a day hike on the Mary Mountain Trail in Hayden Valley in Yellowstone
The Mary Mountain trail is long, long, long.
You need a shuttle to hike the 20 miles one way and I didn’t have that, so I decided to hike in the area of Hayden Valley (the east side), go in a few miles and turn around. I planned to hike ten miles up to Mary Lake, but “something” happened that cut that short. I heard that the west side is mostly forested, that doesn’t appeal to me, specially hiking alone.
This is one of those trails that the park service recommends people hike in groups due to bear activity, so please be aware of that. I am an idiot, so I hiked it alone.
I started at 8:30 am to make sure I could see the area with my binoculars in case there were bears in the area. Within one mile, for the first time in my life I heard wolves howling in the forest to my left (I was beyond excited):
I was beyond excited about the wolves and now that I know more, I should have stayed there and possibly the wolves would have left the forest and give me a view of them.
The trail hugs the “north” side of the valley and keeps close to the hills, so you are not hiking in the middle of Hayden Valley. That is safe because the valley at some times will be full of bison and their “companions” and you dont want to be in the middle of that mess. Alum Creek is the “boundary” for the trail, so it creates a barrier between the trail and the valley.
This big boy was blocking the trail and I have to take a detour from the trail to give him space.
And here comes the “something” part ……………….. I was at about miles 3 in when I saw two hikers up in a hill, stopped. I reached then and guy tells me that the trail is lost. I tell them that I have the trail on my GPS and it is there. At that point, you have to cross Violet Creek (I think that it the name of the creek). So we go together looking for a place to cross the warm creek without getting wet.
We cross it and then notice the trail going up a hill. I see a deviation on my GPS but I decide to ignore it; I do see a trail, so that must be it.
We go up and then I leave them behind. Go up a hill, go down and then in the distance (half a mile?) I see a black bear going into the trees with my binocular. I descend the hill and cross another creek and the trail is gone, gone, gone.
I take another look at my GPS and I am now way off the path. I realized that these people distracted me and we followed an animal trail. I decided that I needed to bushwhack back to the trail instead of backtracking. And that is what I did, up a hike, down a hill, up a hill, down a hill to a creek, cross the creek and finally getting back on trail. That detour took time and reduced the possibility of getting to the lake.
At some point, my knee started to hurt going down hills and I reached an area where it looked I was going to have to up in a forest (and therefore down on the way back). I noticed a lone bison, small in size; when it saw me it ran away. This fellow was prime wolf meat and he knew it, unlike his bigger cousins it ran from anything that got close, including me.
So I turned around.
On the way back the skies started getting gray with nearby forest fires. I could make some bison herds further into the valley.
Hayden Valley is immense and you need binoculars to reach the places where the bison congregate in numbers.
There are areas (now that I was coming back on the proper trail) that are wet since there is more creek space there.
Since this took hike in the fall, I enjoyed nice colors in the bushes. The video has barely any color due to the smoke, so I edited the pics to reflect the nice colors.
Gorgeous !
I loved this hike and I want to do it again. Now, there are thermal areas in there so going off trail could be a problem, but going further into the valley is so appealing. I need to do extensive research and see if what is better: going all the way to the lake or going off trail into Hayden Valley.
Of note, people park their cars on the pullouts that have a view of Hayden Valley and just spend hours looking for bears and wolves.
Again, this trail is for groups of people. There is a large wolf and bear population in Hayden Valley.