Photos of Yellowstone Sepulchre Mountain Hike 6/09/09

Hiked up Sepulchre Mountain, elevation 9,900 feet yesterday with my friend Roger. Great hike, about twelve miles total. Left Ammon at six am, were in the park by eight and were home by ten.

More Bruce Becker Photos

As mentioned in my previous post, Bruce Becker is a professional photographer and outdoorsman who lives in Idaho Falls. I teach at the same school as his wife Lisa. Bruce is a master artist with his camera, and I'm lucky enough to be on his mailing list. Every time he goes out and shoots photos, he sends me some via email.

Anyone who loves the West, the Tetons and Yellowstone in particular, would do well to buy some of his prints. I plan to get a large version of the Lupine Meadows photo in the near future.

Here are some more shots. Check out Bruce's entire portfolio at http://myweb.cableone.net/tetonphoto/default.html

All photos are copyrighted and I hope I don't get sued for using them.

Enjoy! The Idaho Wildflowers montage we have hanging on the wall in our bedroom. Double-click on images to super-size.

All I have to do is look at these photos to remember why I love living here.

Old Faithful Inn--A National Treasure

Bruce Becker, an excellent photographer and the husband of a teacher at my school, took this shot at Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone Park, just a short drive from Idaho Falls. The Inn, built back in the early years of the Twentieth Century, is one of the crown jewels of the National Park system. The interior architecture in the great hall consists entirely of native trees and rock. It must be seen to be believed. Bruce has come close to capturing the majesty of this old inn with this shot.

He writes: "I was messing around with photoshop this morning. The attached image is the combination of over a dozen seperate images. The final shows the lobby of the Old Faithful Inn."

Bruce has a website where you can see all his photos. A gallery of Bruce's outdoor photos are found here: http://myweb.cableone.net/tetonphoto/portmain.html

My favorite Becker shot is below, shot of a field of Lupines below the Grand Tetons, also only eighty miles from Idaho Falls.

A Few More Yellowstone Pictures

The map above shows our approximate hiking route in red.

My friend Roger had a much better digital than I did on our hike across the Central Yellowstone Plateau on Wednesday. He has a 12X Optical Zoom versus my 4X Digital Zoom, and consequently his pictures are better. Here is a second set of Yellowstone photos, taken by Roger Gottlob, fellow educator and future professional photographer, for your viewing pleasure.A black wolf trots nonchalently across a meadow on the eastern side of Mary Mountain. We watched him for about five minutes. He saw us, but was unconcerned by our presence. This wolf was about the size of an over-sized German Shepherd.

At the isolated patrol cabin, Mary's Lake. Heather Gottlob, Roger Gottlob, me.

A landscape shot in the Hayden Valley, showing the massive herd of buffalo we encountered on the way down. We had to detour to the left around a ridge to get past them.

Some people follow directions when asked to pose for a photo. Some do not.

On a ridge overlooking the Hayden Valley, the hiker is back in the good graces of his patient photographer.

A young Grizzly noses for grubs in a meadow at the extreme west end of the Hayden Valley. This grizzly was completely unfazed by human beings. Still, we kept a healthy distance.

Yellowstone Hike Pictures

My friend Roger, his daughter Heather, and I left Idaho Falls at five a.m. this morning, arriving in Yellowstone at the Mary Mountain Trailhead about 7:30. We traversed the empty center of the Park, from an area not far from Old Faithful to an area over by Canyon, a hike of slightly over 21 miles. We finished at a little before eight this evening. We had a friend pick us up and take us the 35-40 miles back to our car at the other end, then drove home, arriving in Idaho Falls about 11:45 p.m. Long day, but fun.


On the hike, we encountered not a single other human being. We saw a large wolf at a distance of about 75 yards (I don't have a photo because I don't have a telephoto, but will add one of Roger's when I get it), several Great Blue Herons, Idaho's state bird--The Mountain Bluebird, too many bison to count, a grizzly bear, eagles, osprey, and much more.

A lone bison walks along a ridge in the remote Hayden Valley of Yellowstone. We saw four or five hundred bison, and on four or five occasions had to make rather inconvenient detours around them, as they use the same trails.Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce Tribe used this same trail to attempt their daring escape from the United States back in the 1870's. About eight miles into the hike, we came upon this old sign denoting an incident on that long march. Only forty miles from Canada, Joseph and his tribe were captured by the US Army. Joseph then said "As the sun now stands, I will fight no more forever".For much of the year, Yellowstone is a harsh place for its animals. We saw dozens of skeletons and bones on the hike. This bone is next to the shoreline of Mary's Lake, about halfway along the 20-mile trail. Much of the water along this trail is not potable, due to the thermal features. We brought our carbon filters and filtered water from the lake.



The day started out cool, then got warm and sunny. By mid-afternoon, we got the usual afternoon thunderstorm, with fantastic lightning and plenty of rain. This picture was taken looking up through lodgepole pine on the way up Mary's Mountain.

Evidence of bear activity is frequent. This is a prime grizzly bear habitat and we noted many signs of recent grizzly use. The photo above shows a grizzly scratching post, the side of a lodgepole pine, with claw marks visible. Roger's hand is to left for size.

Another sign of a recent grizzly on the trail--a huge pawprint indented in the dried mud at our feet. This is my fairly large hand at left to show the incredible size of these magnificent animals.

Hey, there's one now! We saw this at the bottom of the trail near the very end of the day. It is a young Grizzly, maybe several years old, walking across a sage meadow looking for grubs. I do not have a telephoto, so this is the rough distance from us, though it has been cropped.An afternoon thunderstorm growls across the Hayden Valley. Several spouts of rain can be seen cascading to the earth in center and right. If you look just left and below center of photo, you can see part of a herd of roughly 150 bison that we watched as we passed.

This rather stringy-looking hiker used to throw the discus, and to this day, he cannot pass by a buffalo chip without picking it up and flinging it into the stratosphere, a behavior his hiking companions invariably find somewhat disturbing.

Hiking Central Yellowstone Park Tomorrow

Tomorrow morning at five a.m. my friend Roger and his daughter are going to pick me up to drive to Yellowstone Park. We will be hiking the 21-mile Mary Mountain Trail across the center of Yellowstone Park. One of Roger's friends will pick us up at the far end and take us back to Roger's car.

Should be a fun, but long and probably somewhat tiring hike. It will be the first big test of my knee since surgery in March. I've logged about 200 miles jogging since then but no hikes of this distance.

I'll take lots of photos and post the best ones on this blog on Wednesday, assuming we don't become bear bait.

Here is a brief description of the trail from the Park website:

"MARY MOUNTAIN TRAIL

Trailhead: North of Alum Creek pullout, 4 miles south of Canyon Junction

Distance: 21 miles one way

Level of Difficulty: Moderately strenuous if you do the entire hike in one day

Mary Mountain has two trailheads: the eastern trail (noted above) climbs gradually up over Mary Mountain and the park's Central Plateau to the Nez Perce trailhead between Madison and Old Faithful. Elk and bison can sometimes be seen in the distant meadows. The trail through Hayden Valley is often difficult to follow as bison regularly knock down the trail markers. The western trailhead is a few hundred feet north of the Nez Perce Creek pullout. Mary Mountain makes for a long day hike, and you will need to have a vehicle awaiting you at the opposite trailhead. For shorter day hikes, the trail affords good opportunity to walk as far as you wish and then turn back. Be aware that Mary Mountain trail traverses grizzly territory, so look for posted signs concerning grizzly activity.

Photo Above: Bison traverse a meadow near the western end of the Mary Mountain trail. (Photo by Bruce Gourley)