Yellowstone to Dubois: Days 46-51

HD: I generally viewed this 100 mile section as just an administrative move between places — recovering from a double zero in Yellowstone, and getting ready for the Wind River Range. Surprisingly, this ended up as my favorite part of the trail thus far.

Before we get into all of that, I’ll explain my trail name. We were a couple of days north of Helena on the trail, in between water on a hot dry day, and our first cattle trough water source was coming up. This wasn’t just a dirty water trough like we will experience later in New Mexico. The Montana cow troughs are usually spring-fed with a PVC pipe that you can collect from. We passed a few hikers headed the other way who raved about the water source ahead; they said “just look for the herd of cows surrounding it”. We rounded a hilltop and there were the cows as expected. I walked up to the gaggle and… they were all eating a salt lick. So MC decided that I was a salt lick also, considering that my shirt with 2 weeks between washes had dozens of salt rings on it at the time.

The backcountry walk through the southern part of Yellowstone was enjoyable; flattish and with several geyser basins and geothermal features that few folks ever see. Exiting the park, the scenery changed to dramatic cliffs and large trees, with really solid trail conditions. MC and I have seen an increase in our daily mileage over the past few weeks; we hiked back-to-back 27 mile days with moderate elevation gain. We’re definitely hiking faster now, and 25 mile days have become the norm.

We spent an entire day hiking upstream in the Snake River valley. Although this is the same Snake River that built Hells Canyon in Idaho, the river where we are a late lunch on day 3 – only a few miles from its source – was ankle deep and 15 feet wide.

We forded many streams over these 5 days. These streams were wider and deeper than others that we have experienced, and it is always a shock to walk through a cold mountain stream knowing that your shoes and socks will remain wet for the next few hours.

After several weeks of hot and dry weather, we had highs in the 60s and lows near 40, with three days of rain. One of the rain-free days was the coldest for me; water from the night before was all over the willows and the tall grass as we hiked out in shorts and t-shirts. I threw a temper tantrum after shivering uncontrollably for an hour and finally put on most of my clothing. The Michigander amongst us fared far better, although I secretly believe that she was cold also. 

Wildlife was scarce after in the Bridger-Teton National Forest after a seemingly endless train of bison and elk in the Park. We did see several Blacktail deer, and minutes-old mom and cub grizzly tracks on day 3 (we could see her paw print wrinkles even though the day was windy).

Mamallama and Aunt Tina picked us on the highway where the trail crossed a pass and whisked us away to the small but impressive town of Dubois. The local food is very good here.

Tomorrow we begin our longest haul of the trip; 8 days and 168 miles through the much anticipated Wind River range. Every single northbound thru-hiker whom we meet raves about this section of the trail. We are excited and slightly intimidated with all of this. Hopefully it lives up to its reputation. On the other side of the Winds is the tiny town of Atlantic City (no casinos here…) where we will take a zero day before entering the desert-like area of the Great Basin. And then… Colorado!

MC: we always talk about how pretty the sections we hike are, but for this post I’d like to talk about a minor miracle that occurred everyday of the five day stretch we hiked…we had a privy to use each day at precisely the exact time we needed to use it. 

Now, not all privies are created equal but they get the job done nonetheless. Our first privy experience occurred as we were continuing our hike within Yellowstone National Park; we happened upon a trail head that was located right off the south entrance of the Yellowstone highway. Yellowstone has privies at every one of their trailheads because the park is so popular that it needs to make sure its visitors are able to use the facilities easily. However, we did not know we had a trailhead crossing in our future, so it was a lovely surprise. 

The second privy occurred as we were exiting the park and heading into the Teton National Forest; it was my first experience with an open air pit toilet. This may sound terrible at first, but in actuality, you don’t have any of the common terrible smells of the inclosed privies AND you get a view of the forest – best privy experience of the section.

The third privy was located next to an old abandoned cabin, and it too was an open air pit toilet, but as I stated above, not all privies are created equal, this one was pretty “shitty” haha it was not kept up and was really just a box with a toilet lid nailed to the top. Gross. 

Our final surprise privy experience occurred on the last day, when the trail happened to go through one of the prettiest National Forest Campgrounds we had ever seen, so naturally the campground had a privies for the residents, as well as trash cans (another huge find). We also met a man by the name of Dave who shared his starlink WiFi password with us as we ate breakfast next to the privy, minor trail magic that allowed us to communicate with Hannon’s mom, Jackie, the exact pin point location that she would be picking us up at later that day as we headed into the town of Dubois.

Up next is the Wind River Range, which is supposed to be the highlight of the trip due to its breathtaking mountains and views. We will have challenging elevation days, but we have allocated less miles per day than we are currently averaging (which is about 25) in order to combat the elevation. This is also our last section in grizzly country, woof, it’s been nine weeks with those creatures existence floating in the back our brains every time we walk. Anyways, on to Atlantic City, WY which will take us 8 days.