Montana Headwall

MONTANA HEADWALL

Volume 1.1

$4.95

MAY–JULY 2009

MAY–JULY 2009

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WESTERN MONTANA'S PREMIER SPECIALTY OUTDOOR GEAR STORE

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The Bitterroots attract serious attention–and the masses

16 CONTENTS

30

Hike-a-biking the crest of the Whitefish Range

Bearing north to Waterton Lakes National Park

INSIDE Contributors

6

Those who make it possible

On Belay

Wild Things

8

Grub

Snagging the delectable dinosaur

Head Lines

Getaway

10

Calendar

48

Get your race on

24

Lighten up, point-and-shooters

Field testing the best ultralight shelters

Head Shots

The Crux

Our readers’ best pix

38

The Yaak Valley

Head Gear Head Light

Chad Harder

36

Happiness is…an inaugural issue

Montucky landmines Super time for SuperTags A Shadow no longer Water legislation wrap-up Suburban wolves

Cover: Katie Goins, embracing Bitterroot granite.

34

Bearing down on anal plugs

26

50

58

Pursuing fungus, drawing fire

www.montanaheadwall.com

44

Greg Keeler

CONTRIBUTORS

Keeler has taught English at Montana State University in Bozeman since 1975. He has published two memoirs, Waltzing With the Captain: Remembering Richard Brautigan and Trash Fish: a Life. Almost Happy, his latest of seven collections of poetry, will appear this spring. He illustrated Jim Harrison’s chapbook, Livingston Suite, and NPR’s Car Talk aired his song “WD-40 Polka.”

Aaron Teasdale

www.montanaheadwall.com

From the Andes to Africa to the wilds of Montana, writer/photographer Teasdale is happiest in the globe’s woolier corners. His story “Across Masaai Land” was awarded the Best Adventure Travel Article of 2008 by the Society of American Travel Writers, and his work has appeared in Audubon, National Geographic Adventure, Backcountry, Bike, Mountain Gazette, and others. He lives on Missoula’s Northside with his wife and two boys.

Brianna Randall Randall works as water policy director and lobbyist for the Clark Fork Coalition. When she’s not navigating the eddies of Montana water law, Randall can be found hiking, snowboarding, mountain biking, dancing, yoga-ing and sailing on Flathead Lake.

Ari LeVaux LeVaux writes “Flash in the Pan,” a syndicated weekly food column that has appeared in more than 500 newspapers. As a former instructor at the University of Montana in Missoula, LeVaux led student groups to Brazil, Bhutan, and Cuba to study agriculture and food. An avid hunter, skier and hiker, he excels at camp cooking, although he admits his favorite food is fake mayo.

EDITOR-IN-CHIEF GENERAL MANAGER MANAGING EDITOR ADVERTISING DIRECTOR PRODUCTION DIRECTOR CIRCULATION MANAGER CONTRIBUTORS COPY EDITOR ART DIRECTOR PRODUCTION ASSISTANTS ADVERTISING REPRESENTATIVES FRONT DESK

STAFF

Matt Gibson Lynne Foland Chad Harder Peter Kearns Joe Weston Adrian Vatoussis

Matthew Frank, Skylar Browning Amy Linn Kou Moua Jenn Stewart, Jonathan Marquis Carolyn Bartlett, Tami Johnson, Steven Kirst, Chris Melton, Miriam Mick, Hannah Smith, Scott Woodall Lorie Rustvold

Please recycle this magazine

317 S. Orange St.• Missoula, MT 59801 406-543-6609 • Fax 406-543-4367 www.montanaheadwall.com

Montana Headwall is a registered trademark of Independent Publishing, Inc. Copyright 2009 by Independent Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved. Reprinting in whole or in part is forbidden except by permission of Independent Publishing, Inc. Views expressed herein are those of the authors exclusively. Are we having fun yet?

Montana Headwall

Page 6 May–July 2009

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ON BELAY

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Page 8 May–July 2009

A

llow me to offer the first testimonial for Montana Headwall: This magazine makes my life happier. Anything that steels me against the seductions of Wii golf and encourages me to stretch my legs outside earns high marks, and on that score, Headwall’s a big winner. The excitement of planning its launch, sifting through the story ideas, talking adventure and imagining all the fun I could be having primed me to ski more than 20 days this winter, about five times more than usual (and far more than I’ve managed before). At age 42, I’m skiing stronger and having more fun than ever. And that’s a great feeling.

We want Headwall to do the same for you. We’ve tried to create a magazine that embraces Montana’s myriad opportunities for outdoor adventure with so much enthusiasm, friendliness and style, it will inspire you to get out more often and discover new pleasures right out your back door.

Our mindset is inclusive.

Whether it happens on a

mountain, in the woods or on the water, as long as it looks like fun we’ll lap it up like deer at a salt lick. Campers and climbers, hikers and hunters, bicyclists and bait fishermen alike will find kindred spirits in Headwall. Even couch potatoes should get a rise out of it, what with the breathtaking photography, snappy writing and all.

Turn the pages and see for yourself. If we’re getting it right, you should feel the urge to go play outside. That would make us very happy. And if you act on that urge even a few times…well, wouldn’t that make you even happier?

Bear in mind that you’re not just readers of Headwall, you’re the subjects. So keep us up to date on your adventures at hweditor@montanaheadwall.com. Tell us what you’re doing and feel free to offer suggestions. You’ll see a second issue in August. In the meantime, enjoy this inaugural edition of Montana Headwall. Then mosey outdoors for some fun— as often as you possibly can.

Matt Gibson Editor-In-Chief

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CONIBEAR TRAPS

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HEAD LINES

The Montucky Landmine

O

moral compass pointing in the direction of vengeful rage, take a ne minute you’re strolling in the morning sun, hopmoment to consider the law. Your good ol’ state government scotching through the mud and dog poop on the has not only made it “unlawful to destroy, disturb or remove Rattlesnake’s Woods Gulch trail, the next you’re any trap, snare or trapped wildlife,” but also bans you from predown on soggy knee, cradling your dog’s head and wondering emptively triggering a trap—even if your goal is to prevent WTF is up with this heavy wire contraption slowly pinching injury to nearby humans, pets or wildlife. your pet’s trachea into her spine.

So treat the snare with care. And if your dog gets snared, Fifi has just jammed her face into a Conibear trap, and your use mechanical reasoning rather than fury. It’s far more likely immediate priority is to save her life. But unless you’ve come preto release Fifi from the device’s tightenpared—with a Sawzall, a power ing grip. Further, when walking your grinder or at the very least an dog on public land, you’ll always want understanding of how these 1. Start the extraction by covering the dog’s head to carry a sturdy leash, bootlace, belt or “instant kill” traps work—your with your jacket. This can reduce bites and help rope, which can give you the leverage efforts will likely be futile. calm her down. necessary to compress the springs quickUnlike their leg-hold 2. Identify the trap’s orientation. If necessary, twist ly. Study the following illustration, and brethren, which simply clamp a the pinching jaws away from her throat and learn the procedure before you head out. paw, Conibear traps are designed onto her skull.

With only a few minutes until she goes to kill quickly by suffocation. limp, time is not on your side.

And this they do, very efficiently.

3. Now, the hard part. Conibear traps don’t relax Chad Harder Montana’s Fish, Wildlife & easily, and most trappers use a tool to open Parks gives permits to about them. So pull out your belt, a rope or her leash, 3,000 trappers annually, and and thread it through both side rings. each permitee can legally set an 4. Loop the cord back through the closer ring, unlimited number of traps on and step on the far end of the cord. Pull nearly all of our state’s public vigorously on the nearby end until the land. This has responsible springs begin to compress. recreationalists arming themselves with the knowledge and 5. Once the jaws are close together, grab skills necessary to quickly them and hold them together, hooking extract their canine campanion the safety lock before repeating these when she becomes a trapper’s steps on the other side. “incidental take.”

6. Pet the dog enthusiastically before But if attempting to free disposing of the trap with understandable your pet from a snare has your fury.

Illustrations by Rob Rusignola

Montana Headwall

Page 10 May–July 2009

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HUNTING

Take yer shot

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HEAD LINES

Hey hunters, seeking something a little more horny? The rut may still be a long way off, but for those of you longing for something more than a full freezer this fall, now is the time to sign up for the annual Montana SuperTag drawing. This lottery-style license allows you to hunt anywhere in the state, even in the famed “trophy districts” where big racks (but few hunters) roam. You’ve got until July 2 to purchase SuperTags for moose, sheep and goats. The deadline for deer, elk, antelope, bison and mountain lions is July 30. Go to fwp.mt.gov for more details.

BY THE NUMBERS 5: Dollars a SuperTag entry will set you back 7: Montanans among the eight 2008 winners $256,595: Amount generated by SuperTag sales in 2008 50: Chances purchased by 2008 winner Aaron Franz of Sidney to snag a single goat tag Chad Harder

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Chad DeVall in the Bitterroot Valley Photo by: “Photo John”

OBITUARY

Shadow laid to rest Beloved mountain dog Shadow returned to nature’s bosom on March 4, 2009, after a quiet ceremony in the backyard garden of longtime companion Ryan Shaffer.

The mostly-Malamute mixed-breed, affectionately known by many in Missoula’s outdoor community as the Shadow Princess, spent much of her life hiking, hunting and otherwise running at large.

Her wild and suspicious grin was as familiar to backcountry travelers as it was in the Missoula potluck scene. A quiet nature belied an aggressive style that regularly left other dogs in the dust, and she never shied away from a good line.

Originally from Eagle, Colo., Shadow spent time in Vail before transitioning into a communal and rec-centric home in Missoula. Not one to wait for a human’s consent, Shadow excused herself from the claustrophobic confines of home at every opportunity. She was not unknown to Missoula Animal Control.

By all accounts an alpha female and likely a wolf hybrid, Shadow would

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Montana Headwall

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commonly instigate the canine choir, her long and mournful howls nearly indistinguishable from those of her ancestors.

Loved by many, Shadow nevertheless displayed no tolerance for “yipper dogs,” and more than once her owner was called upon to cover the vet bills of lesser, thinner-skinned canines. She further impressed her wild lineage upon a number of elk calves and fawns, and it wasn’t until the second decade of her life that, after being slowed by a stroke, she finally stopped enforcing the rules of the pack with an iron paw.

Shadow is survived by packmates Callie and Huck. Her presence is widely missed.

Chad Harder

UNDER THE BRIDGE

Water laws flow Whenever debates about rivers and property rights surface together, Montanans have found the confluence to be mighty turbulent. The 2009 state legislative session was no exception.

Legislators arrived eager to make waves—and floated more than 100

Montana Headwall

water-related bills—but only a few measures made it through the Capitol’s endless eddies and became law.

River lovers made a big splash with the Big Sky Rivers Act, an effort to create streamside setbacks for new buildings along Montana’s “Big 10” rivers, including the Clark Fork, Blackfoot, Bitterroot and Flathead. After a hearing full of heated testimony from river rats, conservation groups, state agencies, property owners, and businesses, the bill dried up and died along party lines in the House Local Government Committee, effectively moving the issue back to cities and counties.

Other legislation fared better. HB 190 sailed through both houses on a wave of support, clarifying laws for floaters and anglers who access public waterways from county roads and bridges while protecting the rights of riverside landowners.

Our favorite local rivers will run cleaner and clearer thanks to SB 200, a bill banning the sale of phosphate-containing cleaning products in the Clark Fork River basin. This preemptive and cost-effective effort reduces nutrient pollution—one of Montana’s main sources of poor water quality—and should slow the growth of that all-too-familiar slimy green algae.

Page 14 May–July 2009

The Montana Aquatic Invasive Species Act combats the impending tide of nonnative aquatic species—namely zebra and quagga mussels—by creating boat checkpoints and wash stations in heavy-use areas. These little exotics devastate lakes and their associated water-dependent economies by fouling boat motors, disrupting lake ecology, and clogging dams and irrigation infrastructure. Quaggas have already muscled their way into Nevada, and zebras are bottlenecking mighty close to Montana’s western border. The act will help the state in its upstream battle to prevent the invaders from establishing their own lakeside residence in Montana.

Brianna Randall

PACKED IN

Suburban wolves On a snowy walk in late March, Rod Dietz witnessed the stirring spectacle of three gray wolves stalking deer across a slope—the sort of once-in-a-lifetime encounter with an apex predator that might happen in Yellowstone National Park. But Dietz hadn’t traveled any further than the residential area of Missoula’s South Hills.

“I’ve seen them before in trips to Canada and even here in Montana, it just makes you really excited,” Dietz recalls.

“For the next two hours, I thought about those wolves, you know?”

The canids were likely members of the Welcome Creek pack, says wolf management specialist Liz Bradley of Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks (FWP). “They’re a pack that runs the north end of the Sapphire Mountains, and they’ve been found in the Miller Creek area before,” she says.

Bradley calls Dietz’s report a

classic, and one of a rising number of wolf sightings in Missoula neighborhoods like the Rattlesnake, Pattee Canyon, South Hills and Miller Creek.

The 66-year-old Dietz, an avid outdoorsman, wants wolves around “But I don’t want to see their population get so great that there becomes a fear factor among the general population,” he says.

It might be too late.

At the end of last year, at least 497 wolves in 84 packs roamed

Montana, an 18 percent increase over 2007. At least 23 packs straddle the Montana-Idaho border.

“Wolves have this uncanny ability to find other wolves, and to just hook up in a vacant spot and start a new pack,” says Carolyn Sime, wolf coordinator for FWP. But as wolves disperse, clashes with livestock increase. In 2008, 110 wolves in Montana—and eight entire packs—were killed after chronic conflicts.

Despite the lethal control actions, “The population still grew, the population is still secure,” says Sime. “I think a lot of what we’re learning and seeing is wolves are just a very, very dynamic animal.”

That resiliency is, in part, why state officials pushed to remove wolves from the endangered species list. Hunts in Montana and Idaho could begin this fall, unless environmental groups halt delisting in court. They argue hunting could remove 1,000 wolves from the Northern Rockies.

No chance, says Ed Bangs, wolf coordinator for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The environmentalists, he says, are just “crying wolf.”

Matthew Frank

Montana Headwall

Page 15 May–July 2009

by Chad Harder

uman feet rarely stand atop Sky Pilot.

With seven miles of canyon and nearly 5,000 vertical feet separating the summit from its closest trailhead, the 8,792-foot peak receives little attention. But from the ridge between Bear and Sweathouse creeks—a popular Bitterroot backcountry powder stash—Sky Pilot stands out as the hulking hunk of granite to the west. Backcountry skiers regularly ogle its plush north-facing bowl, but the cliffed-out eastern face comes off more like a BASE jumping perch than a descent route. It’s possible that rock climbers have scaled the steep pitch, but nobody ever skied it.

H

Until March, that is, when Colin Chisholm skinned up Bear Creek, picked out a narrow, barely-connected ribbon of snow and ice linking the top to the bottom, climbed it and skied the face. Solo.

“I couldn’t find anyone to go with me,” he says.

Chisholm’s inspiring first descent certainly warrants attention, but it hardly stands alone. Montana’s latest crop of backcountry enthusiasts are targeting the Bitterroot’s steepest shots, and descents long thought impossible are falling, one by one. Sure, small groups of talented mountaineers have been exploring the range’s remote and challenging faces ever since climbing ropes and skis first came to Montana. But lighter and better gear, combined with the growing wealth of route information online, are finally exposing the range for what it really is: an adventurer’s mountain Mecca.

“The terrain that people are now skiing in the Bitterroots is stuff that people in the ’90s didn’t really think was skiable, like the east face of El Capitan,” says Chisholm, the second of perhaps only two who have skied

that puckering pitch northwest of Darby.

“Now all of a sudden, we’re thinking, ‘This is skiable!’”

Skiable to some, maybe, but not the masses. Aside from the Bitterroot’s extreme eastern fringe, the range’s terrain is notoriously difficult to access, a factor that has long kept all but the most committed from even finding— let alone ‘scending—the challenging lines found deep in the backcountry. Today, however, more and more alpinists are pushing their limits on the area’s test pieces—steep, narrow couloirs for the skiers, and soaring buttresses for the rock climbers.

their creeks tumble toward the Bitterroot River. From the air, it appears like a giant yard rake has etched parallel, 15-mile-long trenches from the spine to the valley.

For trail users, the orientation of these canyons means it’s hard to get lost. Unless they’ve humped all the way to Idaho, disoriented hikers can always just drop back down to the valley. But to alpinists questing specific, technical objectives, the

The ’Root cause The heart of the Bitterroot lies in a towering granitic spine running 65 unbroken miles from Highway 12 on the north to the West Fork Road on the south, protected on all sides by the 1.3 million-acre SelwayBitterroot Wilderness. The ridge itself aligns almost perfectly along a North-South axis and doubles as the Montana-Idaho border.

From the crest, a series of rugged canyons on the Montana flank descend directly east as

Katie Goins keeps clipping along on the golden granite above Big Creek.

Chad Harder

Chad Harder

mountain’s orientation to the sun makes all the difference.

For instance, sun on south-facing walls— like those in Blodgett, Lost Horse and Mill creek canyons—regularly melts off enough snow to allow climbers a chance to work world-class, multi-pitch granite in the heart of winter. Just across the canyon on northerly aspects, snow hides from the sun in shaded bowls and gullies well into summer, providing plenty of off-season options for skiers willing to hike their turns.

Of course, the deeper options don’t get targeted if nobody knows they’re there, and it’s likely that many aesthetic Bitterroot lines aren’t just unskied, they’re unnoticed. Most potential adventurers either don’t have the endurance to penetrate far enough to scope the deep-in-there lines, or they lack the technical skills (or cajones) to safely negotiate the terrain.

“The Bitterroots are just really hard to access. It’s not like you’re just going up to a pass and going from there, because there’s not even really any roads,” says John Lehrman, a dedicated Bitterroot skier and entrepreneur.

Colin Chisholm

Skied for the first time last winter: The east face of El Capitan.

Photo by Rex Short of glacierparkphotography.com

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Page 19 May–July 2009

But for the committed few willing to slog uphill for the better part of a day, the payoff can be huge—thousands of vertical feet riding a blank canvas of untouched snow.

This “subcult of backcountry skiers,” as Lehrman calls them, provides the clientele for his new business venture, the Downing Mountain Backcountry Snowsports Lodge.

Positioned on private property halfway up the terrain-rich Downing Mountain, Lehrman’s lodge stands out as an anomaly in a range otherwise devoid of backcountry accommodations. Operating out of the Grubstake Restaurant high above Hamilton, Lehrman provides customers with a steep ski-in, ski-out experience, epicurean meals and an outdoor hot tub with magnificent views. These amenities may attract less

doesn’t get better than this.

It only gets longer. The Bitterroot is a world-class backcountry skiing destination.”

“It

—John Lehrman

Serving western Montana for more than 29 years, and offering the best in personal service and knowledge.

hardened winter travelers to the Bitterroots, encouraging them to comfortably explore the impressive 2,500-foot bowl rising directly above the lodge. But Lehrman’s quick to point out that it’s just a taste of the terrain available on the range’s more secluded ridges and peaks.

“I’ve been to so many places in the Bitterroot and been like, ‘Oh my god, I can’t believe this is here!” he says. “It doesn’t get better than this. It only gets longer. The Bitterroot is a world-class backcountry skiing destination.”

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Page 20 May–July 2009

Dan Hoffman has spent more than a decade jamming his fists into the chossy towers of the Bitterroot’s hardest and most aesthetic walls, largely focusing his energy in the rock climbing showcase of Blodgett Canyon.

He may work as a mild-mannered hydrologist in the horizontal world, but when things get vertical the 32-year-old Hoffman is widely known as “Deathwish Dan.”

Opposite, from top: Cragging on the Kootenai classic “Arms Race” (5.9).

Earning turns above Bass Creek.

Seth Quackenbush takes the Mountaineer’s Route (5.10c) in Lost Horse Canyon.

Chad Harder

Chad Harder

Chad Harder

Montana Headwall

Page 21 May–July 2009

climbs, bringing “A lot of climbers have nicknames, you front-page recogniknow? Some stick, others don’t. This one tion to the burgeonstuck,” he says flatly. ing scene and effecIt stuck for a reason: the lanky Hoffman tively uniting the formoves like a spider over difficult rock, commerly loose-knit rock pleting (with climbing partner Solon Linton) jocks in opposition an unheard of link-up, climbing Blodgett’s to the quarry. three most prominent buttresses—Flathead, Nevertheless, their Shoshone and Nez Perce—in less than a day. lawsuit failed to stop In 2007, he spent an entire summer putting the project. up new routes on Nez Perce, giving him a “The Forest unique and perhaps unparalleled perspecService blew it pretty tive of the valley. seriously on the Lost “We spent like seven or eight weekends Horse situation,” says up there, both days of every weekend, and Chad Harder Gray Thompson, an over the course of the summer we saw other elder statesman of climbers maybe twice,” Hoffman says.

Thompson’s not alone in recognizing the Montana climbing. A prolific rocksmith, “Most summer weekends there’s just two value the Bitterroots provide for hardcore alpine mentor and recently-retired geology or three parties up there in Blodgett, and adventurers. Multiple guidebooks and a professor at the University of Montana, that’s different than a lot of other areas, number of magazine articles over the past Thompson has relentlessly explored the rock like Lost Horse.” decade have shared the range’s lesser-known For years, the Lost Horse Creek drainage world for decades, putting up his first routes with alpinists from outside the region, Bitterroot ascent in 1969. Still a Missoula resremained a sleepy canyon with expansive from Tom Toula’s Rock and Road, an encycloident, the 68-year-old Thompson has but rarely-visited walls. It started gaining pedic, 536-page tome of North popularity about a decade ago America’s climbing areas, to Randall as boulderers—gymnastic Green’s detailed Rock Climbing climbers interested in low-toMontana. However, the widespread the-ground, dynamic moves— “People were like, exposure has met resistance from a began testing themselves on number of locals reluctant to share the high-quality erratics scat‘Who’s this who “their” stash. tered about the wide valley “There was a real anti-publication floor. Climbing contests sprang wants to write a ?’” ethic for a long time,” says Rick Torre, up, drawing a new crop of a longtime Bitterroot climber and climbers to the valley, includauthor/publisher of The Bitterroot —Bitterroot climber/author Rick Torre ing many from the University Mountainbike Guidebook and The of Montana’s substantial wallBitterroot Climber’s Guidebook, an updatcrawling community. ed version of which is scheduled for But a pair of events really release this summer. “People were like, climbed “Oh, about half the days since caused the area to blow up in 2008. First, ‘Who’s this asshole who wants to write a New Year’s.”

Joe Josephson’s climbing guide, Lost Horse climbing guide?’”

“They just plain didn’t understand the Canyon: A Climber’s Guide to Montana’s Best Maybe that was once true, says recreational value of Lost Horse to climbers Climbing and Bouldering, comprehensively Thompson, but times have changed. laid out the canyon’s established routes and when they pushed the quarry through,” he “I think that ethic has largely disapanchored the area on Montana’s rock climb- says. “They’re still lost in the ‘timber beast’ peared. If the climbing exists, you should try days, and haven’t made the transition to ing map. Soon after, the Bitterroot National to make it available to other climbers,” he understanding that recreation value is a lot Forest proposed reopening a retired gravel says. “But that’s the perspective of a scienbigger today.” pit at the base of some of the area’s premier tist, to share everything you know.”

Thompson’s ethos might apply in the climbing world, but Bitterroot skiers lag further behind on the sharing curve, and many remain protective of the goods. Just ask Lehrman. He publishes an online journal called backcountryfocus.com, providing a detailed collection of trip reports and photographs describing his Bitterroot ski outings to remote peaks and ridges. Focusing primarily on terrain that’s either physically or technically beyond the grasp of most winter adventurers, the website could hardly be called a guidebook for the masses.

Still, Chisholm felt betrayed when he came across backcountryfocus.com two years ago. Here was essentially an online Continued on page 54

asshole climbing guide

Chad Harder

Paul Donaldson takes the path less traveled on Canyon Peak.

sick . . .

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Page 23 May–July 2009

HEAD LIGHT

by Chad Harder

Bright Idea Photographs don’t capture subjects, they capture the light reflected off of subjects. And while most cameras provide good exposure in most situations, brilliant objects—snowy mountains, sunshiny water, even the sun itself—sucker cameras into thinking too much light will pass through the lens. The camera then compensates, reducing the light hitting the sensor and creating dark, dull and flat images.

Photographers with manual camera settings can beat this easily—you just ignore the light meter and adjust the settings until the camera’s digital display mirrors your artistic vision. But with so-called “simple” point-and-shoot cameras, the manual setting is missing, and photographers are forced to trick their camera to create their intended image.

How? Override your camera’s sensor by “pre-framing” on nearby foliage, blue sky (without the sun!), even the palm of your hand. Once framed, just press the shutter button halfway down and hold it while you move your lens toward your upcoming award-winning photo. Press the shutter and voilà! You’ve got correct exposure—and the picture you were seeing in the first place.

Chad Harder

Montana Headwall

Page 25 May–July 2009

HEAD SHOTS www.montanaheadwall.com

Chris Russell finds her way up Mount Pollock’s “Great Cleft Route” in Glacier National Park 1/125 sec @ f/16. Morgen Lanning

Kirk Baker and his passenger chute for the ground from high above the Bitterroot Range.

1/1250 sec @ f/20. Ran

Montana Headwall

Page 27 May–July 2009

www.montanaheadwall.com

HEAD SHOTS

Summertime sunset over Sentinel as seen from Playfair Park.

1/250 sec @ f/5.0. Morgen Lanning

The staff of Montana Headwall knows you’re out there having wicked adventures and recording your exploits photographically. Problem is, even excellent images often get loaded onto a hard drive and never again see the light of day. We’re ready to rectify this tragedy by dedicating a few pages of every issue to publish our readers’ best photos.

The rules are simple: go outside, have fun with your friends, and take a bunch of pictures. Then send us your very best to compete against other reader submissions for cool prizes like gift certificates, camera bags and gear.

Send your pix to hweditor@montanaheadwall.com. Include your name, the names of any recognizeable people in the image and, if you’ve got it, technical info like shutter speed and aperture. We’ll take it from there. But don’t delay: Get outside and start shooting today.

Montana Headwall

Page 28 May–July 2009

The illuminated Fusillade Mountain glacier basin silhouettes a hiker in Glacier National Park.

1/250 sec @ f/8.0. Kara McMahon

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Page 29 May–July 2009

ushing our bikes up the final switchback, wind-blasted trees and scree drop off at our side, the cleats of our cycling shoes scraping across the talus. Four thousand feet above our starting point on the valley floor, we finally crest the 7,822-foot Mount Thompson-Seton and enter a world of limitless blue sky, jagged mountains spilling like the sea to every horizon. The weathered ruins of a fire lookout sit scattered across the summit like a memory. Much to our surprise, the mountaintop is furnished, and two ancient metal bed frames atop the ruin invite us to recline, take in the views, and consider our predicament.

P

Today is the first day of a grand, threeday experiment, an attempt to carry featherweight camping gear on mountain bikes while linking the mountaintops of the 85-mile Whitefish Divide Trail. We’re heading south from our car parked near the Canadian border, and will loop back on day four via jeep roads lower in the valley. Currently, we’re sprawled on the second highest peak in the Whitefish Range, one of northwest Montana’s more untamed tangles of mountain and wilderness. We’ve been climbing hard all day in 95-degree heat, and although only 90 minutes of daylight remain, we’ve just run out of water.

day’s vestigial, purplish light settling over Water does not come easily on ridgelines, deep in the heart of grizzly country, we the black silhouettes of surrounding peaks. work diligently to forewarn the large, toothy and before we’d headed out I’d painstakingAs stars overwhelm the sky, Bob says, “If ly planned the trip’s water sources—primari- carnivores with a rolling chorus of calls: people could have seen us today, pushing up Matthew’s booming, owl-like “Whoop! ly alpine lakes perched a few hundred feet that mountain, they would have below the divide. But today’s thought, ‘What the hell are those climb has taken longer than guys thinking?’ expected, and we’re “But to be here now,” he conrealizing we won’t reach any of The is everything a tinues, as if answering a hypothetithem by sunset. We need to cal skeptic, “to be able to sleep on find water, but I’m not really this ridge under the shooting sure how. should be—eight stars...” He trails off, as if that’s the Reluctantly peeling ouranswer itself. selves from the rusty and battered beds, Matthew Lee, Bob , deliciously to twelve inches of The last best crest Allen and I clip in for a plunge To pull off a trip of this magnioff the summit on a faint sliver tude, I had forced myself to choose of a trail before wrapping and dashed with my gear—and partners—wisely. To around the headwall of an make the effort even remotely posalpine bowl. I stop at a switchsible, we had to pack extremely nerve-tingling exposure. back to study the map, which light, work well together, and be shows what just might be a prepared for long, difficult days stream beginning in a crease in without complaint. So I went with the best.

Whoop!”; Bob’s piercing whistle; and my the mountain below us.

Matthew Lee has twice won the Great “I swear I hear water running,” Bob says, sing-song-y, “No bears. Noooo bears.”

Divide Race, a 2,500-mile, unsupported The trail is everything a wilderness trail motioning into the darkening forest below. mountain bike contest that traverses the should be—eight to twelve inches of deliAs he tromps down to check, Matthew and I country’s spine between Mexico and Canada ciously off-camber tread and dashed with listen. along what’s called the Great Divide nerve-tingling exposure. Between the adren“Could just be the breeze in the trees,” I Mountain Bike Route. He was an obvious aline rush and our newfound water, we’re suggest. and beneficial addition to the team, and downright exuberant.

Then we hear a “Woo-hoo!” and Bob when I explained my plan he instantly The sun sets, gilding the surrounding calls up from the greenery, “There’s a spring mountainsides, and we ride onward through agreed to join the “bikepacking” experiment. coming out of the ground right down here!”

For further counsel I tapped into the a darkening night—whooping, whistling, And with that we are saved. obsessive subculture of diehard gram-counand singing with increasing gusto—until we Fully loaded with water for the night ters in the ultralight backpacking world— finally gain the divide itself and make camp. and next morning, we streak through the especially the eggheads extraordinaire over A silver moon illuminates the night as dimming forest, hoping to re-crest the at Bozeman’s BackpackingLight.com. With we relax on the ridgeline after dinner, the Whitefish Divide by nightfall. Since we’re

trail wilderness trail tread off-camber

A series of faint but rideable stretches link the cairns along one of the most spectacular stretches of ridgeline.

More comfortable than they look: the rusty beds in the old lookout provide a fine spot to relax and consider the situation. their advice I whittled my gear, including rack and backpack, down to 15 pounds, in large part because my tent, sleeping bag and pad weighed only 4.5 pounds.

Still, a few evangelical ultralighters tried to convince me to go even lighter. “You’re bringing a sleeping bag?” one snorted, implying that I might as well toss in a brass bed frame and king-sized mattress. But I wanted at least a modicum of comfort, and I wasn’t about to use my multi-tool as a pillow.

Now that we were light enough, we just needed one more rider. When renowned mountain bike photographer Bob Allen agreed to join the team, we were ready to ride.

That left only one question unanswered: Where to go? Bob suggested a few ranges— the Swans, Pioneers, Centennials—but for me, there really never was any question. It had to be the Whitefish Range, the wild area where I first started mountain biking and exploring on two wheels.

The range overlooks the North Fork of the Flathead River Valley, a place I’d roamed regularly as a Minnesota teenager visiting my grandparents’ cabin. Riding into the mountains with little more than a map, a water bottle and a thirst for adventure, I spent countless days over the years losing myself on the network of fading trails. I have a love for the North Fork like nowhere else, and this trip felt like a culmination, a crown jewel, but also something of a farewell.

Riding remote trails is risky for anyone, but for me, taking a hard spill can be even

more dangerous. I have an inherited bleeding condition that I have somehow been able to ignore successfully during many years of high-stakes riding, but now I have children to care for and the demands of my life are more complex. My freewheeling twenties are gone, and being bedridden with injuries is no longer an option. I’ve finally come to accept that my days of riding these trails are numbered and I’m determined to savor every minute of our adventure.

Ridgetop dreaming “What a goat trail,” Matthew says the next day, maneuvering along another crumbling, no-fall section of crest. Sometimes we lose our way completely, shouldering our bikes to search for any sign of the trail. We’d expected easier going atop the divide, but the path alternately vaults or plunges, leaving us to muscle up and down what feels like the very spine of the earth.

Massive wildfires in the North Fork in 1910 inspired Forest Service crews to prep for the next big one, hewing a network of pathways through these mountains and erecting fire lookouts atop the peaks. Today the remnant trails are little more than rough etchings in the mountainsides—perfect for goats and the spirits of foresters long past, but intensely challenging on bicycles. We’re required to use all our skill and strength to navigate the countless mini-summits dotting the divide.

Every 10 miles of trail brings another 5,000 vertical feet of tough climbing. This kind of riding has always been my favorite—rough, wild, and packed with spiraling switchbacks—and the Whitefish Divide in particular has long lived in my dreams. But over the years I’ve only experienced it in bits and pieces, after hours of lung-busting climbing. Now we’re living on it, waking on it each morning and riding along it each day.

We have everything we need until our third and final breakfast, and although we’re still on top of the divide we devour our Continued on page 55

Montana Headwall

Page 33 May–July 2009

by Andy Smetanka

WILD THINGS

Plugging along The bungled truth about anal corks

H

ow do you prep for 131 days of slumber? If you’re a bear, you top off an autumn-long binge of berries and apples with one last bedtime snack of pine needles, moss, even fur bitten from your own coat, effectively corking the colon and preventing a mid-winter fouling of the den.

Waking in spring, you just head out and void the blockage with extreme prejudice.

Or do you? Bear anal plugs have long been the subject of scientific speculation—and to a lesser extent, observation—as well as a popular feature of hey-did-you-know hiker lore.

Yet international bear expert Chuck Jonkel isn’t entirely convinced.

“Ah, the anal plug,” he muses.

“People argue about it even now.

My experience is that most [hibernating bears] don’t have plugs, or if they do, it’s debris from licking and chewing in their sleep, digging a little and grooming and getting hair and dirt and such all mixed in.”

Bear in mind that this Missoulabased biologist has inspected more butts than Sir Mix-A-Lot, and he doubts many of the animals limit themselves to a diet of duff before retiring. More commonly, he says, black and grizzly bears gradually

on,” Jonkel explains. “You’d use up all your energy and die.”

As for rectal plugs, some scientists suggest that the bear’s lower innards secrete a waxy wad of mucus, called a tappen, to aid constipation. Nonetheless, Jonkel

Bear anal plugs have long been the subject of and, to a

scientific speculation—

lesser extent, observation—as well as a

popular feature of hey-did-you-know stop eating in the weeks before hibernation as behavioral and physiological changes start preparing their bodies for several months of groggy half-wakefulness.

“You can’t be in there fidgeting and checking your watch, and so

hiker lore.

remains fairly certain anal plugs are not universal among bears.

Pity, that. One pictures springtime in griz country as a major unplugging of the great ursa, a release of chunky champagne corks amid an aromatic anal anthem.

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Montana Headwall

Page 35 May–July 2009

Roe your boat

by Ari LeVaux

GRUB

Snagging Montana’s delectable dinosaur

S

some look to fishing for its poetry in motion, for the philosophical speculations and harmonious bonds it fosters between the angler and the natural world. Others prefer a more physical experience, one comparable to, say, a cage match with a T-Rex. If this describes you, consider heading east for a bout with the bizarre spoonbill paddlefish.

With a shark’s body and the nose of a giant spatula, the spoonbill paddlefish, Polyodon spathula, is believed to predate dinosaurs by 50 million years. Once widespread, the massive and meaty fish has since been over-harvested, and today only two populations remain—one in China’s Yangtze River, the other in the Missouri River system of Montana and North Dakota.

While the meat is considered delicious, spoonbill eggs are even more coveted for their resemblance to the Caspian Sea sturgeon caviar, which at $100 or more per ounce qualifies as one of the world’s most valuable wildlife commodities.

But Caspian Sea sturgeon numbers have plummeted 90 percent in the last few decades, and sturgeon advocates have successfully redirected roe eaters toward paddlefish eggs. Connoisseurs who’ve embraced paddlefish roe—aka Yellowstone caviar—claim to suffer no loss in the quality of their delicacy.

Gabriel Kreuther, executive chef at The Modern in New York City, is a big fan of Yellowstone caviar. “It’s pitch black,” he told

me by phone, “with a creamy feel and a nutty, grassy taste. It is something good, something delicate.” A 2009 James Beard award semi-finalist, Kreuther serves Yellowstone spoonbill caviar on a cauliflower panna cotta with cockle clams and an orange emulsion, as well as with a tuna and scallop tartar and a salad of celeriac, oysters and almond crème.

While not endangered like its Caspian Sea brethren, the spoonbill has also suffered in recent decades as prime spawning grounds have been erased by development and dams. Still, more than 30,000 roam Montana’s river bottoms, enough for Montana Fish, Wildlife & Parks to allow fishing from May 15 to the end of June, or whenever the quota is reached.

That’s not to say that landing one of these prehistoric monsters is easy.

Regularly weighing more than 100 pounds and feeding exclusively on plankton, spoonbills refuse lures, and even the most wiggly worm or artfully-tied fly arouse nothing in these bottom-feeding vegetarians. Paddlefish anglers instead use heavy-duty fishing gear to hurl weighted treble hooks across the river, dragging them along the bottom and violently

jerking their poles until they snag into a fish and yard it to shore, a battle that can last a half hour or more.

But once landed, paddlefish have become one of the simplest fish for anglers to process. Why? Well, nearly all of Montana’s paddlefish angling happens at the Intake Fishing Access Site north of Glendive where representatives from the Glendive Chamber of Commerce Yellowstone Caviar Project are standing by to clean and wrap your fish in exchange for its eggs. They process the caviar (not a simple procedure) and sell it to benefit paddlefish research and conservation, sending anglers home with a few dozen pounds of quality spoonbill filets.

If snagging a paddlefish sounds like your idea of a good time, head for the Intake Fishing Access Site. Or if you’d prefer to just taste the eggs, contact the Yellowstone Caviar Project via e-mail at chamber@midrivers.com or call (406) 377-5601.

A spoonbill paddlefish, snagged at the Intake Fishing Access Site near Glendive.

Chad Harder

Put Some Bulk In Your Backpack This Summer Don’t hit the trail until you’ve hit the biggest bulk department in Montana.

The Good Food Store stocks more than 800 different bulk items, which means you can carry a different selection of energy-rich nutrition on every trip you take this summer.

Pasta, rice and grains. Dehydrated soups and cereals. Candy, dried fruit, nuts and granola. Coffee and tea. Pancake mix.

Peanut butter. And, of course, 16 varieties of trail mix. So hike on over. For bulk food so healthy and delicious, it’s well worth the weight.

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Montana Headwall

7am to 10pm Every Day Page 37 May–July 2009

GETAWAY

by Matt Gibson In pursuit of corpulent brook trout.

Matt Gibson

Remote possibility The easy pace of pleasure on the Yaak River

O

n a damp, gray Friday afternoon, the second day of our camping trip to the Yaak Valley, my girlfriend Renie and I sought some painless diversion. The fishing had been slow, and the light drizzle doused our enthusiasm for an ambitious hike. We decided on an easy walk to Vinal Lake, just a short drive north of the valley’s namesake “town.”

We strolled a quiet mile along a trail of matted pine straw before arriving at a modest pond sitting in a shallow trough against a low, forested ridge. On a far bank, a neglected boat lay upside down in the brush. Closer to us, a loon silently cruised the dark, cold water. We watched it dive, then reappear unpredictably as far as 50 yards away. After each plunge, we would try to guess where it would surface next. Minutes passed, and a light Montana Headwall

rain began to fall. Renie and I huddled under our umbrella with our shoulders pressed together, scanning the water and anticipating the loon’s next emergence. Tiny ripples from

Such are the

tion, the dimples of rain on an otherwise ordinary pond leave a deep impression.

Hidden in the far northwestern corner of Montana, the Yaak Valley

pleasures of the

Yaak, a place so splendid in its isolation, the dimples of rain on an otherwise ordinary pond leave a deep impression. countless raindrops expanded in delicate circles across the lake. And the hush—not a silence, but a steady whisper of weather—carried my thoughts away.

Such are the pleasures of the Yaak, a place so splendid in its isola-

Page 38 May–July 2009

arcs through heavily timbered mountains between the Purcell Range in Canada and the Cabinet Mountains Wilderness near Libby.

Leaving from Missoula, we spent six leisurely hours on the road, cruising past Noxon before heading north

through the gorgeous Bull River Valley on Montana Highway 56.

Lured by the promise of giants, we stopped along the way at the Ross Creek Cedars Scenic Area for an enchanted picnic among towering oldgrowth trees, some that have stood there for centuries and measure more than 8 feet in diameter. While any pebble plucked absentmindedly from the nearby creek bed would be vastly more ancient, something about the living cathedral at Ross Creek alters the perception of time. A day, a season, a year …what do they matter in the life of such titans?

After shoring up our supplies at Stein’s IGA in Troy, we turned right onto Highway 508, following the Yaak River north through a 7-mile canyon to Yaak Falls, a formidable cascade adjacent a forest service campground. The pocket water of the canyon has a reputation for good rainbow trout fishing, but it’s a rugged walk down to the water. Above the falls, the river flattens out, meandering through willows and grassy meadows.

Undercut banks supposedly hold monster brookies, and a

Matt Gibson

An ancient colossus towers over Ross Creek. tenuous population of rare Columbia River redband trout mingles with the usual mix of cutthroat, rainbow and bull trout.

Our first full day in the valley had been a sunny exemplar of late July, and we wet our lines above town amid the shallow riffles of the Yaak River’s main

Montana Headwall

fork. We’d hoped the small water would serve up easy action on attractors, but had no luck.

Wading wet, we covered about a half-mile of water without a

Page 39 May–July 2009

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Montana Headwall

Page 40 May–July 2009

Yaak Falls strike before giving up. We hadn’t come to work hard—for fish or otherwise—so instead of slicing into our store of summer sausage and bagels, we headed into town for cheeseburgers and local color at the notorious Dirty Shame Saloon. The Dirty Shame and the Yaak Tavern—which adjoins the camper-friendly Yaak Mercantile—pretty much constitute the whole settlement, or at least its visible public life.

We found Dirty Shame owner Gloria Belcher working alone that afternoon, her hands full as she whipped up tasty fare for five customers hungry for a late lunch. (The excellent mango salsa suggested culinary ambition that seemed surprisingly out of place, though not at all unwelcome).

Taking time for cheerful chitchat, Belcher recounted her efforts to fix up the joint after years of benign neglect. The recently completed remodel uncovered dozens of bullet holes in the walls, she said, pointing at the spot where she’d hung a decoration to conceal the hole where a

Matt Gibson

round had pierced the door leading out to the deck. The most recent target of a triggerhappy drunk was a recalcitrant eight ball on the pool table, but that happened before she took over the place, she told us.

Although the fishing never picked up during our three days on the river, I finally landed a healthy 16-inch rainbow on a Stimulator, coaxing him from his hiding spot behind a boulder just a few steps upriver from our campsite. It was the last evening of our trip, and I was finally able to provide Renie with the fresh fish dinner I’d promised. But after landing my prize, I had an unexpected change of heart and released it. I don’t really know what came over me, whether I did it out of respect for this elder statesman of the river, or because I’d left my manhood at home with my power tools. I just know I shouldn’t have mentioned it, because whatever softened my heart toward that fish had not inspired Renie.

Montana Headwall

Page 41 May–July 2009

Matt Gibson

Morning mist rises from the Yaak River.

good-natured ribbing, a rustle of wind, the burble of the river flowing past our campsite, and the twinkle of a million stars above our campfire.

“I really needed to get away,” she said.

“Is this far enough?” I asked.

She didn’t really need to answer. The treetops nodded in the breeze.

No, she wanted meat, and the ribeyes from a previous night were long gone. Chastened, I set out again with my pole and came back with a pathetic 8-inch dink, which I served unpersuasively alongside pasta flavored with antiseptic powder from a foil packet.

Luckily for me, Renie got over it. All it took was a little

On the way Picnic at Ross Creek Cedars, four miles west of Highway 56, just south of Bull Lake. Huge old growth cedars, some as much as 500 years old and more than 8 feet in diameter, tower over a garden of ferns and wild ginger. The one-mile interpretive trail makes for a lovely postprandial stroll.

Try the Forest Service campgrounds at Whitetail and Pete Creek. Both offer private, shady sites, but Whitetail’s riverside setting makes it the most desirable. Longtime campground host Joe White keeps everybody honest, which we appreciated when some Washington bikers tried to muscle in on our choice riverbank site.

Bonus prize

Idaho

Camping British Columbia Montana

Yaak 508

Vinal Lake

Yaak River

Lake Koocanusa Kootenai River

Troy Libby

Highway 508 follows the 56 Yaak Valley over the Ross 2 d Creek Purcell Mountains to Lake Cedars Map by Joe Weston Koocanusa, one of the most remote, lightly traveled stretches of pavement in the Lower 48. An ideal route for cyclists looking to escape traffic, it’s also a relaxing, scenic drive. Lingering snow typically keeps the route impassable until June.

d

Rain check If bad weather drenches your camp, just roll into town and order a cozy meal at the Dirty Shame Saloon or Yaak Tavern.

You can’t miss ’em as they’re pretty much the only two buildings there. If Mother Nature throws a really violent tantrum, rent a rustic cabin at the Dirty Shame or hope for a vacancy at the well-appointed Yaak River Lodge, just a short way down the road.

Montana Headwall

Page 42 May–July 2009

COME PLAY IN THE HIGH COUNTRY • Lodge open daily for breakfast, lunch & dinner.

• 20 cabins/rooms available for rent.

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• Only 12 miles from Lolo Pass & 10 miles from Jerry Johnson Hot Springs!

• Plenty of parking year-round for trailers, campers, snowmobiles, and large groups.

Montana Headwall

Page 43 May–July 2009

Bearing north

by Skylar Browning

DESTINATION

A three-year-old tests border security at Waterton. Her findings: Canada’s got cute bears.

The Prince of Wales Hotel, overlooking Upper Waterton Lake.

G

oat Haunt does not look like an official international border crossing. As we approach the checkpoint from the Canada side, there’s exactly one park ranger and one border agent standing between us and our homeland. I see only two buildings—one up the trail a bit, another just off the trail.

That’s the ranger station, about the size of a large outhouse.

While 11 park and border personnel inhabit Goat Haunt during peak summer weeks, typically just two or three people occupy the post, giving it status as one of our country’s most remote points of entry.

“The moose outnumber us 10-to-1,” says the park ranger, half-jokingly. “They’re our backup.”

After Sept. 11, the government completely shut down the Goat Haunt Border Crossing, fearing that terrorists would take advantage of the minimal operation. But even as border requirements tighten— Montana Headwall

beginning June 1, travelers must have a passport to cross into the United States—Goat Haunt remains a throwback.

For my wife, my 3-year-old daughter and myself, the port is nothing more than a pleasant conversation, a quick flash of paperwork, and a

recommendation for a hike to a favorite nearby overlook.

The area’s quaint, untouched feel makes it an ideal day trip while vacationing in Waterton Lakes National Park in Canada, just north of Glacier National Park in Montana. The park’s hub—Waterton

Townsite—is a charming Canadian village just six hours from Missoula, and it offers the perfect jumping-off point for all levels of thrill-seeking, from longer hikes to shorter excursions more suited to our daughter’s attention span.

Returning to Waterton after a day in the sun, we soaked in small-town hospitality and relaxed in rustic accommodations, promising to return once we realized we couldn’t see everything in a single trip.

Bears on the brain My daughter asks for just one thing out of this family getaway to Waterton: to see a bear.

Aside from the promise of waterfalls, vistas, boat rides and a must-have slice of pie from the famous Park Café in St. Mary, I mention we just might glimpse a bear—not knowing this would become the only thing she cared about.

Fortunately, the Red Rock Parkway leading into the townsite carries a reputation for Page 44 May–July 2009

excellent bear viewing, and it does not disappoint. Three miles into the drive my wife spots a mother and cub on a ridge overlooking the two-lane road. Soon after, we see another pair of black bears playing in a grassy field, just 30 yards from the

green rock formations line the streambed, and well-maintained trails—suitable for kids or grandparents—meander along Bauerman Creek, offering enough variety to keep a family busy for at least a half day.

The next day delivers anoth-

6

5 Red Rock Parkway

Waterton Lakes National Park

moose outnumber us 10-to-1,” says the park ranger, half-jokingly.

“The

er mellow Canadian gem.

Akamina Parkway bends west toward Crandall Lake before dropping south to Cameron Lake—a serene subalpine tarn nestled between the snow-covered peaks of Akamina Ridge.

Arriving at 10 a.m., the place is empty, save for a few park personnel running the dock. We rent a canoe for $25 (row boats and paddle boats are also available by the hour) and paddle the lake’s perimeter, taking in the

6 Lower Waterton Lake

Akamina Parkway

Waterton Townsite

“They’re our backup.” parkway. Staying close to our car, we watch for nearly an hour as the two bears roll around, occasionally poking up their heads to watch the watchers.

Before lunch on the first day of our trip my daughter is already ecstatic about seeing her first real bears.

Red Rock Canyon lies just 25 minutes north of Waterton, but its geography is more reminiscent of an Arizona landscape.

Brilliant magenta, taupe and

Park Entrance

Cameron Lake

Upper Waterton Lake

Glacier National Park view of the towering Mt. Custer and searching the shorelines for grizzly bears.

Go to Goat for moose The massive, border-spanning Upper Waterton Lake is undoubtedly the area’s showcase feature, and any visitor would do well exploring it for a day. Extending from the

Borders, boats and bears, oh my! Annabella Bradley-Browning chills at the beach.

Middle Waterton Lake

Crypt Lake

Canada USA

Goat Haunt Ranger Station

Chief Mountain 17 Port of Entry

Map by Joe Weston

Canadian townsite’s shores south into Montana, the lake’s southern terminus is home to the remote ranger station and border post.

While the 7-mile Lakeshore Trail parallels the lake’s western side, most visitors take advantage of the classic M.V. International, an historic, 200person boat operated by the

Skylar Browning

Waterton Shoreline Cruise Co. For $34, customers get an entertaining history of the park, a lingering view of the clear-cut International Boundary and, 50 minutes later, a drop-off at Goat Haunt. (The most knowledgeable guides are aboard the 10 a.m. launch, friendly locals say.)

Just one mile from the dock, Goat Haunt Overlook provides a stunning view of the lake.

Kootenai Lakes Trail is the most frequently hiked in the area, covering 2.5 miles of the best moose habitat inside Glacier National Park. Our daughter found it easy to navigate, and she delighted at the sight of moose wading in the shallow waters. We didn’t attempt the 6.2-mile hike to Lake Francis, or the additional 4-mile thighbuster up to Brown Pass, but both provide tremendous international views.

Trails from the Crypt Skylar Browning

The historic M.V. International.

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Montana Headwall

Page 46 May–July 2009

Trek 5.4 miles into Crypt Lake and you’ll feel like you

entered Nicolas Cage or Brendan Fraser’s latest action-adventure flick. Ranked among the best (and most popular) hikes in Canada, adventurous climbers start by boating to a dock on Upper Waterton’s east side ($16 roundtrip) before humping toward Hell Roaring Falls. The constant climb passes a series of cascades and crosses a talus slope before climbing a steel ladder and entering a narrow, 60foot-long tunnel through the mountain. Hikers then use a series of cables bolted to the rock as a handrail to maneuver across a cliff. Three hours and 2,300 feet of climbing later, Crypt Lake comes into view to the south, reflecting the mountains of Montana’s Glacier National Park. While the view is breathtaking, don’t dally—the last cruise back to Waterton is your only chance to avoid a lonely night on the ridge. Needless to say, this hike’s not recommended for small children or adults with bad wheels.

How to get there While Crypt Lake receives the bulk of the attention, locals tout 7,805-foot Vimy Peak—situated on the southeast end of Middle Waterton Lake— as a lower profile but equally worthy alternative. With no ladders, no tunnels and a persistent 6.8 miles of climbing, Vimy doesn’t carry quite the cachet as Crypt Lake, but it does offer unparalleled views.

As our guide tells us, “Crypt Lake is fun to try once, but Vimy Peak is fun to keep trying.” He’d already climbed it three times that summer, bushwhacking new trails the last two trips.

Vimy’s easiest approach involves mountain biking four miles of trail before turning upward for a direct climb to the high summit. We figure it’s a good reason to return in a few years when our daughter’s less focused on bear viewing, and more interested in making it to the top.

From western Montana, take Going-to-the-Sun Road through Glacier National Park, connecting with U.S. Highway 89 in St. Mary. Take Chief Mountain International Highway to the border (the station is only open June 1 to Oct. 31) and into Waterton. The drive takes approximately six hours from Missoula.

Where to stay The Prince of Wales Hotel: This iconic and palatial establishment was built in the mid1920s, set on a bluff overlooking Upper Waterton Lake and the town.

The incomparable view belies its small rooms and steep prices. Call 403-859-2231.

Crandall Mountain Lodge: Waterton lost one of its most charming attractions—and fine dining rooms—when the historic Kilmorey Lodge burned down earlier this year, but the Crandall

Cameron Lake nestles between the snowcovered peaks of Akamina Ridge.

Mountain Lodge across the street helps to fill the void with family-friendly accommodations at a fair price. Call 1-866-859-2288.

Townsite Campground: Conveniently located on the south end of Waterton, this premier location includes 238 sites, hot showers, flush toilets, food storage and kitchen shelters. It’s walking distance to restaurants and trailheads, but prepare for extreme winds blowing in from Upper Waterton Lake. Call 877-737-3783.

Local Tip Home cooking is hard to find in Glacier’s gateway communities, and locals know that nobody cooks it up better than the Park Café in St. Mary. Be sure to arrive early for breakfast, and order your pies in advance—we recommend the huckleberry. Smart travelers can order the pie on their way up; it’ll be ready and waiting on the return trip.

Skylar Browning

than 5,000 feet of vert and enough steep snow to require a belay. Plan on bringing your harness and ice axe, but get on the list with Cossitt at jhckal@yahoo.com.

www.montanaheadwall.com

HEAD OUT

MAY May 1-3 Join the Rocky Mountaineers in a burly push for the summits of two 9,000-foot-plus peaks in Glacier National Park, Gunsight Mountain and Edwards Mountain. With the Sun Road not yet open, you can join these intrepid mountaineers and climb into some of the park’s accessible high country. Don’t be fooled though—this trip is advertised as a winter climbing and camping trip and you should arrive prepared for such. Contact Forest Dean at 2407612 or mtnear1@gmail.com for the beta.

May 2 Paddle, cycle and run in the Park to Paradise Triathlon, a team or individual contest through the stunning Paradise Valley. Follow eight miles of paddling on the Yellowstone River with an 18-mile pedal through Yankee Jim Canyon before pounding five miles of pavement to Arch Park in Gardiner. Contact Stacey Gunther at gunther.stacey@gmail.com or 848-7941 for details.

May 9 Join the grupetto at the Watson Children’s Shelter Bike for Shelter, a fundraising fun ride for families. Sign up for the 2-, 15-, 20- or 50-mile race, then set your own pace and feel good about kicking down for “area children in crisis.” For the scoop go to www.shelter4children.com.

May 12 Birders will be flocking to the National Bison Range in Moiese for International Migratory Bird Day. Dig out your binoculars for “beginning and advanced birding” options, as well as bird identification and photography events throughout the day. The range will also be opening the scenic 19-mile Red Sleep Mountain Drive for the summer season, weather permitting, so go to www.birdday.org for more info.

May 16 Get your team together and head to the Lee Metcalf National Wildlife Refuge for the annual Adventure Biothon. This race is designed to test a team’s physical abilities and knowledge of the natural world in a timed navigation of the refuge’s wilds, with short (2-3 miles) and long (3-5 miles) courses designed for “serious athletes, notso-serious athletes, family recreation, or adventurous children.” Contact the refuge at 777-5552 for the scoop.

May 16 Climb/slog up Great Northern Mountain with Rocky Mountaineer Jim Cossitt via the “strenuous, non-technical 7-8-mile” route from the Hungry Horse Reservoir. Smack dab Montana Headwall

JUNE

in the heart of griz country, the final ridge walk to the summit provides impressive and unique views of southern Glacier National Park. Contact Cossitt at jhckal@ yahoo.com and join the summit team.

May 16-17 Feeling buoyant, sailor? Gather those old boxes and get ’em soggy at the annual Cardboard Kayak Races during the Northern Rockies Paddlefest at Wayfarers State Park near Bigfork. Test drive the latest fleet of new canoes and kayaks or drop in on free clinics covering topics like paddling technique and packing boats for extended expeditions. Safety equipment is provided, although you might prefer to bring your own. Contact the Northern Rockies Paddling Symposium Association at 752-2446 for more information.

May 23-24 Leave the gardening implements at home and head to the 33rd Annual Bigfork Whitewater Festival, a weekend of partying and racing through the Swan River’s notorious “Wild Mile,” a Class V stretch of sick whitewater surging with spring runoff. Hundreds of racers and thousands of spectators rally for the triathlon and river races, so sign up early, pack a cooler and be prepared for one of the best whitewater races around. Call the Kalispell Athletic Club at 752-2880 for the lowdown.

May 30 Word on the trail is you shouldn’t wear your new shoes for the 23rd Annual Evaro Mountain Challenge, a collection of 5K and 10K runs over (often muddy) trails and gravel roads. The 10K run provides a “challenging” singletrack experience, and top finishers receive “fun awards.”

Call Bob Hayes at 726-3695 for the scoop.

May 31 At 9,356 feet, Holland Peak is the highest in the Swan Range, and a worthy summer objective of any Montana mountaineer. But climb it in May, and you’re in for a “VERY challenging spring climb,” says trip leader Jim Cossitt. Participants should expect a great deal of exposure, more

Page 48 May–July 2009

June 6-7 Don’t tell the FAA, but the annual Powder River Buffalo Shoot will be held “near the new air strip off Highway 59 North” just 3 miles west of Broadus, West Dakota. Marksmen can bring their traditional single shot or lever action rifle in calibers .375 or larger and join in the fun.

Contestants will test their accuracy on metal targets at distances of 250 to 1,000 yards, and organizers remind you to bring plenty of ammo. Learn more by emailing broadusfire@rangeweb.net.

June 19-21 You’ll find a three-day bicycle bonanza during the Anaconda Bicycle Festival, a fundraising party that chips in toward the restoration of Washoe Park. The showcase road event, Pedal the Pintlers, goes down on Saturday and includes 25-, 50- and 100-mile rides through the mountains. Then on Sunday their dirty fat tire brethren hit the trail for the “Disco Mountain Boogie,” a series of 21-, 17- and 11-mile circuits of “scenic, fast, yet challenging routes” through the Deer Lodge National Forest. Learn more from the folks at Sven’s Bike Shop at 563-7988.

June 20 Ridge runners can scoot to Wulfman’s Continental Divide Trail Run, a 14K point-to-point race along the single-track section of The Continental Divide Trail from Pipestone to Homestake Pass.

Organizers point out that while there’s “just one hill,” there’s plenty of microbeers and “carnivorous and vegetarian fare available.” Get more info at www.buttespissandmoanrunners.com.

June 21 Head out for the summer solstice with the Rocky Mountaineers for a “warm-up” to the top of Warrior Mountain in the Swan Range. Although this should be a non-technical jaunt, participants can expect at least some snow travel in the 10 miles and nearly 5,000 feet of vert covered during the day. Sharpen your ice axe, and then contact Jim Cossitt at jhckal@yahoo.com for more information.

June 21 Apprehensive about jumping headfirst into a triathlon? Then consider hitting the Summer Solstice Triathlon in Kalispell. This “beginner’s tri” includes a 1/2-mile swim in Foys Lake, a 12.7-mile bike ride and a 3-mile run, although some folks sign up just for the free food and post-race massages. Check out www.summithealthcenter.com for more info.

June 21 The Treasure State Triathlon starts competitors off with a 1.5K open swim, follows it with a 40K bike ride and culminates in a 10K run, all amid the splendor of the East Gallatin Recreation Area. This race is the 2009 State of Montana qualifier for the “Best of the U.S. Triathlete Competition,” and all proceeds benefit the recreation area. Go to to www.tri-mt.com to get lined out.

June 27 Get yer runner’s high at the 41st Annual Beartooth Run, a 4.4and 8.2-mile race that climbs the 2,000foot ascent of the Beartooth Highway and ends at Vista Point. For the lowdown go to www.beartoothrun.com.

June 27 Head to Lolo Pass for the Mountain to Meadow Half Marathon and 5K Fun Run, a camas flower-filled trot in the shadow of the Bitterroot Mountains. In honor of the pass’s historical significance, actors will perform a Lewis and Clark routine, firing ancient muskets to get the race rolling.

E-mail coordinator@runlolopass.org for the scoop.

JULY July 4 Bike riding runners will find their calling in the Make It Hurt On The Dirt Off-Road Duathlon in Bozeman. Utilizing crosscountry ski trails and Forest Service roads, the woods ’n’ meadow course includes some stiff ups and downs. Learn more at www.homestakelodge.com or call 585-8052.

July 9-11 Fort Peck Lake boasts some of the best walleye fishing in Montana, so if you love slaying these invasives sign up for the Montana Governor’s Cup Walleye Tournament and be prepared to bring home a cash prize of $15,000. Teams pay $400 to enter.

Call 228-2222 to get fishy.

July 10-12 Jump in your raft for the 46th annual Yellowstone River Boat Float, a leisurely three-day float from Livingston to Laurel on one of the state’s largest and most historic rivers. Floaters will retrace the route of Lewis and Clark, except there’s live bands, street dances and at least one diversion dam en route.

A team of Jetskiers provide support. Call 222-4414 for more information.

July 11 For distance-pain geeks, the Glacier Challenge has it all: six modes of transport, a stunning locale, great competition and a good cause. Teams or individuals can enter this competitive fundraiser for Flathead Youth Homes while winding through 55 miles of Whitefish’s “backstreets, rivers, lakes and…singletrack.”

Contact hplumb@youthhomes.com or 261-1831 for more information.

July 11 Hardcores, take note. The Devil’s Backbone 50-miler runs the crest of the Gallatin Range, in what organizers call a “graduate level” run. It’s nearly unsupported and unmarked, and runners must carry EVERYTHING they need for 5 to 9 hours of serious trail running.

Participants should carry bear spray and expect 11,400 total feet of vertical gain, as well as no easy way off the course. Most of the course lies above 9,500 feet; hydration comes in the form of streams, meltwater and a “murky lake at 11 miles and 39 miles.” Beginners are not invited, but log on to www.winddrinkers.org to learn more.

July 11 Wait! Don’t toss those boxes!

Instead, fashion yourself a boat, strap on a floation device and sign yourself up for FWP’s annual Cardboard Cup Regatta at Helena’s Spring Meadow Lake State Park. Your boat must be made of cardboard, so tap into your inner Noah and let your imagination run wild. Call Craig Marr at 495-3270 for the lowdown.

July 12 Head to Helena for the Spring Meadow Lake Olympic Triathlon, a 1.5K swim, 40k bike and 10k run through the trails of Spring Meadow Lake State Park. Visit www.usa-triathlon.org or e-mail cajake@dishmail.net for more info.

July 16-19 Pit your mountainwoman/man skills against the best on their home turf during Libby’s Two Rivers Rendezvous, a series of self-sufficiency tests that include tomahawk throwing, blackpowder shooting and more. It’s fun for the whole compound!

Call 293-9798 to get the lowdown.

July 17-18 Log-rollers and other backwoods-style athletes can test their mettle at Darby’s annual Logger Days, a weekend of 17 competitive logging events. Call 961-8324 to get informed.

July 19 Hit the Downtown Criterium and the Sleeping Child Time Trial in this year’s Tour of the Bitterroot, a day of bicycle racing in and around Hamilton. Visit www.tourofthebitterroot.blogspot.com for more info.

July 19 Cyclists looking for a bit of everything can head to the Tour de Bozeman, a road race that combines a flat, 20K out-and-back time trial, a 300meter sprint and “an unrelenting 70-mile road race.” The weekend’s “three-stage omnium” takes place both downtown and in Bridger Canyon, and the winner will go home with $5,000. Check out www.tourdebozeman.com for the scoop.

July 25 Paddle fiends should head to Fort Benton for the Montana Cup Boat Race, a human-powered contest on the mighty Missouri River. All nonmotorized craft, from outriggers and rowing shells to canoes and kayaks, are fair game, although beginners should note that race organizers are extending their welcome only to “fit, experienced paddlers.”

Call 771-7240 to get in the game.

July 25-August 3 Like jumping out of perfectly good airplanes? Then head to Lost Prairie’s 42nd Annual Jump Meet for a week of fun, both in the air and on the ground. Jumps from 13,000 feet will cost qualified jumpers $25, a small price to be a part of the Northwest’s largest gathering of skydivers in a stunning locale. Drop in on www.skydive lostprairie.com for more beta.

July 26 The XTERRA Wild Horse Creek Triathlon in Bozeman features a 1,200yard swim, 16-mile mountain bike ride and a 6-mile trail run around Hyalite Reservoir for teams and individuals.

For the less hardcore, try the Wild Horse Creek “Just Tri Off-Road” Triathlon the same morning. Learn more about either at www.bigskytri.com, or e-mail bigskytri@yahoo.com.

Chad Harder

Light sleepers

by Chad Harder

HEAD GEAR

Flyweight shelters keep you floating down the trail

Chad Harder

H

eavy backpacks create all kinds of misery on the trail, sometimes slowing your pace enough to blow objectives entirely. On ambitious adventures that truly test your physical limits, there’s no better way to boost your chances of success than to reduce your pack weight.

Any serious gram-shaving should begin with an honest look at your heaviest item—most often, the tent. In an ongoing quest to limit the pain inherent in lugging around a week’s worth of gear and food, the Headwall gear team has tried with varying success to duck mountain weather in a number of uber-light ways—from tents to tarps to Tyvek.

True, flyweight tarps work fine in mild conditions and might save you in an emergency, but serious mountain weather can require more substantial shelter, one you trust to protect Montana Headwall

Page 50 May–July 2009

you and yours when skies grow ominous. Don’t kid yourself— June makes a fine time for a blizzard ’round these parts.

As tent makers work to squeeze every possible ounce out of their products, they’ve altered traditional designs significantly, creating tents with but a single wall, tents that need no poles, and tents that have no floor. Some are functional, others frustratingly lacking. But when you’re an “ultralighter,” only a few features matter: weather resistance, ventilation and space. We’ve taken three of the newer and more remarkable shelters and put them through the ringer. (Note: we’re not calling this grouping “tents,” because two of the three are so minimalist as to be more tarp than tent.) All, however, will keep you dry and protected in your quest for Montana-sized objectives, without breaking your back or the bank in the process.

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Page 51 May–July 2009

GoLite Shangri-La 3 • www.golite.com • $225 • 1.8 pounds Nine inches of heavy November snow had us mighty worried. While we’d gone to town for supplies, my tent—a Shangri-La 3 on its maiden voyage— needed to protect three people’s gear during a raging Rattlesnake storm. If the shelter buckled, we’d be screwed—and forced to retreat the 10 miles to the trailhead.

But even with all that snow, there it stood, proud and upright, the three down sleeping bags and piles of warm gear bone dry inside. Two dozen nights of blissful slumber later, I can confidently place the 3 among the best designed ultralight shelters on the market.

It’s cozy for three, but spacious for two. Near-vertical walls and a 62-inch center height mean four stanky, poker-playing climbers can ante up on down days without ever touching. The hexagonal shape and SilLite fabric keep it crazy-strong, shedding wind and rain like a mallard.

To achieve its best-in-test 1.8 pounds, the 3 goes floorless and pitches without poles—just suspend a line from a branch, clip in the apex and stake out the corners.

You’ve now got a spacious interior, equally suited for sprawling or late-night massage.

Non-intimates can block unwanted fondling by instead erecting it with the pole (13 ounces, included), or a paddle, or a cut-to-fit branch.

Uncomfortable with such a slight setup? Buy the custom floor ($75, 1.4 pounds) or bugproof “nest” ($150, 2.3 pounds). Although both add enough weight to void ultralight status, they do deliver an excellent night’s sleep.

—Chad Harder

Big Agnes Seedhouse SL2 www.bigagnes.com • $320 • 3.4 pounds Upstart tent maker Big Agnes forever changed the ultralight tent landscape five years ago with the introduction of the impossibly light Seedhouse SL series, and with ongoing ounce-shedding refinements, the latest Seedhouse SL2 weighs in at a groundbreaking 3.4 pounds.

Unlike the other shelters here, the Seedhouse requires poles (included) to pitch. While this means it’s easily the heaviest in our review, it also allows it to be freestanding—and therefore a breeze to pitch anywhere. With a waterproof bathtub floor and gossamer mesh body, it’s also the best for clear-night stargazing.

A silicone-treated nylon fly tautly protects the cozy innards while simultaneously adding a diminutive, 8-square-foot vestibule. I’ve weathered multiple mountain storms in the SL2, and it handles wind and weather with aplomb.

A single door and a svelte 28 square feet of floor space mean you’ll be intimate with tent mates. Halitosis sufferers will prefer the more spacious, three-person SL3, while soloists will love the SL1, which weighs less than some bivy sacks.

An accessory footprint ($50, 8 ounces) allows for a “fast-fly” configuration that won’t keep bugs out, but does keep you dry for only 2.1 pounds.

A tent this light and stormworthy does come at a price—at $320, the SL2 is the costliest in the test. And as with all ultralight gear it needs to be treated with care, so those who are hard on gear should opt for a heavier tent. But if you’re in the market for a minimalist, freestanding backcountry shelter, the SL2 is hard to beat.

—Aaron Teasdale

Montana Headwall

Page 52 May–July 2009

Outdoor Research NightHaven www.outdoorresearch.com $179 • 2.2 pounds The smallest-packing shelter in our test, the Nalgene-sized Nighthaven protects two friends from the elements remarkably well. Note I say “friends,” as this “tarp tent” gets far too cozy for squabbly non-intimates.

That said, mine has saved me and my sweetie from brutal alpine weather en route to the highest peaks in Montana and Wyoming, and other than a suspiciously marmot-sized hole in the screening, it’s none the worse for wear.

By using solely Silnylon and mesh, Seattle-based Outdoor Research designed this extra-long single-wall to be both mosquito

and weatherproof, an unheard of achievement among single-wall tarp tents. It achieves its 2.2 pound trail weight by dispensing with a floor (4 ounces of Tyvek sheeting substitutes well), and relies on trekking poles to hold it up.

The NightHaven’s brilliant and unique design keeps bugs at bay via a drape of screening that hangs to the ground, and a fairly flexible pitch allows for more headroom in mellow weather or a low-profile pitch when the wind blows. Either way, when pitched properly a high-low vent system keeps air moving reasonably well, and plenty of adjustable guylines and stake loops keep it rigid when a maelstrom strikes.

Some will find the Nighthaven’s shortcomings unacceptable. It has no room to sit upright.

It lacks a vestibule and can be confusing (at first) to set up. But for a retail of $179, the NightHaven serves as a full-protection, singlewall shelter whose size, weight and price match that of your average bivy.

—Chad Harder

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Montana Headwall

Page 53 May–July 2009

Exposed CONTINUED FROM PAGE 22 instruction manual, broadcasting the exact beta he’d been identifying and exploring for more than a decade, now available to anyone.

To be clear, the 42-year-old Chisholm is a rare specimen, an adrenalinized hospice worker who finds skiing “no-fall” first descents—often by himself—to be a meditative experience.

“The risk of death elevates the need for focus and attention,” he says. “When you are climbing or skiing a difficult line, the ego, the self vanishes, and you have only the immediate, pure moment.”

This kind of meditation works best in an uncrowded setting, and like Jesus defending the temple against the scourge of gambling, Chisholm sent a sharply-worded e-mail to Lehrman, chastising him for recklessly exposing the sacred mountains—through his web site and ski lodge—to a death of a thousand ski cuts.

Lehrman anticipated that kind of feedback, but not from such a reputable source.

“Colin came in and reached out to me with his concerns, and his e-mail was crippling,” he says. “I said to myself, ‘this is the guy whose mind I have to change.’”

After talking on the phone, the two decided to go for a ski and try to powder over their differences. It worked, and they’re now frequent ski partners, although Lehrman still struggles to balance the joy he gets from sharing his adventures on the Internet with the fears of his critics.

“Some people say, and I really sympathize with this, that if you read one of my posts then you can’t go and experience it as an exploration for yourself,” he says, noting that his site exists in an online reality of Google Earth and endless Internet adventure forums. “Of course you can choose not to read these things, not be networked, and just go out and do it on your own,” he says. “But as long as you disseminate the info to create culture, growth and discussion, I’d say it’s for the better.”

Let’s hope so. Technology and the spread of information continue to influence the way adventurers approach the Bitterroots. And new guidebooks, like Missoula’s Climbing Guide and Big Sky Rock, Vol. 6, both due for publication by First Ascent Press this summer, will undoubtedly bring even more users to our fantastic and fragile backyard range. It’s something Lehrman’s acutely aware of.

“Maybe the time has come for the Bitterroot,” he says. “If it has, and the public decides it has, and the Forest Service decides it has, then I want a role in shaping it. And I want everyone else to have a role in shaping it, too.”

Montana Headwall

Page 54 May–July 2009

Top of the world CONTINUED FROM PAGE 35 remaining food. Clearly we’ve gone a bit overboard in our minimalism, and although ultralight is good, there’s a point of diminishing returns.

Fortunately, two of the trail workers near Red Meadow Lake merrily offer us beer at 10 a.m. We shrug, and chug.

Fortunately, the caloriedeficit bonk doesn’t hit until we reach the roads below, the same roads that will by the end of the day deliver us, filthy and famished, to the steaks and flowing taps of the Northern Lights Saloon in Polebridge.

But that’s still a long way off, and we still have hours astride the divide—the most spectacular stretch of ridgeline yet. Here we find a series of long and faint but rideable stretches linking cairn to cairn, high above a series of blue tarns rippling lightly in the breeze. Snow slivers cling to the scree slopes and hug the shorelines below. With temperatures nearing 70 degrees, gusty winds send a low patchwork of cumulus pillows scudding across the sky.

We begin our final descent just a few miles from the range’s southern terminus. With another day (and some food), we could ride all the way to Whitefish. Bob, Matthew and I agree that in our lifetimes of great cycling experiences, this ranks as one of the best.

50 50 Single-Malt

Scotches

Craft Beers

Whittling pack weights (including rack and pack) down to 15 pounds made this multi-day technical trip possible.

While the two of them roll away, I take one last look across the mountaintops, the pale blue sky stretching forever on all sides. We’d done it. I’d done it.

We’d spent three days up here in the great open, in the land of

mountain goats and golden eagles. I blow a kiss into the air and smile. If this is my last mountain bike ride up here, it’s a hell of a farewell—85 miles in three glorious days, directly on top of the world.

On-Tap

One Great Location

The route:

North Fork of the Flathead River Kintla Lake

Charge in and get your horn wet.

Trail Creek

Mt. Thompson-Seton

Glacier Route Seven

Whale Creek

Trail 26

Northfork Road Whale Lake

Trail 26

Polebridge h fis te hi W Di vid e

Whitefish Divide Trail #26 runs for 40-ish miles along the crest of the Whitefish Range immediately west of Glacier National Park. The best divide access from the north is via Whale Creek, though it is also possible to reach it on overgrown trails from Trail Creek. The Glacier View Ranger District Map is the best source for studying your options. The trail can be followed south toward Whitefish Mountain, and at trail’s end dirt roads will lead you to Whitefish itself. We exited at Coal Creek Road and looped back to our car near Ninko Cabin on Whale Creek. No permits are required, but don’t forget the bear spray.

Map by Joe Weston

158 Ryman Street Downtown Missoula 406/721-6061

Coal Creek Haines Pass

Montana Headwall

Page 55 May–July 2009

The Crux CONTINUED FROM PAGE 58 at because much of the time we stuck to the islands, figuring they were public domain, but even there we would hear the occasional pop. In those instances, the merry patter of gunfire would inspire Doug to reminisce about Vietnam, sending him into combat mode and creating in him a longing for a weapon of his own. Deprived of such an option, he would become a soundless blur, passing behind willow thickets and moving with such alacrity that I found it difficult to understand how his bag could fill with mushrooms when I never saw him stoop to pick them. When we arrived at the canoe, Andrea would have it ready to go, like the driver in a bank heist, and we’d be off to the next island.

In late May, we came across so many fawns that Doug and I

Montana Headwall

temporarily lost our Bambiphobia and fantasized about how tender and tasty they might be, tossed guts hide and all into a deep fat turkey fryer and served up on a bed of hot, buttered mushrooms— though Andrea’s icy gaze would soon return us to more eco-friendly topics, like chanterelle and boletus mushrooms.

We pursued those the year before, from late June through early September, dodging lightning strikes and slogging through marshes in the Gallatin Range. Up there, the gunfire had a slightly different ring to it.

Because we were in a national forest, we knew there was no irate landowner behind it and that it was most likely just some guy sighting in his rifle. But the accompanying splinter of twigs

Page 56 May–July 2009

in the pines above us offered little consolation, so we assumed a low profile between old firefighting berms while we rooted in the moss and stuffed our bags.

Chanterelles look something like orange circus peanut candy and are about the same color as the pieces of clay pigeons scattered around some of the most productive mushroom spots, so between the lightning strikes, the shooting, the splintering, the trenches, and the shattered orange targets, I sometimes figured it wasn’t much of a stretch for Doug to start thinking Tet. Once, he left Andrea and me rummaging through the duff after chanterelles and started briskly skirting the perimeter of the hillside, disappearing and reappearing like a phantom. I got a little concerned, but

Andrea (who always picked the most mushrooms) seemed to be taking it in stride.

“He okay?”

“Yeah.”

“He armed?”

“You can ask him. He’s right behind you.”

After I finished crapping myself, I noticed that he had crammed two bags full of boletes. By crammed, I mean four or five per bag. They’re huge.

“I think I got ’em all,” said Doug. “Let’s go, before that idiot shoots us.”

Now that I’m back in my truck here on the Gallatin, I can see a pickup out in the field near the fence where I was picking and wonder if the rancher is down there in the cottonwoods gunning for me. If so, I hope he doesn’t step on the fawn.

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Montana Headwall

Page 57 May–July 2009

by Greg Keeler

THE CRUX

Keeler’s heroes Under heavy fire, a misfit unit captures mongo ‘shrooms

I

’m pretty sure the gunfire is a coincidence, so I slip back through the fence and start bagging more grapefruit-sized morels. It’s too bad these springs feeding the Gallatin River aren’t below the high-water mark and in the public domain, since springs are where I usually find morels—dotting the glades between cottonwood deadfall like tan ostrich eggs.

I’m just about to lay my hands on one the size and shape of a human brain when I hear two more shots and hurl myself back through the fence, tearing my hip waders on a barb.

Hmmm, the shooting stops when I’m on the river side of the fence, then starts when I’m on the mondo morel side of the fence. Perhaps there is a connection. Perhaps I

clump of fat ones popping up by a lightning-fried stump, but I only make it half way because I’ve tripped over a fawn sleeping in the high grass. It looks up at me in horror with its huge Bambi eyes, my mojo fizzles, and I back apologetically toward the fence. I can handle a little gunfire, but I’d croak if I crippled a fawn.

Lugging my bags to the truck, I think back to last spring when I canoed for mushrooms on the Yellowstone with Doug and Andrea Peacock. We usually didn’t worry about getting shot

gunfire, but I’d croak if I crippled a fawn.”

“ I can handle a little

should quit while the quittin’s good.

Perhaps not.

Once again, I slip through the fence and make a mad dash for a

Continued on page 56

Greg Keeler

Montana Headwall

Page 59 May–July 2009