After planning it for over a year, on August 15th we left on the biggest expedition ever for Troop 24 - an 11 day backpacking trip in the Bridger Wilderness in the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming. It's close to a thousand miles to the trailhead, near Pinedale, Wyoming and it would take us two long days of driving to get there. Because we were planning to drive to about the middle of Idaho on the first day, we gathered at the Community Club at 5:00 AM to get an early start. At about 6 o'clock our little caravan of four cars with 15 people and all the gear and food for an 11 day backpacking trip left the Community Club in good spirits.

The Gray Ghost with Wobbly Wheel
Blocks Entrance to Church Parking Lot

On the way over Snoqualamie Pass, there was an omnious bang under the car, but as all seemed to be working well, I continued on to our first rendezvous at the town of Cle Elum. After leaving the freeway at the Cle Elum exit, a frightening chatter and grinding noise came from under the car. I came to a stop blocking the entrance to the parking lot of a Seventh Day Adventist Church.

A little investigating found that the right front tire was just about ready to fall off due to a missing nut on the stabilzing arm. We were really lucky that the wheel hadn't come off when we were coming down from the pass at 70mph. Some of the guys were worried about blocking the entrance to the church lot, but I said "Don't worry, it's Saturday not Sunday. At the time I didn't realize that the Seventh Day Adventists had their services on Saturday

What was maddening was that I had just taken the car in and had the front suspension worked on in order to prevent what had just happened. In their haste the car place had not tightened the nut that holds the stabilizing arm in place so we were stuck in Cle Elem.

Luckilly we were able to find a muffler shop that was open and had our car towed there. While we were waiting for the tow truck, Cars began to show up and people all dressed up in suits and ties and "Sunday" finery began to gather for a Saturday morning service. The pastor came out and asked why we were parked there. I told him we were a bunch of boy scouts on our way for a backpacking trip to Wyoming and our misfortune in getting stuck. He offered to have a collection taken up to see us on our way and that they would pray for us, but I told him that we didn't need a collection and thanked him for his concern. We were really glad when the tow truck came.

A couple of "good old boys" were manning the shop that morning and they soon found out that they didn't have the right nut. None of the other wrecking yards or auto parts stores had one in stock either. Finally they found a wrecking yard in Ellensburg had an older Toyota that might have a nut of the same size. but we would have to hustle because Cle Elum's Pioneer Days Celebration was shutting everything down at noon. so Charlie and I hustled out to Ellensburg and back to make the deadline.

Driving like hell, we got back with about 10 minutes to spare only to find that Bill Peckinpaugh had found the right sized nut in a hardware store in town and that the car had been fixed about five minutes after we left. It wasn't until about one o'clock after having lunch that we were able to hit the road again - so much for our early start.

It was a long and uneventful drive through central Washington and then into Eastern Oregon. One of our cars had a little overheating problems but as dusk was falling we pulled off the highway to camp for the night at Farewell Bend State Park near the Idaho Border, well short of our goal of Glenn's Ferry Idaho.

The Former Farewell Bend Truck Stop
"You Can Check out, But You Can Never Leave"

Farewell Bend is named for the spot where the Oregon Trail leaves the Snake River before it descends into Hells Canyon. After setting up our tents just before it was completely dark, we had our supper at the Farewell Bend Truck Stop restaurant. Talk about God-Awful. A lot of us ordered steak, which turned out to be inedible. Most of the meals were left on the table.

A few of the boys looked in the bar, and shook their heads at the clientele. If there is an asshole in the universe, the Farewell Bend Truck Stop comes close to fitting the bill. Fortunately, it has been closed for several years now. It had the vibe of the Eagle's Hotel California, "You can check out, but you can never leave".

In the morning (or ever), none of us wanted to return to the truck stop so we headed east and made our stop for breakfast at a Denny's in Ontario, Oregon just before the Idaho border.

Idaho was pretty boring and we lost count of how many times we crossed the Snake River. When we hit Idaho Falls we left the Interstate and headed east towards Wyoming.

Idaho Falls is an interesting town that looks as if it hasn't changed much since the 1950's. Soon after leaving Idaho Falls, the scenery becomes more interesting as we head into the mountains. As we go into Wyoming, the pines and quaking aspens along the road cheer us all up.

Palmdale Campground (Google 2007)
Now Closed

The closer we get to the turn off towards Jackson Hole, the more tourist traffic we hit. Along our old friend the Snake, we drove into the first of many Wyoming thunderstorms that we would experience just about every day we were in Wyoming. And like all the others, it wasn't long until the sun was shining again.

We pulled into Pinedale at about 5 pm and got set up at our campsite at the Pinedale Campground. We set up our tents in the grassy field. There wasn't much to recommend it but they did have hot showers. We were glad that we weren't one of the many people in campers and trailers that were making the place their home for the summer.

We had hoped to get into Pinedale early in the afternoon in order to get all our gear together so we could get an early start on our first day on the trail but our brakedown in Cle Elum had made that impossible. We were glad that the driving was over in any event.

McGregor's Pub - Best Steak Ever
(Gone Forever but Not Forgotten)

We broke up into groups for dinner. In 1988 I had one of the best dinners I had ever had at a restaurant in Pinedale called McGregor's Pub, so I wanted to go back there again. I talked Charlie Walker, Bill Peckinpaugh, Andrew, Kyle, and Peter to go with me.

Although We had to wait to get seated, it was worth it. It was expensive but we all could remember that dinner the whole time we had to eat freeze dried food in the next 10 days.

It was raining when we got up the next morning so we just rolled out of bed and headed out to eat. We had breakfast at Stockman's Restaurant, which I feel has gone downhill somewhat since the last time I had been there in 1988. But you can't screw breakfast up too much and we were full when we got done.

One of the things we had hoped to get done the previous day, was to get our fishing licenses all squared away but due to the lateness of our arrival that wasn't possible. Getting 15 licenses takes quite a bit of time and our group filled the small Great Outdoor Shop This shop although small has just about every conceivable hiking or backpacking item as well as a large selection of fishing equipment. The arms race in fishing gear continued as a lot of us bought last minute additions to our lures in the hopes of finding that one lure that would guarantee success.

When we got back to camp, the rain had stopped and the sun had come out and we were able to sort our gear out in dry conditions which was a help. When we left the campground, Adam was driving and managed to back into just about the only tree in the campground. We could hear Greg yelling at his son and the rest of us got a good laugh out of it.

Willow Cr Trailhead - Start of Hike

Our plan was to drive to the Willow Creek Trailhead and drop our gear after which two cars would return to Pinedale and go on to the Elkhart Park trailhead to leave one car for when we came out. The remaining car would then go back to Willow Creek with all four drivers.

The Willow Creek road goes through sagebrush country and we made our way past bunches of cattle grazing on the open range. There were also several herds of pronghorn antelopes along the road. Unfortunately, the condition of the road deteriorated after the turnoff for the last ranch was passed.

At a rough spot in the road, Charlie refused to go any further. He said that Bill could wreck his 15 year old POS car but he wasn't wrecking his. So to avoid breaking an axle or scraping an oil pan so we decided that Bill P.'s four wheel drive and Bill M.'s Camry would go on to the trailhead and that Peckinpaugh's SUV would be used to shuttle all the gear and people from Charlie's and Greg's cars to the trailhead.

When everything was at the trailhead, then all the cars would go to Elkhart Park. The three passenger cars would be left at Elkhart Park and Bill P.'s SUV would return to the Willow Creek trailhead with all 4 drivers. Because of the time needed to make several trips to transfer the gear and the long shuttle to and from Elkhart Park we weren't ready to hit the trail until 4:30 in the afternoon.

The parking area at the trailhead has sagebrush on one side of the road and pine trees on the other. The trail takes off through the pines and begins climbing immediately. Due to the amount of food needed for an eleven day trip, our packs were very heavilly loaded and we took a well needed break about every 20 minutes.

Break Along Trail - Day 1

As we made our way up the steep trail, the clouds began to cover the sky. Just as we made our way onto the top of the ridge near Big Flattop Mountain it began to rain. Taking shelter amidst the trees at the edge of the meadows of Indian Park, we waited out the worst of the rain.

After the rain let up, we took off up the trail when we all heard the wails of a large group of coyotes. Greg and Adam at the end of the line saw them crossing Indian Park.

Just before the junction with the Bluff Cr. Trail a large bolt of lightening hit the ridge just in front of us. We pulled up and took a break as shown in the above photo.

First Night's Campsite

Just as fast as the storm came up, it was gone again and the skies showed evidence of clearing. We hoisted our packs on and quickly passed the junction of the Bluff Creek trail which appeared to be much more heavilly used than our trail. The Bluff Creek trail is the access to the high country used by the Lozier Ranch for their pack trips for tourists and hunters.

Just beyond the junction, the trail rounds a ridge top and begins a gradual descent to Bluff Park Creek. It was getting late and it was apparent that we would not make our desired destination of Section Corner lake so we began looking for the first possible camp spot that we could find. As we descended the hill we came upon a bench with a level spot and a fire ring near a small stream. The spot also had a good view out over the valley. We set up camp and by the time we were cooking dinner it was almost completely dark.

I never like to wash dishes in the dark but there wasn't much we could do about it. We got a good fire going and had a good time discussing our plans for the following day. Just before we hit the sack, we noticed some strange lights to the south. At first we thought it was a forest fire, but it soon became apparent that it wasn't.

There were a large number of faint stationary lights and a few bright lights that changed in brightness and shape as well as position. UFO's came to mind. We couldn't find any explanation and when we got up in the morning, there was nothing there but a ridge with trees on it. Who knows?