Journey back to Louisville (Day 10 & 11)

My journey home began a little later than planned (which unfortunately had been par for the course since meeting up with my family).  After the cars were packed and condo cleaned up, we got on the road around 10am.  Dad determined that we were going to take a different route back home, a more scenic one.  We left Bozeman on Interstate 90 heading towards Billings but turned off to head towards Gardiner through the Yellowstone River canyon.  Words again cannot describe how beautiful this area of the west is.  I felt like I had almost gone back in time and was part of the movie "A River Runs Through It" (I know - that is such a cliche of MT).

After driving through the beautiful canyon we reached Gardiner, MT and topped off our fuel tanks.  We weren't going to run into somewhere to get gas for quite some time so this was a wise decision.  Gardiner is home to the original entrance to Yellowstone National Park and is also the site of the arch that Teddy Roosevelt stood in front of when dedicating the park.

After driving through the northern part of Yellowstone Park, we came out on the Chief Joseph Scenic Highway.  This highway runs along the route utilized by the Nez Perce tribe to escape the US Calvary.  Below are a couple of links about the highway.  Unfortunately, I did not have time to stop and get pictures of the drive home due to the fact that a) I got left later than planned and b) I lost 2 hours in the drive home (stupid time zones).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wyoming_Highway_296
http://www.wyomingtourism.org/thingstodo/detail/Chief-Joseph-Scenic-Byway/2721

The Chief Joseph Scenic Highway ends when you reach Cody, WY but the awesome scenery did not stop there as well.  After leaving Cody and before the Ten Sleep region of WY, we drove through this amazing area that had the same rock formations as the Badlands.  This was the night before the Super Moon and it was absolutely incredible to see the sunset create all of these deep reds and purples on the rock formations and to see the moon rise in the distance.  After that we drove through the Ten Sleep region and came out onto Interstate 90 again just outside of Gillette, WY.  I drove as long as I could that night and stopped just past Rapid City, SD at a rest stop to sleep for a couple of hours before carrying on.

I woke up and got back on the road around 3am MST and had smooth sailing throughout the rest of the trip.  I ran into a little rush hour traffic in St. Louis, MO (nothing too bad) and was through the city with only an extra .5 hours added on.  Driving between St. Louis and Louisville was very cool that night because of the Super Moon.  I swear, it was so bright I probably could have driven without my headlights.  I got back to the house around 10:30pm, unpacked the essentials from the car and went to bed.  I was exhausted from my whirlwind adventure but wouldn't have traded any of it for the world.

While, I hope that you all have enjoyed the journey and continue to check back periodically for more tales of adventure (and mis-adventure), shenanigans and daily exploits from The Professor's Wife.

Fly fishing the Gallatin (Day 9)

My final day in the mountains (free of seeing them from the drivers seat of my car) was spent fly fishing the Gallatin with my Dad.  While living in Colorado, I loved dry line fly fishing and developed a passion for it.  I loved the peacefulness that comes with the repetitive motion of the cast, the thrill of setting the hook and the fight that a good sized trout puts up as you reel in your line.  For the past 10 or so years, I have talked about fishing the Gallatin but never found the time or was willing to spend the additional money due to the fact that I sold my gear to help pay for our wedding.  But this trip, Dad suggested that we go and do it and I was all in.  We used an outfitter and guide, it was just easier to go this route because then all the gear would be provided.

We headed down to the shop a little before 9am so that we could get the most time on the river possible (we only booked a half a day [4 hours]).  Our guide took us down the canyon and found us a good spot to start.  He spent some time showing Dad the proper way to set a fly hook and cast and provided me a brief refresher.

We ventured down the embankment by the highway and onto the river.  I had almost forgotten the rush of excitement, apprehension and joy that all happen at once the minute you step into the river and make your first cast.  This was my first foray into drift line fishing and it took me a bit to get the hang of it.  But after the first half hour, it was like I had stopped fishing yesterday.  My muscles, though sore and our of shape, remembered the rhythm of the cast and allowing the rod to work for you.  We spent almost 5 hours on the river - our guide didn't have another group booked and wanted to make sure that we got a chance to catch as many fish as possible.

We finished our morning of fishing on a flat, fast moving section of the river where Dad had by far more success than I did.  Below is a picture of the good sized rainbow trout that he caught.  I believe that Dad and I have found another outdoor past time that we will partake in every chance we can get now.

After getting back from our fishing trip, Mom, Dad and I headed up to the base of the mountain to check out the shops and get some souvenirs.  We wandered past M.R. Hummers and saw that BOGO happy hour was to start at 4pm so we decided that we would head over there to get a drink before heading back down to the condo for dinner.  Well - what was supposed to be one drink turned into an all night excursion hanging out with Big Sky locals and talking with the owner about the changes that continue to happen at our mountain.  I love spending time with my parents, they have the ability to start conversations with anyone, anywhere.  We made our way back down to the condo (after many, many drinks - including my new favorite shot the "Hummer" and a fabulous dinner of prime rib and bone in ribeye) at around 11pm to sleep our last sleep in the mountains before heading home.

Specimen Creek (Yellowstone National Park) (Day 8)

The eighth day of my trip began similar to the rest - breakfast with a side of maps and trail guides for good measure.  We hadn't decided on where we wanted to hike so Mom and Dad were pouring over the maps trying to make a decision.  Mom did not want to do a lot of climbing (elevation wise that is) and I really had no opinion.  I just wanted to be on the trail and hiking and it didn't really matter to me where we went.  We finally decided on Specimen Creek trail in Yellowstone.  The trail head was approximately halfway between Big Sky and West Yellowstone.  This trail is one of the many in Yellowstone that link to multiple other trails so there is no real end to the trail.  We decided that we would hike in for approximately 3 hours and hike back out.

The trail was absolutely beautiful running along Specimen Creek pretty much the entire way in.  Approximately 2 miles in from the trail head, we came upon the first Wilderness Campsite.  It was this great site right along a meadow that would make the perfect camping spot with our future kids.  It would be the perfect place to see moose, elk and other wildlife as well as a great spot for star gazing.

As stated above, we hiked in for about 3 hours, found a spot to sit and ate our lunches.  We then headed back out to the trail head.  No wildlife seen on this hike except for a few grouse of some kind but some fantastic landscapes (most of the pictures below are courtesy of my Mom).

We then headed down to West Yellowstone for some biking souvenirs and then back to Big Sky.  We ended up seeing some wildlife at the condo that night - Todd (the fox) and Mr. Beaver decided to stop by and say hello.  Both have become staples of the Lakeside Condominiums community.

Beehive Basin and Disc Golf (Day 7)

Day 7 began with one of the bike rides that I wanted to do as part of this trip - up and down from the resort to the village.  I knew that we were planning a hike for this day as well so I got up early and was on the bike by 8am.  Unfortunately, I did not realize that it was going to be as cold of ride down as it was.  I reached the village in approximately 16 minutes but was a giant popsicle by the time I got there.  I stopped for a bit to thaw out before making the journey back up the mountain (total elevation gain was going to be 1,578 ft.).  I started back up the mountain and unfortunately, I ended up walking some of the big climbs but made the full 12+ mile loop in 1 hour and 20 minutes.

After a quick breakfast and a change of clothes Mom, Dad and I were off for our hike.  Beehive Basin is very close to the resort so it was a short drive to the trail head.  Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on what your view is on the expansion of the resort, we got to drive through all of the new housing that is going in on the mountain.  These homes are absolutely beautiful but, in my opinion, are such a waste.  These homes are barely lived in, maybe a max of 4 weeks out of the year and are driving up the cost of living all over Big Sky without creating a community in the process.  But enough about my views about my mountain.

We reached the trail head and began our ascent to Beehive Basin.  This trail climbs a little over 1,000 feet from start to finish and provided some spectacular views of Lone Peak and the surrounding Gallatin National Forest.  Along the way we happened upon a yellow bellied marmot chillin' in the sun enjoying the last few warm days of fall before his winter hibernation and was fortunate enough to get a picture of him (and Mom got a few of me).

We reached Beehive Basin, found a nice place to rest and enjoyed our lunch.  The views were pretty amazing.

We then headed back down and true to form, the descent is always shorter (time wise) than the ascent.  We reached the car in half the time and headed back to the condo.  When we reached the condo, Hayley and Hannah roped me into going disc golfing with them on the course down in the village.  I quickly changed and off we headed.  I was assuming this was going to be like most discing that I have done in the past - a leisurely stroll, some adult beverages and good times.  Boy, was I wrong.  This course was nestled into the side of the mountain so the holes were some of the most challenging I have ever done.  Up and down mini canyons, large lodge pole pines and treacherous  terrain was all par for the course.  We played about 9 holes and decided to call it good (running out of beer was really the determining factor).  From there we headed down to the Lone Peak Brewery and enjoyed some snacks and excellent beers.

West Yellowstone to Old Faithful by bike (Day 6)

So when I started planning my epic adventure across the west I had decided that I wanted to do some road biking.  My Dad suggested that I ride from West Yellowstone to Old Faithful.  Seeing as it was only 30 miles, I though what the heck, why not.  I convinced my Mom and Hayley to join me on this epic ride through the park and they joined me, though a little reluctantly at first.  Originally, the plan was to be on our way to West Yellowstone by 8:30am so that we could be on the road by 9:30am but in true Gallion fashion, we ended up running a little late.  We finally got everything and everyone loaded into the car at approximately 9:30am.  Dad and Hannah were going to act as our road crew throughout the trip (and thank god they did, more to come on that later) so they drove us to just inside the park where we unloaded the bikes and got on the road at approximately 11am.

Mom led most of the way to set the pace and the park was absolutely beautiful.  I snapped a few pictures along the way of the beauty that is Yellowstone Park.

We made it to Madison Junction, halfway on our journey with no incidents to speak of.  We stopped long enough to shed a few layers and take a halfway picture.

Unfortunately, the best laid plans of mice and men often do not go as planned.  As we began to ascend one of the hills on the road I road up front to pull the group up the hill and then disaster struck.  I blew a tire and we had no cell service.  I got out my patch kit to fix my tube because of course we didn't stop at the bike shop as planned before we started our ride to pick up some extra tubes.  We found the hole and got the patch on and it appeared to be holding.

Dad and Hannah drove up as I was finishing the patch and planned to ride on.  Dad said that he would go to the next turn out and wait to see if the patch would hold.  Unfortunately, the patch did not hold and it looked like my journey would be over.  I rode up over the ridge on my soon to be very flat tire and walked down to meet the group at the turnout.  Mom was determined to finish the ride as was I so Dad drove me back to West Yellowstone where I was able to get a new tire and tube in record time.  We drove back and met the group and were back on the road about 2 hours after the infamous flat.

As we started back out on our trip the wind had picked up and unfortunately we were riding straight into it making the ride miserable to get going again.  We finally reached the geyser basin and knew that we were getting close to Old Faithful.  But alas, one of us would not finish the ride into Old Faithful.  Approximately 3 miles out from Old Faithful, Hayley had to call the ride a bust.  Her quads had cramped up and she was not going to make it up another hill.  She told me to finish out the ride and send out the road crew to come and get her.

I caught up to Mom and told her what had happened and road ahead to Old Faithful to find Dad and Hannah.  I though that I saw them leaving as I was pulling into the parking lot but I couldn't be sure.  I road up to the Visitors Center, the geyser and the general store with no luck on finding them.  Mom finally reached Old Faithful as well and then we set out to try to get a hold of them - which is harder than it sounds due to the lack of cell phone coverage in the majority of the park.  We eventually got a hold of them and they were already there to pick Hayley up.

Mom and I took our finishers selfie as we waited for the rest of them to get back to Old Faithful.  Everyone eventually made it to Old Faithful about 6 hours after we started, which with all considered is not bad.

We then finished loading the bikes and headed back out to West Yellowstone for dinner at the Slippery Otter Pub.  It was burgers all around for the riders and crew as well as some well deserved beverages!

Big Sky, MT & Earthquake Lake (Day 5)

I reached Big Sky at approximately 10pm on Monday night and was exhausted a) from hiking almost 24 miles that day and b) driving 4.5 hours up from Grand Teton National Park.  I slept fairly well but did not want to do anything strenuous on Tuesday.  So I hung out with my parents and we went down to Bozeman to do some shopping (groceries and REI - no trip is complete without a stop at REI).  We then grabbed lunch at Famous Daves and headed out to Earthquake Lake down by West Yellowstone.

Earthquake Lake is the sight of the largest earthquake in Montana.  On Aug. 17, 1959 a 7.3-7.5 earthquake hit approximately 15 miles north of West Yellowstone and caused one of the largest landslides in US history.  The quake was so large that it shifted the lake approximately 17 degrees leaving one side of the lake flooded and the other with miles of lake bottom visible from the opposite shore.  Below are a couple of links to check it out as well as some pictures.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1959_Hebgen_Lake_earthquake
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quake_Lake
http://www.fs.usda.gov/detail/gallatin/specialplaces/?cid=stelprdb5127785

After checking out the visitors center and getting my all important National Park Passport Stamp we headed back to the condo for dinner and an early night before our planned 30 mile bike ride into Yellowstone on Wednesday.

Grand Teton National Park (Day 3 & 4)

After an extremely restful night of sleep, I awoke to find that the storm system that had blanketed the Tetons the previous day was still lingering in the area so again, no beautiful views of the mountains.  Just as it was in the Badlands, I had another up close and personal experience with wildlife in my camp.  A moose cow and calf made their way through the campsite on their way out to the meadow to eat.  I was fortunate enough to have my camera ready and got a few shots of them as they wandered through (sorry some of them are a bit blurry, nature doesn't always cooperate and stay still in bad light allowing for a great shot).

I decided that even the rain was not going to stop me from getting out into the park.  I drove back into the park and stopped by the new visitors center to check on the status of the trail that I was going to be doing the next day up and over the Paintbrush Divide.  The ranger shared with me that there was a fair amount of snow on the pass but that the trail should be good the whole way up and down.  I decided that my best option for hiking would be to head over and check out where my trail head was and to ensure that I knew my turns for my trail.  I hiked up from String Lake toward Holly Lake and met a fair amount of people heading up to camp at the higher elevations.  I turned back after about 4 miles because I did not want to regret it in the morning by being tired and sore.

I headed back to camp for a nap and an early dinner because I wanted to be up with camp broken the next morning by 6am so I could be on the trail by first light at 6:45am.  I decided after I ate that I would head into Jackson Hole to wander around and people watch (tourist watching is one of my favorite past times when on vacation).  I was fortunate enough to catch the moose cow and calf making their way back down to the river on my way out of the campground and took a few more pics (this time in better light).

On my way into Jackson I decided to stop and take in the beauty of Grand Teton National Park.  The weather system that had plagued the area for the previous two days had finally moved on leaving the mountains to finally be seen.  Enjoy!

Once I reached Jackson, I walked around for awhile and then settled on a beer at the Town Square Tavern (it was $3 happy hour so I couldn't pass that up).  After a beer and some interesting conversation with the bartender I headed back to camp.

The next morning I awoke early as planned to find that the weather system that had plagued the Tetons for the past two days had finally lifted and the mountains were amazing.  Unfortunately, I overslept so in order to be on the trail as planned I had to get going - no time for pictures.  I got to the trail head, grabbed my pack and away I went.  I ran into a couple also doing the loop that day but they were cruising at a much faster pace than I was so I figured I'd see them at Lake Solitude.  The first 4 miles of the trail was smooth sailing, I was heading along at a 2 mile an hour pace and making good time.  Then I hit the first set of switch backs to head up to Holly Lake and that's when the altitude started to hit me.  Instead of cruising along at a fast pace, it was now much slower and more deliberate.  As I was plodding along, I looked over to my right and was surprised by a huge bull moose about 20 feet off of the trail.  He was laying down enjoying his peaceful morning and was not disturbed by my stopping for a couple of pictures.

After I passed the moose the trail continued to steepen and become more challenging.  I slowed down even more and just kept telling myself "one foot in front of the other."  I had finally reached to two main snow fields that the park rangers had given me the heads up about the day before and slowly hiked through them (I did not want to have an impromptu sledding moment while at the top of the pass).  After the snow fields, I reached the shale rock fields that are at the top of the mountain - it is extremely slow going through these as you need to ensure that you have solid footing each time so that you don't slip and fall down the side of the mountain.  So after about 4.5 hours of hiking I reached the summit and crossed over Paintbrush Divide.  It was pretty cold up at the top so I stayed long enough to snap a couple of pictures and then started my way back down.

Throughout my hike up and over the pass I had met very few hikers but the ones I had met were friendly and enjoying their hike as much as I was.  I had been listening to my audiobooks on my iPod to create noise so that if there were any bears in the area, they would know that I was on the trail and hopefully steer clear of the trail.  This has become the new back country recommendation when hiking alone due to the fact that it sounds like multiple human voices talking.  But as I started my descent down to Lake Solitude, I ran into a very grumpy old man who pretty much berated me for having my iPod on and said that I was ruining the hike for everyone because you could hear it for miles - which wasn't true.  So because I felt bad, I turned off my audio book and figured that since the trail was a lot busier on the Cascade Canyon side that I wasn't in nearly as much danger of running into a bear that would be alarmed to find me on the trail.

After crossing another small snow field and the shale rock field on the descent, I finally reached Lake Solitude (the half way point for my hike) at 1pm - 6 hours from my start time.  My original plan was to stop and eat at the lake but I did not know how long it was going to take me to descend the remaining 8 miles so I decided to keep moving and eat on the go.  I stopped to shed my winter gear that I was wearing to cross the pass and to snap a couple more pictures.  Pictures and words can't do justice the amazing views that I saw.

The trail heading down to Lake Jenny was packed with hikers coming up to Lake Solitude, so again like I stated before, I was not nearly as concerned about running into a bear on this side of the pass as I was on the other side, but alas I would be proved wrong.  I was probably a mile away from Lake Solitude enjoying the high alpine forest when out of the trees approximately 15-20 feet in front of me a black bear bounded out of the trees onto the trail.  It was a medium sized black bear but alas I did not get a picture of him.  I debated as he climbed back up the other side of the trail if I should get my bear spray ready in case he came at me or take a picture.  I went with the safe option.  But below is a picture from the internet of what he looked like.

After my run in with the bear, I decided that no matter how many people were on the trail, I was going to hike with my iPod back on.  I know that the bear knew that there were people on the trail but I wasn't going to risk not making enough noise.  After my bear run in my adrenaline was pumping pretty heavy and I'm pretty sure the next 2 miles of the descent I did in less than an hour.  I eventually reached the halfway point of the descent and made the turn for Jenny Lake (approximately 4 miles to go).  At this point I had been on the trail for almost 7 hours and was getting very tired (my legs and my mind) but I kept plodding along.  The trail continued to descend down into Cascade Canyon and unfortunately there was not much to see or take pictures of.  I finally reached the point where my trail was supposed to break off and head back to String Lake (only 2.4 miles to go!) but was devastated to find out that the section of trail was closed for maintenance.  This meant I was going to have to add an additional 3 miles on to my trip and head all the way down to Jenny Lake and along the edge.  Though I knew that it was going to be fine, I was not mentally prepared for the additional mileage.  It was slow going through the last five miles but I made it back to the car in due time.  I reached the care at approximately 4:45pm, 9 hours and 45 minutes after I started.  I checked my FitBit (I was using this for my mileage) and per the picture below had a total mileage for the day of 23.92 miles.  Needless to say, I was happy to be back at the car and ready to head up to Montana to join the rest of my family in Big Sky.