Before we get to the main topic of today’s post I need to add a postscript to yesterdays post. After I wrote it, we went (unsuccessfully) looking for wolves again, but when we got back to our campsite there was a mama bear and two cubs just across the creek from us!

What a great bonus to an already amazing day.

This morning we got up and headed to our wolf spot just down the road from our campground. It was cold and the rain was coming and there were no wolves to be seen. Our original plan was to do Hell Roaring and then do the trout lake hike in the afternoon, but the radar and the sky and our own senses were showing rain so we headed back to the camper to hunker down for a few hours.

At about 10:30 the rain stopped so we jumped in the truck and headed for Hell Roaring, a hike down to a suspension bridge followed by a hike back up. About a quarter mile into our hike we were totally shocked to encounter a black bear about 15 feet off the path just munching on berries! Of course we stopped and quietly watched for a few minutes (ignoring advice to make a lot of noise) after grabbing a couple of pictures we headed on our way keeping an eye in the rear view!

The hike down (about 500 feet) was pretty easy and the views were great!

Especially of this impressive gorge on the Yellowstone river.

By the time we were making our way back up to the trail head, the bear was gone, or at least not seen. We headed on our way to fill up with gas and go back to the camper for lunch. We had though about doing the trout lake trail, but I was against getting back in the truck and driving 15 miles to do another hike, so we compromised and went on the slough creek trail. It was a climb to start but very peaceful and nice. We happened up this pretty marshy area, both of us commented that there ought to be a moose standing in the middle.

I told Jane I’m going to stand here until a moose appears. And then this happened.

Thanks ChatGPT.

After the hike Jane said that she wanted to drive back to the Wolf spotting area. As a good husband I agreed, even though I thought it was a waste of time. A good husband knows to admit when he is wrong, and this is one of those times where I was clearly wrong. The wolves were out. Not very active, and they were about a mile and a half away. So even though our really nice spotting scope they just looked like black blobs laying around, until they got up and moved. That was impressive! There are at least five of them in this picture.

Here is a short clip (28 seconds) that should open in your browser Wolves in Action