This morning was miserable. My shorts were still soaked and so was everything outside. Even my food bag, hanging from a tree, was wet. Not only was it wet, it was really cold. I didn’t see any frost on the ground but that might be because there was just so much water everywhere.
Of course, the trail was still overgrown and my legs and feet got soaked again. I thought about putting on my rain pants but since they were in the mesh pocket outside of my pack yesterday they were also soaked. For the first few hours my feet were freezing and they got a fresh dose of ice cold water every time I brushed against a bush. It was misery. The one sorta highlight was when I saw a little black head pop up on the trail ahead. It was a young black bear and it immediately ran into the woods. That’s the kind of bear encounter I enjoy.
Luckily, the sun eventually came up above the mountains and the trail started to dry out. It was still pretty overgrown in a lot of places but at least it was overgrown with these.
That is a thimbleberry and it’s delicious. I just found out they were edible a couple weeks ago and am very happy to see them all over the trail right now.
The title of this post is two bears and I already described my first encounter. The second one was a little more exciting. (Sorta)
For part of the day I saw these big grizzly footprints, but they were going the opposite direction as me. We already missed each other. Then I started to see some big piles of bear poop. One of them looked pretty fresh and about 5 minutes later I hear a large crack behind me. This isn’t super uncommon in these large burn areas with downed trees everywhere, but then I heard more crashing and saw a big brown animal running uphill away from me. I didn’t get a great view, but I’m pretty sure I saw the big hump of a grizzly bounding through the woods. It also could have been an elk I guess.
This section of trail is famous for the blowdowns that cover the trail every year. The trail goes through huge burn areas and winter storms knock over a ton of trees. Southbound hikers hit this area long before trail crews can get to work and you hear tails of “Lucifer’s Lincoln logs” and 6 miles stretches that take a full day.
Northbound hikers panic and start looking for ways around the blowdowns and end up doing weird road walks and all kinds of stuff. All that was unnecessary because the trail was cleared! Mostly. There was just one mile of blowdowns left after the crew called it quits for the summer. It took me half an hour to make it over, under, and around the fallen trees in that mile. 10 extra minutes of work. Not even close to the worst blowdowns I’ve seen on the trail. There were so many thimbleberries I think that may have slowed me down more than the trees!
Before entering the park, you cross the divide on US Highway 2. Kinda cool to see a road I know would take me directly back home.
Across the highway the trail enters a well maintained trail system that connects to the national park. My app says I’m not in the park yet, but the signs seem like the kind you see in national parks.
The views certainly are the same as the ones you get in national parks.
I have about 7.5 miles to the town of East Glacier where I’ll rest for the day and then start the last 100 miles to Canada!!