Post coming soon…
Spanish Peaks – Ennis to Big Sky
Tobacco Root Mountains – Whitehall to Ennis
Post coming soon…
Big Sky Alternate part 2
This is our rough draft of the second leg to Big Sky and eventually Yellowstone. Woohoo!
Birthday in Helena!
We made it back to Helena! And just in time for my birthday! Usually I would prefer spending my birthday on trail, but this time around I was just hoping for a relaxing town day for once. We ran around Helena and ended up downtown eating a delicious burger with beef fat potatoes, then we ran into Dragonsky, Lavender, and Jenga, some CDT friends we met in Glacier. It was awesome catching up with them for a moment!
Later in the day we met up with Pretzel and Snags (Martha and Trevor), the AT thru-hikers we met last time we were in Helena, and Pretzel offered to have us over for a birthday dinner. She made grilled salmon, grilled veggies, a grain salad with delicious lemon herb yogurt sauce, and a homemade carrot cake! We were going to rent Asteroid City and watch it on their big projector screen, but we ended up just hanging out on the deck talking trail and enjoying the cool evening weather until late in the evening. I wouldn’t have changed a thing, it was so good to spend more time with new wonderful friends.
A couple of days later we hiked through this little town called Mammoth on the Big Sky Alternate and managed to snag a nice campsite on a stretch of road full of first come first served sites. As I was waiting for my cold soaked ramen to be ready to eat, Smarts pulled a surprise out of his food bag. Instant cheesecake with cherry topping! I got to have a second birthday “cake” on trail thanks to the sweetest partner I could ever hope for. I don’t know what I’ve done to deserve such amazing people in my life, this was easily one of the best birthdays I’ve ever had. I’m a very lucky girl.
Starting the Big Sky Alternate
So we’re going to do it. We are taking the Big Sky cut off and heading straight for Yellowstone. We are not sure if we are going in via Mammoth or West Yellowstone, but we are pretty sure we have a route through Grand Teton National Park! We will figure out how to reconnect with the CDT south of the Tetons but before the Winds. This is exciting as f***!! Above (in red) is the first part of our route on the way to Big Sky.