2017 Yellowstone Backpacking Highlights: The Lamar, Part 1

Our 2017 Lamar Backcountry trek will go down in the books as perhaps the greatest trip for wildlife viewing in the 39 year history of Big Wild Adventures! OK, there was that trip in the Gros Ventre Wilderness in 2010 that was also extraordinary, and included a mule deer chasing a wolf. But for sheer numbers and big mammal biomass, this one took the cake.

First, let’s understand that this guided Yellowstone hiking trek covers not just the upper Lamar River back country, but also some high tributaries of the Lamar plus a mountain pass and a long walk through the spectacular Pelican Valley on the last day. The first day is mostly through wide open country, and on the 2017 trek, we saw literally hundreds of bison and a couple dozen pronghorn “antelope”, as we backpacked through country that is sometimes called the “Serengeti of North America”.  A great start! The next two days in the upper Lamar were in a mostly forested part of the valley, with occasional big meadows and of course, the beautiful Lamar River. Wildlife sightings fell off a bit, to a few mule deer and bison, plus plenty of bird life. Just those sightings would have been above average for most entire backpack trips in western North America! Toward the end of day four, a one mile-long meadow ended at our designated campsite. But wait. A very large male grizzly blocked our route, grazing in the meadow about 300 yards away. He was between our 8 person group (6 clients plus myself and c0-guide Jesse Ford) and camp!

Moreover, 3 young Californians were at the campsite adjacent to the lower part of the meadow, close to where we stood watching the Griz. Understandably, these three Yellowstone backpackers were not too enthusiastic about camping by themselves next to the meadow that Ursus arctos horribilis was utilizing for food. So Jesse and I invited them to join us; thus our group went from 8 to 11, a very safe group size for camping next to a grizzly. But we still had to get past the bear. And thunderstorms were approaching. So we carefully slipped around him as he furiously grazed the meadow, watching us all the way, once standing up on his hind legs for a better view, but intent on gorging himself while showing no aggressive behavior toward this large mass of human protoplasm. Once camped, we enjoyed further views of this huge griz (one of the biggest I’d ever seen) in the meadow, and we also enjoyed a close visit by a coyote who avoided the bear but had no interest in altering his route to put distance between himself and our camp.

When we awoke in the morning, the grizzly was gone, but certainly not forgotten!

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