Yellowstone continues to be a place of unexpected incidents making national news. Two notable ones include the car that crashed into a thermal pond, and the unrelated steam explosion at Biscuit Bay. While I was not directly involved in either of those responses, as I was working in the clinic both times, my colleagues responded and we reviewed them during our weekly emergency services training. Fortunately, the injuries from the vehicle crash were relatively minor and thank God that no one was killed or injured during the steam explosion. Both of these could have been much worse. The greatest lesson of spending extended time living in and around Yellowstone is that the entire area is alive and changing each day. The beauty is that we get to experience this amazing environment as visitors and staff, but a healthy respect is absolutely required of all.
My friend Dennis had a last-minute conflict having to post-pone his trip, and I suddenly found myself with 4 days off with no agenda. Polling my clinic friends…the recommendation was to make a trip to Glacier National Park. In almost no time I had a campground booked and a plan of approach from the east entrance. Twenty-four hours later I was on my way to Glacier. I did my best to avoid the usual highways and took the route less traveled through several of the national forests between Yellowstone and Glacier. I arrived at the east entrance to a small crowd of tourists, a friendly watercraft inspection crew who gave my kayak a green light to use on the waterways and started on the Going-to-the-Sun Road westward. What an exceptional experience to drive the road and see the amazing topography of Glacier with the many rock layers, steep ravines, and engineering marvel of the road itself (built in the late 1920’s and early 1930’s). After 3-4 hours of travel, I arrived at my campground near the west entrance and right on the shore of Lake McDonald. I was greeted by a friendly campsite host volunteer and camp neighbor who was quite familiar with the region and provided many tips on places to explore. The sunset was glorious and the kayaking on the lake in the early morning was amazing. Afterward I ventured further north-west from Glacier to Flathead National Forest to off-road on the advice of my camp neighbor. I explored many miles of trails up and down the mountains along the US/Canadian border before turning south toward Kalispell to camp for the night. The next day I plotted an “avoid highway” route back toward Yellowstone through more national forest lands and on several off-road trails. It was fun to spend time in a new place and see the grandeur of all that Montana has to offer.
The up-coming week has me working in the clinic for 5 days then off for 5 days and I have an adventure planned into Idaho. I’ll be headed to the Salmon-Challis National Forest for a few days to explore and travel the trails to the west of Yellowstone. Until next time…be well and thanks for following along.
