Backpacking in the Beartooths

For most of the recreation opportunities Joel and I have had this year, flexibility has been the key. As I headed out backpacking a couple weeks ago with the Women’s Wine Hiking Society, that held true, as well. We had planned on doing The Beaten Path – described as; “The Beaten Path is a 26 mile thru-hike in the beautiful Beartooth-Absoraka Wilderness. Capping out at ~10,000ft elevation, the trail passes towering granite cliffs, sparkling alpine lakes, crashing cascades, and lush flower-filled meadows through some of the tallest mountains in Montana.”

Nope – not this year … due to heavy snowpack and damage from melt out, one of the main bridges was washed out a couple of years ago. Several unfortunate drownings have happened as folks tried to make their own way across the river so that was not an option for us. We left on the same trail but set up camp and then did day hiking from our camp, then went back to the same trailhead, instead of a point to point thru-hike.

Our group carpooled up from UT and stayed the night in Cooke City, MT. We then headed to the Clark Fork trailhead where we read all the notices reinforcing that we were heading into grizzly country. We all had bear canisters for our food, bear spray and had the opportunity to ask a Yellowstone wildlife biologist questions beforehand on proper cooking and camping.

We were immediately struck by the lush green landscape, huge lakes and beautiful flowers. We passed Kersey Lake and hiked about 8 miles to our “base camp” at Russel Lake.

Rest break about 4 miles in – always a good time to stretch!

We were bombarded by flowers the entire time – nice to see as we are past the peak in Utah right now.

We found a great campsite where we were able to put up all of our (5) tents. The plan was to minimize our “footprint” and share tents but some folks weren’t keen on that.

Stream close to the campsite where we could filter water.

Filtering water w/gravity bags have seemed to replace the piston/pump filters.

Our hike the next day would take up the pass to the right of this large “pile of rocks!”

We made sure that we were “Bear Aware” and kept all food and cooking supplies several hundred yards from our tents.

Once we were up and on the trail, we headed past Ouzel Lake, Bald Knob Lake, Skull Lake and up to Fossil Lake where we had lunch and then headed back to camp. The timing was perfect as a pretty big thunderstorm rolled through soon after we got back.

Trip leader (another Alison!) looking for wildlife.

Angelique, one of the co-founders of the Women’s Wine Hiking Society.

Lunch time – we were watching closely the clouds that started rolling in.

Like Dad always said, “Unless you are the lead dog, the view never changes!” I chose to hang out at the back and enjoy the flowers!

Fun to see some actual moisture on the trail!

Cindy, in front is the other co-founder of the group.

The next morning we hiked back to the trailhead and grabbed lunch in Cooke City and then headed up Beartooth pass for a quick drive on the purported second most scenic highway in the US. It was beautiful! The Blue Ridge Parkway is #1, BTW – not sure if I agree.

We even managed to see 3 Grizzly Bears foraging on the side of a hill – glad that this was as close we got to the bruins! Not the greatest photos but it was very clear that they were huge, and well-fed.

As soon as we had our sightseeing “fix,” we headed to Gardiner, MT for the night. This involved passing through Yellowstone Nat’l Park and many herds of bison.