Beans on Tour

Writing from my sister-in-law Amy’s cabin doorstep, in Tetons National Park. Chilly toes and nose, but the morning sun is starting to rise high enough to reach me, so soon I should thaw. We are back in the mountains, beautiful big mountains. It has come as a wonderful relief. We arrived 2 nights ago, and rose early our first morning to head up Buck mountain. Nothing technically difficult, but a steep rise of over 5500ft, and a beautiful, exposed ridge climb/scramble. It has been over a year and a half since we last climbed regularly. We have been officially “taking a break”. It had become tiresome driving multiple hours to crags, and spending every weekend away from our home, most of our friends, and the beautiful hills/mountains surrounding Blacksburg (in which we could reach mountain biking trails by bike from our doorstep). We simply weren’t excited enough about it to be bothered. Over the past few months the need has slowly been growing inside me. And this brief taste of being up high, the early morning rise with cool mountain air, the exposure, and the buzz of it all, has us both so excited for our move to the Italian Alps next February. This route was a particularly nice welcome back, as we had the mountain totally to ourselves, apart from the bear and countless pikas that we met along the way.

It’s such a pleasure to be here with Amy and her boyfriend Adam. I look forward to a week hanging out with them in these beautiful surroundings. We have our tent set up in the woods behind their park cabin, from where we can hear the elk calling to each other as we lay down to sleep. Such a high pitched cry, it’s hard to imagine it coming from such a stocky animal.

Since our last blog entry we’ve spent a week in Missoula, Montana with friends who used to live in Blacksburg with us. It was a week of eating, drinking, catching up with friends and mountain biking in the beautiful mountains surrounding Missoula. Highlights for me included riding the long sweeping bike trails, flashing through the trees and out into high mountain meadows filled with tall grasses. A much smoother ride than in Blacksburg, with serpent-like trails weaving back and forth down the mountain. And hours of floating down the river lounging on old car wheel inner tubes. Tired mountain-biking-legs dangling in the water. And extended dinners with friends, when too many cooks managed not to spoil the broth.

Gina learning how to ride Mike’s motorbike.

On our way from Missoula to the Tetons we spent a weekend in Yellowstone National park, where we rapidly suffered from geyser and tourist overload. I wonder how the world is not completely saturated with photos of geysers and buffalo, with the rate that they were being taken by so many people. It’s funny how people enter a tourist zone, such as a state park, and immediately lose their brain, metamorphosing into a “touron”. Emergency stops in the middle of a busy road, to watch a deer in the woods, suddenly seem the right thing to do. Driving the wrong direction down one way roads, is okey dokey. Everybody turns into the next David Attenborough, approaching dangerous wild animals as if they were puppy dogs waiting for a treat.

Don’t get me wrong, Yellowstone is amazing. So beautiful and surreal, in a “we’ve just stepped into a prehistoric land” type way. Bubbling and exploding geysers all over the place, vibrantly coloured colonies of microorganisms covering the ground, magnificent waterfalls, and buffalo strolling along as if they own the joint (which of course they do). But Jeff and I were relieved to leave the herd of “tourons” behind, and head for the relative refuge of the Tetons.

Ahh, take a deep breath of that mountain air…

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Tags: amy, buck mtn., missoula, tetons, yellowstone

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009 at 5:40 pm and is filed under Travel, US of A Road Trip. You can follow any comments to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site.