Big Creek Valley

Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness, Bitterroot National Forest, Montana

The plan: a quick trip in the Bitterroot to grab a summit and take advantage of the early warm weather in the valley. Like most plans it didn't pan out exactly as I had hoped. Recent rains and warm temps have sped up the snowmelt, but at the cost of high, fast water in the mountain creeks.

The flowers are taking advantage of the conditions and I saw more blooms of Wild Alberta Roses in 2 days than I have ever seen. They made the Big Creek valley really pretty.

Not to be outdone there were lots of other flowers blooming along the valley floor as well, but I have taken so many photos of flowers lately I thought I should give them a break. This wonderful Mountain Arnica was off by itself although it had lots of mates along sections of the trail.

I don't often find toads around the mountains, but this guy was taking a break near where I was exploring, nearly stepped on him. He was a lot bigger than I expected, almost 6 inches long just in the body. Last I saw of him, he was creeping along looking for lunch.

Once I was 7 to 8 miles up the valley the mountains started showing themselves. I was eager to get out of the valley bottom and head up to the summits. First I had to get past the lake at the head of this closed in valley.

When I got to where I wanted to cross the fast water it was just a bit more than I had bargend for. There would be no way to survive a slip down the falls so I looked around and then started looking for a good camp location for the night. About 2 miles down the valley near the south fork of Big Creek I found a great spot near a downed tree. Bugs were minimal so I opted to sleep out under the stars. Makes camp so easy to get set up.

On my way back to the truck on day 2 I found that aliens had invaded. The mushrooms sure looked like visitors from another planet anyhow.

I also ran across a mom grouse that wouldn't fly off and was making cooing noises. I knew there were little ones nearby...

…and I found 3 of them. But not wanting to upset mom more I just took a picture of the one furthest from her and quickly moved on down the trail to my truck and the road home.