Part Fourteen

     June 15 - 19                        Helena, MT/Helena NF                        (Go to Pt 1)
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We checked into a ‘rustic’, motel on the west side of town right around dusk and stood under a hot shower for the first time in three weeks.  After that revival, we wandered down to the nearby steakhouse to feed our insatiable appetites with a ‘game-on’ feast that included Montana sized steaks with all the fixings and cherry pie a-la-mode.  ​

The next morning we emptied and cleaned out our packs, then threw the winter clothes and equipment that we no longer needed, including the now, completely exhausted Bear Paws, back in the packs and started our hike around Helena, heading for the Post Office first.

Our supplies for the next leg had been boxed up in St. Louis by my Dad and sent to the Helena Post Office for general delivery pick-up.  Until we got to the Post Office, we didn’t know if the boxes would be there or not.

​Fortunately, our resupply stock had arrived and we unboxed the contents in the parking lot, loading everything into our packs and reusing the boxes for the clothes and equipment that needed to be sent back.  Then we headed for the laundromat. 

Click on map to enlarge

We had next to nothing in the way of clothes, beyond what we were wearing, so we loitered about the laundromat in our long-johns while the rest of our stuff went through the cycle. The final stop on our walk-about was the grocery store where we were going to have to address the failed, freeze dried dinner experiment.  

​In the end, there was no way around going without heavy, canned foods as the only other viable option.  Once back at the motel, we reorganized our stuff and packed the bags with a week’s worth of provisions for the next stretch to Butte. ​

Camp at Kading along the Little Bigfoot River (click on photo to enlarge)

We got a quick ride out of town the next morning and took a random track down from Highway 12 at MacDonald Pass into Renig Gulch.  Down at the streambed we picked up another muddy, two-rut track that took us down the gulch and out to the Little Bigfoot River where 11 miles of dirt road brought us to camp along the river at Kading.

​During the afternoon we had been pestered by mosquitoes but when we went to make camp at Kading the 

bloodsuckers swarmed in large, bug-clouds and I was suddenly as desperate to get the tent up as if I were standing butt-naked in a howling snowstorm.  The peckers were so bad that I finally had to pull out my rain coat for some protection while we hustled to get the tent’s pegs secured and us out of the scrum

The next morning we continued up the valley on a trail that grew fainter as we went and by the time we reached the boggy marshlands of Bigfoot Meadows the trail was long gone.  With a lot of body english we did what we could to make ourselves light on our feet as we bog-sloshed our way across the marsh-meadows to the far side. Once out of the wetlands we were confronted with a dense, stunted forest infested with brittle, stab-jabber branches.

​We timber-bashed our way through until we finally started to climb up out of the valley and, hard as this was to believe, the forest actually grew thicker as we climbed.  Fighting against the vicious branches and deadfall for every yard of higher terrain gained, we eventually reached level ground, indicating the top of 

Kip Rusk in the upper part of Little Bigfoot Meadows.

the ridge, or so we figured.  Shorts and t-shirts had offered scant protection against the forest’s claws and we were both a scratched up mess with blood smeared gouges mixed with sweat and dirt slashed across our lower legs and forearms. ​

Craig Dunn in the woods during our wrong-turn, misadventure.

We dropped our packs and pulled out the map and compass to try and get a bearing on our location but it was futile in this thicket of trees to see any of the terrain.  We checked the compass bearing and, depending where on the ridge we were, our compass reading might have us heading in the right direction, assuming we were actually on the ridgeline, none of which we knew for certain.

We were standing in a small, gap-like pass and as I looked around I started to notice the faint traces of a trail bearing to the west. We had to get out of this forest to where we could get a view of the terrain and maybe this ghost trail would get us there, so we started tracking the trail through the woods.  

The terrain sprawled and undulated in imperceptible ways and the dry, scraggily, pine woods effectively obscured navigational views.  There were unmarked, unused trails that wandered intermittently through the forest but the pine-needled path we were following maintained the ridge so we stuck with it. 

I was out front and we were moving across this terrain pretty fast, so I leaned on my not-yet-seasoned ‘gut-feeling’ as to whether this path was taking us the right direction or not and at this particular moment my gut-feeling was quite comfortable with following the trail, heading along the Continental Divide, or so I had it convincingly pictured in my head.

The path improved as we progressed along the ridgeline and we were hell-on-fire, burning up the first several miles effortlessly.  Compared to the previous six weeks, our packs were light as day sacks, our legs were now in powerful shape and this terrain was easy.  

​As such, we were in full-throttle mode when two hours later the forest thinned out, the trail ended and the ridge suddenly dropped away into a vast, arid valley and situated several miles out in the valley was a town, a fairly good sized town.  And in no way should we be seeing any vast valleys and definitely no towns.  So, WTF now?!

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Go to Part 15

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The CDTC was founded in 2012 by volunteers and recreationists hoping to provide a unified voice for the CDT. Working hand-in-hand with the U.S. Forest Service and other federal land management agencies, the CDTC is a non-profit partner supporting stewardship of the CDT. The mission of the CDTC is to complete, promote and protect the Continental Divide National Scenic Trail, a world-class national resource. For more information, please visit continentaldividetrail.org.

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