The Joe Brown trailhead left one reminder which I found about three days later: a tick. I pulled it out of my hair while in the employee dining room at lunch. I was wearing my fleece that day for the first time since we went hiking, so there's not much question as to where it came from. Thankfully I got it before it bit me, so I promptly took it outside and set fire to it. This was my first tick ever - I suppose it had to happen sooner or later, right?
The next trail Nadia and I decided to tackle was the Black Canyon, formed by the Yellowstone River. The trail runs West-East just north of the Grand Loop Road in the park between Mammoth and Tower. We entered the trail through Blacktail Deer Creek, which is between 5 and 10 miles East of Mammoth. Our plan was to camp overnight on the trail, which we figured would be clear of snow since the temperatures had been in the 60s all week.
Now, that was the hypothetical plan. Here's what really happened:
We took off on Blacktail Deer Creek at about 10:30 AM, dodging piles of snow and keeping relatively dry feet for the first mile of the trail. Once we got to the top of the first hill (after about a half-mile wide meadow) we saw what we were in for: it was going to be a snowy day. The trail was soon entirely buried in snow, but undeterred by the drifts, we continued on. After all, it was a beautiful day, and two hawks seemed to be keeping tabs on us as they swooped above our heads riding the wind. We assumed we would just cross the creek at some point, and besides, the ranger said we wouldn't have to ford the Yellowstone because a suspension bridge awaited us at the junction. Furthermore, we both figured the snow would be melted on the northern side of the canyon, since it gets direct sunlight for nearly the entire day.
We kept hauling through the snow - one slow step after another. First it was ankle deep, with it occasionally reaching up to my calf. Then it was calf deep, rising in parts to my thigh. Before long we were up to our hips in snow, laboriously trying different routes around the snow drifts. For those of you that haven't experienced it - snow above your waist is completely impassable without snowshoes or skis or crawling on all fours in the snow. And with my overnight pack on my back, I certainly wasn't crawling. To make it worse, the beautiful weather during the week had caused the top half-inch of snow to turn into a crusty-ice layer that probably would have supported both of us had we been without our overnight packs. After about four hours of postholing, we decided to take a break and ring out our socks, gather our composure, and have a bit of a snack. The wind was whipping around at a constant 25 mph, and eating away at our faces, and the sun had punished us already for not bringing sunscreen.
It was decision time: continue on, or turn back and face another 2-3 hours of postholing (assuming that not having to break trail would speed up our return). When I posed this question to Nadia, her response was simply "Fuck that. We came this far, I'm not about to turn back now."
So on it was, around the bend which we assumed to be the Yellowstone River Trail. Unbeknownst to us, the trail actually cut back further than we went, not that we had an option. Before us was a meadow turned lake, with maybe a quarter mile left of bushwacking/postholing down to the river. I turned back to Nadia and told her "I'm going for it. If I can cross the river, we can get to the other side where there isn't snow (because that side of the valley had been exposed to the sun, while the side we were on was in the shadows all day). If you can't hear me when I get down there, one waving arm means we can cross, two means no." Onward I went, trudging down the hill, tripping over branches and fallen logs buried beneath the snow, and eventually through ankle-deep snow melt. But the good news was that the river was crossable with a bit of a hop and a skip, and dry land was ahead. I waved Nadia down from the hill, and onward we pressed, hoping to find a place to camp somewhere along the trail.
By this point we had lost hope of finding our reserved campsite, and were willing to settle for anything rock-free, snow-free, and with a place to hang our food. This was bear country, and grizzlies and black bears alike were coming out of hibernation with empty stomachs and an apetite that could kill. The only site we could find that suited our needs would have meant hanging our food directly above our tent pad, which was itself situated on a game trail. Probably not the best of ideas, since we had seen plenty of bear droppings on the trail. So onward we pushed, and before long, Gardiner was within sight, about three miles away - all of it downhill. I made a package of dehydrated chili, and we decided to keep moving to Gardiner. There was booze and a warm bed waiting for us at home - may as well take advantage of it, right?
So onward we pressed, down fields of snow and mud (because where there wasn't snow, there was certainly mud). Before long we met up with the Rescue Creek Trail, which has a bridge across the Yellowstone River, and leads right up to the road out of the park. We walked our way into Gardiner, and arrived at the Blue Goose (one of two bars in town, and the definite employee hangout) right at 9:30 PM - 11 hours after we set out. We covered approximately 15 miles that day including all of our sidetracks up and down hills, around cliffs, and across rivers. This was truly a tiring day, both physically and mentally - thankfully one of our coworkers came and picked us up from the Goose and drove us back to Mammoth. Nadia and I were both wind-chapped, and I had cuts on my shins from breaking through the ice. Would I do it again? Absolutely not! Do I regret it? Absolutely not!!! We saw two Sandhill Cranes, and heard a wolf howling, not to mention the birds of prey and countless elk.
That's enough for one post, but things to expect in the next post:
-Lava Creek
-5 bears
-Mammoth Hot Springs bushwacking
-A Bald Eagle
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