Saturday, July 08, 2006

When everybody keeps retreating
But you can't seem to get enough
Let my love open the door

Duder just got out of the backcountry.

I am sitting here with one WILL DANGER.

We are nursing blisters, watching Pulp Fiction and generally recovering from the experience.

And what an experience it was...

For serial, the Beartooth Wilderness is Fucking Insane.

The whole time, it felt like we were in Middle Earth, and I kept looking for hobbits.

Also, we were only on a trail the first day and the very end of the last day.

The rest of the time, were were scratching our heads, looking at huge fucking mountains and saying, "I think we go over that ridgeline, and then drop down the next drainage.... but I am not entirely sure."

Total bushwhacking. Except we were climbing boulders, scrambling down cliffs, guessing our location, second-guessing, stopping to fish, and laughing, laughing, laughing.

My water filter broke, so we hiked 20 (twenty) miles yesterday to get out of the backcountry and back to our car. With 45 pound packs, by the by. But pimpin' ain't easy.

It was, um, arduous.

Adventure!

And pain.

It was seriously incredible though.

We stayed for two days at a place called Cloverleaf Lakes.

Oh. My. God.

Dios Mios.

It was three intrelocking lakes, like a clover (duh), and it was at about 10,000 feet.

We pulled cutthroat trout after cuttthroat trout out of those lakes and interlocking streams.

It was enough to make you forget about everything and everyone and all the bullshit in your life.

I am in the process of uploading pictures.

P.S. Did that Pearl Jam video work? 1500 friggin' people clicked here since I posted it and nobody told me. Fuckers.

P.P.S. Will Danger and I decided to do some fishing today. We drove through Yellowstone and up Paradise Valley. The Yellowstone was muddy, so we drove up a tributary called Six Mile Creek.

It was tough, gnarly country.

We caught a few brook trout.

On our way out, we were driving down this narrow gravel road, and, boom.

There was a huge fucking grizzly bear standing in the road.

He turned and took a look at us, and then started running down the road.

Hauling ass.

We came around a bend, and there he was, again, listening for us, and looking at us, thinking, "Fuckin' A. I can't shake these guys."

Then he took off, up this steep mountainside, the likes of which would cause a human to huff and puff and slip like an idiot.

But, no.

Duder the bear ran up it like it was nothing.

P.P.P.S. It was super cool. I'm still kind of jazzed about it, nine hours later.

P.P.P.P.S. The bums will always lose, Lebowski.

P.P.P.P.P.S. The first night in the Beartooths, this mountain goat came into camp. We were just hanging out. So was the goat. She circled around our campsite, again and again. The next friggin' morning, she brought all her friends. There were 13 (thirteen) mountain goats, walking around our campsite, jockeying for position. They were pawing up the ground where we had peed, and eating the dirt.

No shit.

Thirteen friggin' mountain goats.

Big ones, little ones, all doing this dominant/submissive thing, trying to get at the pee.

One little guy, maybe a year old, got poked in the butt by another goat and jumped straight into the air, all four feet, just bang, straight up, like two feet in the air.

Damn those things are athletic.

Pictures will follow.

But anyway, despite a bit of a scare and the most difficult hike of my life, here I am, back in Bozeman, hanging with Will Danger.

Serial.

It was infuckingcredible.


P.P.P.P.P.P.S.


See you around.