Day One of the Hike

We drove as close to the trailhead as possible but our sedan was no match for the Abasaroka-Beartooth backroads of Montana. We had no choice but to add an extra three miles to our hike by parking the car. I suggested it first because I was driving and I didn't want to be responsible for puncturing Angie's Audi's oil pan. It was raining and probably 55 degrees that June 30th. My pack felt light. I was in the lead, nearly bouncing from excitement. I knew I was in the best shape of my life. A couple of years of farm work makes a man accustomed to hauling weight across rough terrain. We were going to be gone for seven days. This is, in Angie's words, "one of the remotest wildernesses in the lower 48" after all. We would climb past the treeline, we would see snow, Angie's red tank of bear repellent reminded me that we would be in grizzly country.

We made it to the trailhead and I was pleasantly surprised that Angie and I had a similar pace. She was the guide and I was just a student, at least, that's what I was telling myself so that I could really "let go" and enjoy the wild. After about six creek crossings, I had had enough. I was worried about hypothermia at the first one; it was freezing and I crossed barefoot and pantsless. On the other side, I robotically went through the motions of redressing into my still dry pants and socks. It was mostly a nuisance after that, after I realized it wasn't that cold. A snow patch here and there and we were losing altitude on this trail so it was warming up. Another bright patch: the sun was out and the rain had stopped. The last crossing bummed me out. We found a few creeks were easily avoided by crossing on fallen logs, that feels heroic, but the last creek was more of a river. Sixty feet wide and crotch deep on me. Swift and rocky and cold. I had to go first. I'd gone first on every crossing so far. I had to prove that a country boy raised in the Ozarks could do anything. I decided to lose the pants and socks but keep the boots. Angie had wading shoes; I assumed that my gravel road hardened feet would suffice but the numbing cold made it to dangerous to go barefoot. I grabbed a spruce pole and used it to probe upstream as I leaned into the current. "Don't forget to unbuckle your pack." Angie didn't want me to be drowned by my pack in the event of a slip up. That crossing was my first real fear of the trip and it felt intoxicating. A slip up out here could be bad. But we made it across. A few hundred more feet and voila, my first Montana mountain meadow.

We had a chance to rest and warm up in the summer sun. But we were on a tight schedule and Angie informed me that we had to cross that snowy mountain before camping. So we climbed seemingly endless switchbacks back into the snowier altitudes. Part of me wanted to stay in the lower meadow full of sparkling raindrops but we had to go up. She bought me gaiters as a gift and I forgot to pack them so the deep snow filled my creek-wet boots. I worried the first time I fell through the snow. I worried about frostbite, I was scared again. Fear really focuses me. I just kept walking.

 The snow became more navigable and consistent and my feet got hot. In fact, I was monitoring just how hot the exertion got me because I didn't want to end up with a sweaty torso on a cold mountain pass at night. At night?!?! It was getting dark and we were still ascending. This was a 12,000 foot mountain pass with solid snow. Were we the first over this mountain this season? No prints. I inwardly panicked and all but raced up the mountain, it took everything my thighs had to side step and create new foot holds in the steep snow. Angie said they helped a little as she followed in my tracks. But we made it and the top was joyful. Nobody looks at a mountain and says, "Hey, I could climb that before dark." But we did it.

I had just had a day that I would never forget. I didn't speak as we descended into a new valley to find a suitable campsite. She would pick it out. She'd done this before so I got to relax. We found a spot that wasn't terribly cold. I slipped out of language mode and heated creek water for our dehydrated supper while she set up. This was Day 1. What would be next?