hiking part of the long Specimen Ridge in Yellowstone
Specimen Ridge sits between the Yellowstone River and Lamar Valley. On the topo maps there are points when you can overlook both if you get off the established trail. If you continue to the end of the trail, you will arrive to the Lamar River. I was planning to hike a few miles in (about 7 or 8) and then turn around since I didnt have a shuttle and didn’t want to ford the Lamar River.
I learned about this trail by reading the Rick McIntyre books about wolves 8 and 21. I had to hike in that area to visualize the books.
You can also start the hike at the Yellowstone picnic area trail and hike along the Yellowstone River for a while, but the connection to the trail is steep and I decided against that. When I got to the trailhead, there were a few guys mounting horses to also go into the trail. I decided to wait for them and follow the horses. Couple hundred yards into the trail there is a large herd of bison (about 50) just resting around some trees. I was curious to see what would happen, which was the horses just walked within the bison like nothing and the bison did not care either. Me ………… well that was going to be another story.
I noticed a horny male so that told me that I would have to make a bigger detour than what I would normally do around these fellows. Well, halfway on my detour the herd decided to move down the valley. That day hundreds and hundreds of bison flooded the road and valley below. Once I passed the bison and gained some elevation I captured them going down to the road:
On, and this dude was there too:
The trail then goes behind a hill and you loose sight of the valley. You need to keep an eye for the markers since there are quite a few animal trails (bison) that look real and will take you away from the real trail. That part is step, so take it slowly.
Once at the top of that section, you are in the Specimen ridge and from then one you need to keep an eye for the trail markers since the trail is lost at some parts. There were a couple of markers down and when I put them back I could smell a perfume-type odor. I am thinking that was bison pee since they are the ones that put those posts down.
At some point I wanted to see if I could see Lamar Valley, so I left the trail and hiked up to the ridge on the left on the trail, up a hill that has a large black rock at the top. I was premature, I did see the road below but not Lamar Valley yet. I was realizing from the topo map that it would be obscured until I arrived to Lamar River and I was not going that far.
There is an area where you see a small forest to the right and further south a small valley where a few bison were resting.
For a moment I thought that was a good place for wolves to keep an eye on the bison herd, so I sat down and looked at the area for a while. I didn’t want to hike down there and disturb the wolves if they were there. You can see the bison herd at a distance:
A bit past the area I took this video, there was no one else there but a few antelopes on the ridge. This area is also known for wolves, but the only prey that was were those bison and antelopes and wolves will not catch up to those speedy antelopes.
At about mile seven, I turned around. Oh, the trail markers …………. I think the rangers collect elk antlers and then put them also around the markers.
On the way back I realized that I was going fast and early, so I detoured south to get close to the part of the ridge that overlooks the Yellowstone River.
I think it is well worth doing more miles but that would mean fording the Lamar River and that is a real river, I can’t figure that is something that people would do.
So when I was close to the trailhead and I was looking at some antelopes, I noticed some movement. This is the second of these dudes that I saw on my trip:
