"The Bob"

We made it! 7 days, 100 miles through a one million acre wilderness. After hitching to Maria's Pass on Highway 2 we headed in on ATV roads. Did countless stream crossing and met some real old montana cowboys, all smiles and six-shooters. Then we saw no one for almost 2 days. We hike through huge hauntingly beautiful burn areas and dense lodgepole pile tree tunnels. The amount of water in this place was astounding and following rivers to streams to springs on passes and then down streams to more rivers did nothing to lessen the mystery of this ecosystem. Only one wrong turn and backtrack and not too bad of one at that. The rest was averging 15 mile days and hanging a bear bag before last light. We took a dip in Dean Lake, an aquamarine alpine cirque with pebble beaches. Just as we we geting out two guys on horseback and two geologists came out of the trees. After that we met an outfitter from a large trail ride group at our campsite next to My Lake. Day six was The Chinese Wall, the main attraction of the Bob Marshall Wilderness, and rightly so. Here the divide is a massive cliff face with the trail following along its base and above its huge valley drainages. We spent so long gawking at this amazing feature that we left ourselves only three hours to do the nearly nine miles to our next campsite. Before we made a run for it we met Nate and Dave, two backpackers driving crosscountry. We broke out our food bags and swapped a few items. The day out to Benchmark was full of people as we passed mule train after mule train and a large Forest Service crew. We made it out to the trailhead and our feet touched gravel road for the first time in a week. After camping by the airstrip and watching a helicopter land and take off. we hiked down the road to the Wilderness Ranch where we recieved our kickbox and extra goodies courtesy of Nick's family, thanks so much! We talked with Shelley and she poured us some green Kool-Aid but informed us that her husband had just left for Augusta 15 minutes before we got there. So we took our big box and sat out in the scarce shade by the road, reading and snacking for a few hours until Wally picked us up. he was out exploring where his father had built roads with the WPA in the thirties and had a brouchure from 1932. He took us as far as the lake and, after teaching us a bit about fly-fishing said if we were still around when he was done he'd take us into town, ...we were. So here we are in Augusta with the dry plains all aroud and jagged mountains on the horizon. We ate at the Buckhorn Bar, a unique place and watched Obama on Fox News at Wagons West Motel. Tired but happy, and amazed by all we've come through, we are plotting our course through the Scapegoat. Talk to you in Lincoln. -Alex