. He decided to explore it by walking from north to south, from one side to the other, and discovered a “parallel universe” along the way.
Their journey along the 3,100-mile (4,989 km) Continental Divide Trail from Montana to New Mexico is described in a captivating new book titled ‘The Great Divide,’ published by Gestalten.
It took Voors four and a half months to complete the trek, which he says is equivalent to 15 round trips to reach the summit of Mount Everest. During this time, he went through five pairs of shoes, 50 hamburgers, and 100 beers, and found 100 chipmunks, one grizzly bear, three black bears, 12 wolves, five moose, five moose, 50 deer, one bald eagle, five snakes, and ‘ a million mosquitoes’.
He reveals that for periods it was a life “without pizzas, without cappuccinos, without anything”, adding: “Living in nature was like living in a parallel universe.” For five months I had not been bothered by any incoming phone calls. Sure, I had been in sporadic contact with loved ones and clients, but only with voicemails or long-delayed weekly emails.
“This parallel universe had become, for a brief period, my home, and to my amazement I saw how quickly I had adapted to it.” Stunning photographs, helpful maps, and charming illustrations help recreate Voors’ journey in the tome. Scroll down to see MailOnline Travel’s hand-picked selection of images from across their pages…
Tim Voors passes through Colorado’s southern San Juan Desert while hiking the Continental Divide Trail and remembers seeing “infinite shades of yellow spread over the vast range.” And he adds: “It was a beautiful mixture of colors, stretching as far as the eye could see and filling my heart with joy all day long.” Because of the remoteness, there were no roads, no hikers, no hunters, no Internet, no cell coverage, no ski lifts, no pizzas, no cappuccinos, no nothing. This was the wild, open expanse he had longed for for the past four years.
“The Scapegoat Wilderness stretches out in front of us with some easy meadows,” Voors writes as he recalls reaching mile 289 of his trip. The area comprises 239,936 acres spread across three national forests in Montana. Voors continues: ‘Countless spring flowers bloom along the trail as it meanders along the ridges. It is as if we are walking on the back of a sleeping dragon as it descends along the Rocky Mountains.
The trail disappears beneath a snowfield in this fascinating photograph taken near Leadore, Idaho.
“Yellowstone had a surprise in store for us,” Voors writes, recalling the moment he came across this steaming river in Yellowstone National Park, which “required only one thing: a swim.” He remembers the “clear stream” flowing “gently” through the valley with “bubbling geysers” on either side. “It was a scene straight out of a fairy tale or an apocalyptic sci-fi movie,” he adds. “I couldn’t understand why this whole river was so hot”
A photograph taken as Voors absorbs a view of Yellowstone National Park, which “lies far in the distance,” with the trail leading hikers into a “magical, magical valley.”
As Voors walks further south, he notices how everything is “continually in motion” around him and “always changing.” He writes: ‘The days were getting hotter and I saw at least three snakes a day. The grass gradually turned golden, with dried orange flowers, and the occasional tree shone gold. Pictured: Part of the trail in Wyoming, which ‘winds between countless magical lakes’
Voors finds “the perfect camping spot,” pictured, high in Wyoming’s Wind River Range. “I have to stop and take it all in from time to time,” he writes. “The chances of him ever coming back were pretty slim.” Voors describes the area as “an imposing, flat monolith” rising above an “opaque, turquoise river.” And he adds: ‘The trail wound through a meandering bed of mauve-blue sage. The end of summer had dried up all the flowers. The sweet smell of sage in the morning never disappoints’
See one of the places Voors stops for a swim during an “awesome day” hiking through Wind River Range, Wyoming.
While hiking the Wind River Range, pictured here, Voors is awakened by a campmate yelling “Moose,” he writes. “It was 6 in the morning and I quickly stuck my head out of my tent to see what was going on,” he continues. ‘To my surprise, a large bull elk with its heavy antlers was staring at me. No more than 8 feet (2.5 m) away from my tent.
The road to Lordsburg, New Mexico. In his chapter titled “The Final Push,” Voors describes seeing “the golden desert spread out with pale mountains in the distance.” He adds: “Maybe I was fantasizing, but I felt like I could see Mexico on the horizon. I didn’t know if it was physically possible to see 100 miles away, but somehow I felt like I could see the end of my trip.
The Great Divide, by Tim Voors, is published by Gestalten and sells for £30 ($37)