For nearly a year I had been planning on coming up here. Actually it was two years now that I think of it. I loaded my pack, cooked dinner, and slept in the back of the truck at the trailhead with my dogs. I was hoping to get an early start.
I did. By 7am me and Ben and Maggie (my border collies) had our packs on, and started up the trail just as the first sunlight was hitting the trees on the ridge.
I let out a loud 'yeeeeehaaah' every 10 minutes or so, that probably could be heard a mile up the trail. That cleared out any grizzlies that were foraging in the meadows in the early morning. More than once I smelled the musky scent of a large animal, not elk, as I crossed one of these meadows. I could see the ground was torn up here and there, as if something was eating roots. My dogs smelled it also, and got excited, pulling on their leash and lifting up to their hind feet to look up the trail, then up the slope.
Nine miles later my yeehahs were a heck of a lot quieter when I went around blind corners in the trail - more like 'heeeyyyy bear, it's me, I'm coming,' as I clacked my trekking poles together.
Several lakes and some rocky peaks came into view as I topped the saddle of the last divide separating me from the backcountry basin I had been wanting for so long to see.
I climbed to the lakes that were at timberline, and set up my tent in a clump of spruce above one of them. I then hauled all my food to the ridge on the opposite side of the lake from my tent. 40 minutes later I was sitting on that ridge eating cooked rice and drinking coffee, admiring miles of wild Montana surrounding me on all sides, home of the great bear and at least one pack of wolves. After dinner I warmed some hot chocolate that went well with the White Chocolate Macadamia cookies I always bring along.
I felt awful satisfied to have made it those nine miles so easily, reaching the basin by 2:30pm, especially since I am getting so darn old. I was a little apprehensive about night up there alone. The forest ranger down in West Yellowstone had told me there were plenty of grizzly where I was going. A little bit of fear is a good thing though. It keeps you careful. I burnt some blueberry leaves in my cook pot and stood over the smoke, trying to mask the scent of my clothes.
I have done this sort of thing before though, for quite a few years now. I went to sleep soon after dark and slept peacefully all night long, as did the dogs in the tent with me.
There are moments of grace and beauty in life, that might seem small at the time, but as they stay in your memory you realize how important they are. The images and feel of that next morning have remained with me, when I woke to clear and calm skies. Over the next few hours the reflection in the lake down from camp was unbelievable. Calm, windless weather like that doesnt happen a lot in the Montana mountains. I have woke to morning thunder and rain more than once.
But standing there in such a place, on such a morning, made me realize I am living right, being one that puts stake in a simple and humble life.
My highest goal is to have the strength and will to be on a mountain to witness something like that, with my two wild and loyal dogs beside me, watching the sun come in and out of the clouds, seeing the landscape, now in shadows, now with a brilliance near to heaven.
