So a bit of travel chaos ends in a beautiful day and and beautiful way to start back on the trail for the hikers! Montana does not disappoint. Great views. Great people. Great food.
After kicking around Helena for a day with the hikers, making sure they had everything they needed (yes, we found our way to another gear shop...) doing a bit of laundry, and packing up, we headed out in the morning for MacDonald Pass to drop them off for day 1 of their now-southbound CDT journey. If this day was any sign of things to come for them, it was a good sign!
And they were literally "there, with bells on!" as well as holstered bear spray. Best to be prepared. I'd spent enough time googling info about grizzly bears generally and what to do in a grizzly encounter that we had a little Q&A before they left to be sure everyone was prepared. Now, they might have been humoring me a little when they agreed to my suggestion that they practice drawing the bear spray from the holster every night before they settled in! I hope not, because I think this would be a good thing!! Don't you?!?
Now, I would really wouldn't want to have a close encounter with any bear, but I especially wouldn't want to have one with a grizzly bear! I was reading some article about bears and the author said something to the effect of "black bears can be aggressive when they have a good reason, but grizzlies can just be a-holes." That kind of summed it up, I thought. (Oh, I know, I know... They have their reasons, too. But still.)
Thankfully, Jamie (aka "Pork Rind" or "Chicarone", depending on who you talk to) and Bob (aka "Buck 50") had done their bear homework and passed my pop quiz!
So off they went!
Happy trails!
Comments