Selway Bitterroot Wilderness - Day 1

My pack stood alone in the living room, filled to capacity but not overflowing. What had been a chaos of food and gear was now a single compact object, inanimate but bursting with potential. I had managed to pack ten days worth of provisions without going much over forty pounds, and I hoped that ten days would be enough to repeat Dave’s fourteen-day adventure. After six years of dreaming, and six months of preparation, all that remained was the final drive to the Selway River.

A well-worn paperback copy of “In the Shining Mountains” rested in the side pocket for easy access, even though I knew the words almost by heart. I had done my best to honor Dave’s intentions. I had no guide books or official trail maps, Dave’s book would be enough. I didn’t want to know anything about the area that Dave hadn’t also known. I had no GPS. I would cook all of my meals over wood fires. But I did bring a tent instead of a space blanket, and I hadn’t brought a gun, knowing that the area had likely been completely shot-out over the forty years since Dave was here. Now the time for philosophizing was finished. I lifted the pack onto my back, feeling the exact and true weight of my choices, nodded, and walked out the door.

The sun was already close to the western horizon when I rolled out of Missoula heading south. I drove fast, hoping to reach the Selway before nightfall. At Lolo I turned right and climbed towards the continental divide. Soon the houses and traffic were gone, leaving only dark trees and deer on the shoulder. I began to feel the size and weight of the Bitterroot wilderness. It would take me two hours of fast driving to cross the wilderness area from east to west, and I only had five days to hike across it from west to east.

For entertainment on the road I was listening to the second book of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and as I finally turned onto Selway Road the narrator finished the last chapter - leaving Frodo and Sam on the edge of their desperate trek into Mordor. A fitting sendoff, I thought. I had no ring to throw into Moose Lake, and western civilization did not hang in the balance, but still I felt kinship with their adventure. I parked in the first available campsite, crawled into the back of the car, and fell asleep.

Just after dawn I was awake, too restless with nervous energy to make a real breakfast or even brew coffee. I gnawed on trail mix and was at the ranger station by 7:30, the posted opening time. I imagined a hearty greeting, an offered cup of coffee, and a seat by the desk while we poured over maps and discussed the country. I puttered in my car for a few minutes, giving the ranger time to put the coffee on, then went to the door. It was locked.

By 8 I would have settled for instant coffee. Finally a man arrived in a big white truck, said hello, and went inside. After a polite interval I followed him in, disappointed when I couldn't detect any scent of coffee in the foyer. Still, he had information and so I went down my list of questions. Did he have a recent weather report? Rain coming. Where should I park my car? End of the road. With no more than twenty words he answered everything I asked. I felt somewhat let down by our conversation, but as I turned to go he called after me with the only unsolicited words of our time together.

"Be careful out there", he said.

That was more like it.

An hour later I pulled into a small dirt parking lot at the end of the road. It consisted of a ramp for unloading horses, an outhouse, and a few Forest Service pickup trucks dozing in the blazing sun. I backed my car in beside them, patted the steering wheel in gratitude, and pulled my pack from the back seat.  After days of car travel it was my turn to do the work.

I had two landmarks to find today: Dave’s swimming hole near the four-mile mark, and his first campsite around mile eight. Anticipation and excitement finally broke through the layers of preparation that had brought me here, and my pack felt feather-light as I buckled it on.

The only trail leaving the parking lot was no more than a dusty groove through knee-high brambles. It didn't seem right, but it was the only trail I could find so I started walking, expecting to hit a dead end. After five minutes I realized that I was on my way.

Trail #4 follows the north bank of the Selway river, heading east and upstream towards the continental divide. The river runs fast, sometimes smooth and quiet on a bed of cobbles, sometimes breaking out into wide stretches of chaotic roaring whitewater. The water is faintly green, nearly invisible when it isn't covered with waves and froth. The rocks on the bottom look close, but I was to learn later how deceiving this could be. Above the river, steep hillsides rise quickly into huge timbered ridges. On hillside traverses the trail is sunny and exposed, with few trees and dry rocky sand. When it turns into a drainage, the trees become dense, the trail muddy, and the underbrush nearly obscures the way.

At first I was spooked by the sections of poor visibility, expecting at any moment to bump into a bear coming the other way around a corner. When I couldn't see more than ten feet in front of me I started banging my hiking poles together to provide some warning. The first Forest Service employee I encountered seemed startled by my pole-banging. The second, twenty minutes later, also startled. When the third appeared, I resolved to stop making so much noise. For all that this was a wilderness trail, it seemed to be very busy.

Around the four-mile mark, the trail came close to a section of river where the current ran hard against the other bank, leaving a small sandy beach with tall boulders in slow current on this bank. I knew immediately that this was Dave's swimming hole. I leaned my pack against a tree and hung my sweat-soaked shirt over a bush. At the waters edge I stooped low and scooped cold water onto my face. It felt like the freshly melted snow that it was. The river was fast but quiet, almost peaceful in this section, and silence echoed across the canyon. Since crossing the wilderness boundary I hadn't seen any more people, and the feeling of being alone was growing in my chest.

I sat on shore and watched the river. Little waves surged up on the beach, lapping on the boulders and fading away. The current on the far side of the river tore past like cars on a highway, and when I looked away from the river the trees seemed to move upstream. Dave was here, Dave was here - the thought surged in my brain. "This is Dave's rock", I said out loud. I felt nothing. This spot did not belong to me, did not feel like the long-awaited place of legend that I hoped for. I sat a few minutes longer, thinking about why I was here. I could not expect to find him on this trail, emerging with a grin and a Rip Van Winkle beard from a hermit's cave. What was I really looking for?

Finally I put my boots back on, hoisted my pack onto my shoulders, and continued up the trail. The noon sun was a physical presence looming over my right shoulder. The heat was unbelievable. The miles seemed endless, but after a few hours I came out on a large timbered flat, lumpy with ground squirrel burrows. I could hear a good-sized creek running fast just beyond a screen of trees. I looked around and imagined Dave setting up his tarp and gathering firewood. I had come eight miles so far, and it did not take any imagination to know how nice it would be to camp here.

For a time I sat leaning against one of the large pines, trying to relax and slow down, still carrying the rush and hurry of civilization in my brain. It made sense to camp here, to give myself some time to adjust into the trip instead of charging ahead like schedules mattered. I was tempted, as Dave was, to find a place to settle for a week - to make a home in the wild. Build a day shelter, wash some already-smelly clothes, explore from there with a small pack. Spend my days glassing the slopes for animals. But it was still early, and I was too restless, so eventually I reloaded my pack and rejoined the trail.

All that long afternoon I worked my way upstream. The trail worked in and out of gullies and rose away from the river to avoid cliffs, but always it followed the Selway. When the trail rose, the constant roar of the river faded to a hum in my right ear. An osprey called as I came around an outcrop of rock, then flushed and swooped across the river.  The odors of the forest were strong here - warm pine needles, dung from pack horses, and the faintest trace of moisture coming from the river. The setting sun began to stretch my shadow out on the bushes in front of me, and the growing shade was a welcome change.

I caught a whiff of hot creosote before I noticed the source - a long bridge of heavy timbers and suspension cables crossing the river. It was the junction with Three Links Creek, where Dave spent his second night and started the side trip that would occupy him for the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth days of his adventure. The contrast between the main trail and the side trail was obvious. Where one was dusty, covered with the tracks of man and beast, the other was rocky, brushy, and overgrown as it worked its way up next to a rushing mountain creek.

Once again I was too restless to stop so I pressed on for another mile, but my heart was not in it and I set up my tent at the next marginally plausible camp site. All day I had felt driven by something outside myself, and I knew that wasn’t the right approach. I comforted myself by remembering Dave’s first day, when he also pushed too hard and set up camp late. We both knew the importance of matching the rhythm of the wild, but transitioning away from the strictures of civilization takes time.

This section of trail, although not heavily travelled by most standards, had not really felt like wilderness. But I remembered the “missing person” posters at the trailhead and knew that I should not get too comfortable. I planned to reach the Moose Creek ranger station tomorrow and hoped it would help me transition into wilderness mode. It felt strange to be hurrying towards the last remaining outpost of humanity, but beyond the station there was nothing but miles and miles of wilderness.

At twilight the waxing crescent moon showed itself briefly before following the sun behind the western hills. In my hurry to get started I hadn't checked the moon calendar, but now I knew that the moon would be a growing nighttime presence for the rest of my trip. Before I fell asleep, I raked a section of the trail smooth for six feet. If anything passed in the night, it would leave footprints in the sand and I would see evidence in the morning. With that, I closed my eyes and passed out.