It is Saturday morning January 24, 2015; the reality of what has happened is beginning to sink in. Almost 81 hours ago, I arrived back in Helena, Montana with the Continental Divide trip almost surely canceled. This morning for the first time, I felt the slam of what that really implies. A huge sense of loss is welling up inside of me, awful to bear, and seemingly with no relief to come from any direction.
On April 29, 2008, after 1.5 months I completed approximately 150 miles of travel in the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness. Within days, I began to wonder what was next while realizing the trip had demonstrated that my days of winter expedition trips were numbered. My eyes soon fell upon the Continental Divide. By the end of May, I had penciled in the initial route to travel 990 miles along the Continental Divide between Yellowstone National Park and the Canadian border on the northern edge of Glacier National Park.
About 13 months later, I began writing about the Selway-Bitterroot experience. In another year, I had my freshly completed first manuscript and a realization that I needed to take action where the Continental Divide trip was concerned. I could only hope I was not too late. In the early days of September 2010, I began to make plans for a tough strength and endurance-training regimen during the following winter, coupled with the need to research an area of the Continental Divide inside Glacier National Park near the Canadian border, which was supposed to be undoable in winter conditions. I began with three autumn reconnaissance trips. In just over one month ending near the end of the second week of October, I traveled in the backcountry for 17 days.
A little more than 3 ½ months later, I began the first winter trip on the eastern side of Glacier National Park. The date was February 2, 2011, and a La Niña weather phenomenon was strangling the high country of Glacier, with huge snowstorms lining up behind each other. In another 3 ½ months, now near the end of May, I exited the park for the final time, successful at accessing the previously stated inaccessible Hole in the Wall area of the park. I did not realize at the time that I would be writing a book about the four trips, particularly the final trip, 16 days in length, which had nearly taken my life twice, not including the near misses of roaring and camp shaking avalanches. At the time I had no idea of the toll that last trip had wrested from me.
In May 2013, with my second written manuscript now in the hands of a publisher, I broached the subject of the Continental Divide winter trip to my wife. The detailed planning for the 990-mile winter trip began.
So it is that after eight days on the route, and now with one week remaining in January 2015, and nearly 7 years after I began the preliminary plans, I have canceled the trip. Among other reasons, I have waited too long and my age now says no. This morning the heavy reality is nearly suffocating. My chest feels a great weight upon it. Simultaneously there is a sense of loss in purpose and an emptiness. The mourning has begun, although no doubt for more than just the trip. I believe a new chapter has started; the autumn phase of my life has begun in earnestness.
I’m saddened that your vision and all it’s planning are not coming to fruition. My hope is that your other collective expeditions will inspire others. You certainly have inspired me to experience the parts of Montana that I am capable of and I encourage others to do the same through the active example of my day-hiking group.
Me too Don. Perhaps not all is lost. There are numerous resupplies in some very spicy areas, which I can take advantage of this winter. One of them is the Henrys Lake Mountains, where technical gear will be necessary, and is already on location with a resupply. Another area is the entire southern Bitterroot Range. Any one of these trips is worth writing about afterwards.
Sorry to hear your plans are not coming together. I am really enjoying your book, the trips you have done are very inspiring. Glad I had a chance to meet you near Blair Lake.
I am glad if you are enjoying my book Shawn. I still have it in my mind to pay a visit this winter area where you and I met. A few other locations in mine as well. Stay tuned with the going ons of the next 90 days.