Crazy Horse

It's a beautiful blue sky day in the Black Hills of South Dakota, as I stand on the observation deck of the Crazy Horse Memorial, looking out at Thunderhead Mountain. This mountain of granite rock is being blasted, chiseled and carved, into a sculpture of the famous American Indian, named Crazy Horse, an Oglala Lakota warrior. There is a smaller scale model of the sculpture, of how the mountain will eventually look, that sits on the deck, and it's about 15 feet high, and a pure white color. The observation area and museum are very busy and the visitors are milling about looking at the view and the exhibits, but it's a different kind of crowd and they seemed quiet and respectful.

This project was the dream of sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski and his family, and it was started in 1948. This massive sculpture will depict the upper body of Crazy Horse, his arm pointing to the east and the head and neck of his horse, and will be 563 feet high and 641 feet long. In comparison the carvings of Presidents on Mount Rushmore are 60 foot tall. The face of Crazy Horse is now completed and it's 87 feet high, and work continues on blasting and forming the rock. The Crazy Horse sculpture is a work of geometry, of lines, circles, triangles and curves, which is constantly evolving. A work of art, on an immense scale.

I spot something moving on the mountain just to the side of where the horses head is being carved, and at first I thought it was one of the workers on the mountain but it wasn't. It was an animal with 4 hooves, two black colored horns and its a whitish color; a wild mountain goat. The mountain goat is oblivious to his surroundings and he turns in a circle and lays down, only interested in taking a nap, in the shade of the cliff face, that eventually be formed into the nose of a horse. This is a place of refuge, on these high cliffs, where over the eons the mountain goats have sought refuge. Crazy Horse would approve of the presence of these magnificent animals.

Crazy Horse was born in 1840 and was killed in 1877, while a prisoner of the U.S. Government. Crazy Horse was a famed warrior that fought many battles with great distinction, and was known as leader and strategist in battle and he fought in many of the most famous engagements across the West including the Wagon Box fight, Fetterman fight, Battle of the Rosebud and the Battle of the Little Big Horn. Crazy Horse fought for the Indian People and his tribe against the U.S Government, so save their way of life, their land and hunting grounds. His most famous encounter was with the 7^th Calvary at the battle of the Little Big Horn or the Battle of Greasy Grass Creek as the Indians called it.

General Custer and his command of 210 soldiers were attempting to flank the Indian Village along the Little Big Horn River, but they first had to find a ford and a way around the steep cut banks. Before that could be accomplished the Indians attacked their flank and pushed the soldiers back up the hills, where they fought a desperate last stand. Crazy Horse led a flanking assault, with a large group of warriors, at a place now called Custer Hill, which effectively ended the battle, and swept Custer and 210 troopers to their death.

Crazy Horse was very resolute in his determination to fight for his people, and their lands, even in the face of impossible odds, but he would never give up his fight, to keep the Black Hills. I see the Crazy Horse Memorial as more than a massive granite sculpture, but a permanent marker, a mountain of art and protest, a hard rock heap of determination, that the Tribes will not give up their struggle for the Black Hills. The eyes of Crazy Horse look out over the Black Hills, in a timeless gaze, watching over the creeks, meadows and ponderosa pine forests. A steadfast and stalwart lookout.

The shadow of a warrior on a horse, rides the pine forest late in the afternoon and wedges across the landscape, as the wind howls and curls around Thunderhead Mountain. The crackle and sound of footsteps in pine litter breaking sticks. I take one last look at the sculpted mountain, and stand it awe of the man, and the monument.

North Country Prairie

Photo Credit: Claranne Baddeley

The wind blows across the prairie of North Dakota and the grass sways in emerald green waves, like an incoming tide sweeping in off the ocean. The only sound is the wind and the chattering of red-winged black birds down in the slough and the chirping of gophers, Richardson's Ground Squirrel.

My wife Louise and I are staying at the Baddeley Ranch, which originally was owned by her parents, Hazel and Lloyd Swensrud. Louise and her sister Claranne were raised on the farm. Claranne and her husband Charlie recently purchased the ranch and are raising horses, angus cattle and longhorns. Louise, Hazel and myself are spending a few days at the ranch visiting.

The ranch is nestled behind two small rounded hills, on the rolling prairie of North Dakota. About 10,000 years ago, continental glaciers swept north over this region leaving a landscape of undulating hills, small lakes and ponds. The soils are generally deep and laced with sand, gravel and rock and scattered large boulders called erratics are quite prevalent. Glacial debris.

Claranne gave me a couple of pictures of the ranch and the first one shows longhorn cattle with the ranch buildings in the background, on the wide open prairie. The second picture shows Claranne's husband Charlie and their daughter Linea, on horseback. Linea is riding a horse named the Ragin' Cajun, with a saddle that was owned by her grandfather. Charlie is riding a horse named Gone Physco. In the foreground of the picture is an old horse drawn one-bottom plow that Hazel and Lloyd used for farming, many years ago.

The prairie grass has gotten off to a slow growth this year after a hard winter, with lots of snow, which will make for smaller hay crops. The small ponds and lakes are brim full of water, which will make for great nesting habitat for ducks, geese, swans, red-winged blackbirds and shorebirds. In the fall the adult birds and their young will take flight to more moderate climates.

The weather is king, in the north prairie country, and the seasons dominate the activities of the local residents. Summer brings hay cutting and tending of crops followed by fall which is harvest time for wheat and other crops. Winter seems endless with arctic like conditions of frozen ground and snow followed by the miracle of spring with the regrowth of the grasses, new calves on the range, and brand-new flocks of baby ducks. The timeless cadence of life on the prairie.

Mocassin Trails Under Hawk Shaddows

Growing up in Montana and living in the northwest, I often find my path crossing with the trails of the Lewis and Clark expedition. In 1805 the expedition traveled up the Missouri River, crossing the Continental divide and wintered on the Pacific Coast of Oregon. In 1806 they left the coast in the spring, working their way up the Columbia River and its drainage's, crossing back over the continental divide, then down the Missouri River and Yellowstone Rivers making their way back to St. Louis, Missouri. Their accomplishments were remarkable and they covered a huge geographical area with the help of their Indian Guides.

This summer we decided to follow a portion of the Lewis and Clark trail over Lemhi Pass, from Idaho into Montana. Leaving the paved road at Tendoy, Idaho, we turned onto a gravel road that follows Agency Creek. The road heads east and crosses the famous Lemhi Pass, about a 24 mile trip from pavement to pavement. The canyon is very narrow, lined with dense brush and cottonwood trees, and the water in the creek was running high, cold and clear. The lower end of the canyon is steep with open prairie.

About half way up the canyon we came to a Forest Service signpost that indicated the location of the first encampment in Idaho, for the expedition. On Monday August 12^th, 1805 Lewis and 3 of his men, in an advance party, traveled west over Lemhi Pass, and camped at that location. The continued their trek the next day, leaving Agency Creek following the Indian trail that climbed to the top of the main ridge to the south.

We continued our trip up the mountain on the narrow winding road. Silver sage dotted the green, grassy slopes and the north facing slopes became heavily forested with Douglas fir, lodgepole pine, spruce, and small stands of aspen. At the top we reached Lemhi Pass, which was fairly open with spectacular vistas in several directions.

At 7,373 feet Lemhi Pass is an ancient gateway, a hole in the mighty Bitterroot Range, the continental divide separating the waters of the Pacific from the waters of the Atlantic. This passage was well known to the Indian tribes and their well worn paths traversed this gap. Lemhi Pass is a convenient passageway through this region, and the boots of mountain man, pioneers and stagecoach wheels soon followed the moccasin traces, in the decades to come.

The Lewis and Clark expedition was overjoyed to reach the headwaters of the Missouri River after toiling for many months, towing, poling and rowing their canoes upstream. They had hoped to find an easy water passage by canoe to the Pacific, but what they saw looking out to the west from the top of Lemhi Pass was one snow capped mountain range after another. An endless archipelago of peaks and ridges. The only water route through this region to the waters of the Pacific was the Salmon River which was impassible by canoe or horse.

I heard the screech of a hawk and spotted two Red-Tailed Hawks flying in tandem directly over the pass, as if they were playing tag, darting back and forth, wingtip to wingtip. Perhaps it was a mother hawk teaching a young bird the finer arts of aerial acrobatics or a mate teasing its partner. The birds lingered over the high ridge, in a timeless ritual of gliding wings, propelled by thermal updrafts, against a hazy blue sky.

The paths of warriors and pioneers has long grown over by bunch grass and trees and only the gravel stage coach road remains, and the remembrance of explorers and hunters. The view from the pass was spectacular, with mountains in all directions, many of them snow capped, and shawled with forest. It was quiet with only the sound of the wind in the tree tops, and the birds at play. We didn't see a single person on our passage over the mountains, which was all the better as far as I was concerned. Lemhi Pass is a place I could linger for several days, in all its natural splendor. But like Lewis and Clark I have places to go, trails to conquer and journals to write.

Buffalo Trace on The Chinook Prairie

I have always enjoyed trekking the prairie of eastern Montana. On on particular trip I drove north of Chinook, Montana, towards the Canadian border. The medicine line. I had a map showing federal lands and I was searching for undisturbed prairie. A chunk of bunch grass wilderness.

The road bed was gravel and my car kicked up a plume of chalky colored dust. I found a wide spot in the road to park and headed out on foot across the flat prairie, on no particular path, intent on exploring and wandering. To the south, about 30 miles away, I could see the high peaks of the Bears Paw Mountains at 5,000 to 6,000 feet. The summits are scarfed with black patches of timber; douglas fir, subalpine fir and ponderosa pine and the creek bottoms are lined with wild rose, chokecherry, service berry and willow.

The prairie I was hiking was about 2,600 feet in elevation, on a level plain, with an occasional shallow drainage, most of them dry, and a few stock ponds and small lakes, that shelter ducks and shorebirds. The prairie looks flat but it's quite deceiving because there are hidden arroyos which you can't see until you get out and start hiking. I continued my trek, wandering towards the east and my truck was soon out of sight. The sky was a dark indigo blue color and cloudless, and it was a fine day to be out.

The prairie seems trackless but there are a many over grown trails of buffalo and elk, Indians, cowboys and whiskery runners. The prairie is dominated by grasses, typically, buffalo grass, grama, wheatgrass, and needlegrass and the home of mule deer, pronghorn, jackrabbit, prairie dogs, coyotes, fox, 13-lined ground squirrel, badgers, sage grouse, sharp-tailed grouse, and greater prairie chickens. Long gone are the buffalo, wolves and grizzlies.

It's so quiet on the high plains you can almost hear yourself think. The limitless horizon is daunting, and it seems to swallows you alive. Some find it lonely on the prairie but I find it exhilarating. Often the only noise is the rustling of wind across the dry stalks of bunch grass, and the occasional screeching of a Red-Tailed Hawk, "keeeeer keeeer". Or the whistling sound made by the wings of a brace of teal, flying low headed for scarce water.

A Horned Lark landed on a nearby perch, and stared at me, as if I am disturbing his peace or invading forbidden territory. The lark, in his bandido like outfit (minus the sombrero) looked directly into my eyes, warning me to flee his prairie empire. The Horned Lark has very unique coloration with black like horns, a dark mask and a conspicuous black breast band under the throat like a bandanna. The Lark lingered for a few minutes, giving me the evil eye, and I decided to move on, and end my intrusion on it's nesting territory.

At night the vast prairie of eastern Montana is wall to wall stars, planets and meteors. The Milky Way dominates the sky from horizon to horizon and northern lights often dance the sky shimmering, shaking, waning and waxing. The Indians have a belief that the northern lights are our ancestors, coming back to visit.

I walked slowly through the short grass and kept one eye to the ground, looking for interesting rocks or other objects. Much of northern Montana was glaciated by continental glaciers, leaving a wide diversity of rocks and minerals, in its wake.

I spotted something on the ground, out of the corner of my eye that looked odd. The object had a curved shape and it was a horn. I thought perhaps it was from a domestic cow but it was a horn from a buffalo. A trace of the ancient herds. The outside surface of the horn was badly eroded and flaked but it retained its shape and heft. I decided to keep the buffalo horn put it in my pack.

13 million buffalo, once roamed Montana. By 1883 buffalo had been exterminated by hide hunters with one of the last massacres occurring in northern Montana in the Sweetgrass Hills. A few remnant herds were protected in Yellowstone Park and on the Flathead Reservation and exist to this day.

I crossed a shallow ravine, crawling through thick brush, and a few hours later turned and headed back to the west, towards my truck. I hesitated because the terrain looked very unfamiliar with no distinguishing landmarks, except for the Bears Paw Mountains, way off to the south. I knew I had to hike in a westerly direction but I wasn't sure where my vehicle was. It was a warm summer day and I had plenty of time to find my way, and to scout new territory. Ahhh, the life of the high plains drifter.

Playing at the Bottom of Glacial Lake Missoula

I grew up in the small town of Pablo, Montana and as kids we played at the bottom of a lake, that was at one time, 2,000 feet deep. Covered by waters and glaciers. This huge inter mountain lake was an ice age relic, that disappeared about 13,000 years ago. Glacial Lake Missoula. Pablo is a small town in the Flathead Valley and is located directly adjacent to the Mission Range, a magnificent archipelago of alpine peaks and forests. Geologic research has shown that the massive Cordilleran ice sheet or glacier, covered even the highest peaks of the Mission Mountains, some 4,000 feet deep, as far south as the Pablo area.

The glaciers are mostly gone now except on some of the highest peaks of the Missions.

Glacial Lake Missoula was formed when the Cordilleran ice sheet moved south and blocked the Clarks Fork River near the Idaho border. A huge lake was formed behind the immense ice dam and its waters spread 200 miles to the east, with major lobes to the north and south. Lake Missoula at its peak covered 17,000 square miles, and inundated parts of several major river valleys including the Clearwater, Blackfoot, Clarks Fork, Bitterroot and the Flathead. Research has shown that this ice dam was breached by waters of Glacial Lake Missoula at least 40 times, creating huge floods the inundated eastern Washington and Oregon, following the Columbia River to the sea. This ancient lake and the ice sheets are long gone but a great deal of evidence was left in its wake, including Flathead Lake.

As kids we knew little about geography, but the traces of momentous geologic events was everywhere. Not that we cared as we were just interested in playing and exploring. There was a sandy area in our back yard and we dug pits, trenches, tunnels, piled up mounds and scraped shallow canyons. It was easy digging with nary a rock to be found. I remember many times digging furiously down through those soft layers, to see how deep I could go. The bottomless abyss. In reality my excavations probably never reached a depth of more than 4 or 5 feet, before supper interrupted mining operations. We were like a bunch of badgers rooting around and digging in the sand.

We constructed highways, bridges, tunnels, towns, forts, mountain ranges and canyons in the sand and raced our toy trucks and cars through a make believe world. These fine feats of engineering usually disappeared a few hours later, covered up by newer endeavours or simply stomped on or blown away by spurious winds.

This ocean of sand in the area around Pablo, was lain down by streams, rivers and floods from melting glacial ice or silt deposited at the bottom of lakes, which then drained away leaving a flat sandy plain.

Then there were the tunnels the older kids had dug, that were so narrow you had to belly crawl through them. These adits were dug horizontally in the soft sand and were about 8 feet below the surface, and 10-15 feet long. I was very fearful of venturing into those shafts and never lingered long in those dang, dark tombs. The soft walls and ceilings could have easily collapsed, snaring us permanently in glacial debris.

There were scattered ponds in the valley, that were formed during ancient glaciation, from huge chunks of ice left behind by retreating glaciers that melted, leaving permanent lakes. Sometimes called pot holes. The lakes and creeks abounded with fish, ducks, geese and shore birds and were a delight to explore and investigate. We plied these waters with our home made fishing poles, pursing devious cutthroat trout and in the winter dusted off our ice skates and spent many hours gliding and sliding on the thick ice.

In the winter we would snow sled at a place we called Big Mountain, after the ski hill up north at Whitefish. Our sledding hill was a series of small mounds which were probably glacial moraines; areas of rock and sand literally bulldozed up by ancient glaciers. The hills were heavily forested with dark green Ponderosa pine, and a couple of miles to the west, rose the foothills of the Mission Range.

The Mission Mountains shadowed over us with its towering peaks, ridges, glacial horns, cirque valleys and rushing clear water streams that roared down white water rapids. Glorious stands of pine and fir covered the mountains and parts of the valley floor and many a youthful expedition traversed the hidden glades and towering stands of yellow pine.

Cataclysmic geologic events sculpted the Flathead Valley and surrounding mountains and created a wondrous landscape and it was an incredible place to come of age. I probably still have glacial silt embedded in some of my toys that have survived my childhood and many fond memories of romping at the bottom of ancient lakes.

The Siberian Express Rolls Over Haystack Butte

The coldest winters I ever experienced, were in eastern Montana. One day in particular, back in the early 1980's, when I lived in Havre, Montana, the wind chill factor was 100 degrees F. below zero.

The winds were screaming that day and even inside a heated building you were cold, and a heavy sweater didn't help much. If you faced the wall your front was cold and your back was warm. Cold pressed into the walls like spears of glacial ice were about to stab through the building, and into your body.

The story of 100 F. below zero wind chill factor, was probably an exaggeration, but I suspect it wasn't far off. To obtain a wind chill of -100, the temperature has to be - 45 degrees or colder, with winds over 60 miles per hour. That combination is possible, on the high plains.

The Montanans call the big storms and cold fronts that roar in from Canada, the Siberian Express.

Another memorable freeze-out, was the time I climbed Crow Peak (9,300 feet elevation), in Montana, back in January of 1973. The main summit of Crow Peak is above timber line, with no trees except for a few gnarly patches of krummholz. In German krumm means “crooked, bent, or twisted” and holz means “wood”. The fierce winter gales, and extreme low temperatures of Montana winter, turn high elevation trees into stunted low growing shrubs, that take foothold in the lee side of large rocks, or low spots in the terrain. An arctic environment. The lower elevations are forested with lodgepole pine, aspen, spruce and limber pine.

Four of us snowshoed into Leslie Lake, at 8100 feet, and stayed two nights at an abandoned miners cabin, which was in disrepair but offered 4 walls and a roof and an old wood stove that was functional. I suspect that the cabin is long gone, crushed by deep winter snows or ambushed by avalanches. Or torn down by looters. We took a day trip and ascended Crow Peak, on snowshoes, and once on the summit the wind was screaming, and it was incredibly cold. A retreat was in order. I had taken off my snowshoes and when I attempted to strap them back on I was unable to, because my hands were so cold. Numb and almost useless. One of my friends luckily had nimble enough hands to help me buckle them back on and we were soon traversing our way back to the cabin.

A couple years later two of my friends decided to mount a winter expedition to Leslie Lake. On the return trip out they attempted to cross a steep and icy slope, and they were unable to kick footholds with their skis and snowshoes and every step they slid a few feet closer to the bottom of a gorge. Each slip brought them closer to trouble and calamity. Darkness bore down and they were forced to bivouac in the canyon bottom, in several feet of snow. In the seemingly endless arctic night of Montana they huddled and shivered together, in one sleeping bag. With frost bitten feet, they hiked out the next day to the trail head.

I checked out the statistics on the coldest place in the Rocky Mountains, and there were some surprises. The Western Region Climate Center has the statistics by State, for record values:
Record Lowest Recorded Temperatures (degrees F)
Alaska: -80 at Prospect Creek Camp
Colorado: -61 at Maybell
Idaho: - 60 at Island Park Dam
Montana: -70 at Rogers Pass
Utah: -69 at Peter's Sink
Wyoming: -66 at Riverside R.S.
Alberta, Canada: -78 at Fort Vermillion

There are probably other weather stations out there that are record holders, or near record holders, but never received credit, because the data was lost or never recorded. My friend Steve tells me that the Taylor Park weather station (10,410 feet) in Colorado, has registered two observations at -60 degrees. For many years the Taylor Park was a manual station, and often times in the winter the weather data was never recorded, because it involved someone slogging for many miles through deep snows and frigid temperatures. The Maybell station is the current record holder, in Colorado, for lowest temperature recorded, at -61.

The Taylor Park station holds one weather record for Colorado, for the longest number of days, with a temperature of <= 32 degrees, which was for 310 days. A krummholz kinda summer. Perhaps one day the big chill will occur and Taylor Park will trounce the Maybell record. If not the current second place record will be condemned to haunt the data vaults, in Stygian exile.

The record in Montana, for the longest number of days with a temperature of <=32 degrees, is 251 days, set by West Yellowstone station, at a whopping 6,668 feet elevation. Montana, you can do better.

The wind speed, as well as temperature, needs to be factored in when calculating wind chill (how cold it really feels). In reviewing the State records for average wind speed and and I figured Wyoming or Montana would have the highest average speeds. Wrong. Not even close. Colorado has two stations that top the record for the highest average annual wind speed with Monarch Pass at 19 mph (over 11,000 feet elevation) and La Veta pass at 16 mph at (9,400 feet elevation). Monarch Pass is an extremely cold place, but at least you can drop down into the trees or a canyon to escape the wind.

What does all this data really mean or prove? Its just a bunch of statistics generated by weather stations scattered here and there.

I think the coldest place in the world is near a small cone shaped mountain called Haystack Butte, in the Sweetgrass Hills, north of Chester Montana, out on the treeless Great Plains, which is just a few miles from the Canadian Border. A great norther or Siberian Express can work up quite a head of steam, with nary even a twig to slow it down, between northern Alberta and Montana. The first obstacle this glacial air mass encounters, once it crosses the border, is the Sweetgrass Hills, which it smashes into and breaks with great fury, like a monster wave hitting a huge rock on the Pacific coast.

Try finding a place out of the wind on the open prairie. Other than a local tavern which sometimes functions more like a mountaineers hut, than a watering hole.

So I will cast my lot with eastern Montana, being the coldest place in Rocky Mountains, with the high plains of Wyoming coming in second.

Wolves frolic in the shadow of Denali

My wife Louise and I explored Denali National Park, in Alaska, for 3 days, in early Sept. of 2003. The tourist pamphlets informed us we had less than a 20% chance of viewing the mountain, due to the frequent cloud cover and storms. Denali Peak at 20,320 feet tall, was clearly visible every day, beating the odds and defying the authorities. A few low dark clouds scudded across the hazy blue sky, and in direct contrast to the massive glaciers, snow fields, horns and craigs and the low lying tundra and taiga forest.

The base of the mountain is 2,000 feet elevation which grants the mountain 18,000 feet of vertical rise. The tallest peak in North America. The Athabascan's called Denali the Great One, which seems rather appropriate. It's a land of perpetual ice and snow.

Denali and the surrounding peaks loomed over us, even though we never came closer than 40 miles. It was hard to take my eyes off the great massif, with its massive glaciers, rock walls and a protective warren of smaller peaks. When you first view Denali, the surrounding glacial horns seem insignificant until you realize, many of them are well over 13,000 feet in elevation. The mountain dominates the land, and the sky, in every way. If I had to characterize Denali I would call her haughty, overbearing, arrogant, lordly, superior. But beautiful.

On the day we drove south, back to Anchorage, the wind was blowing up a hurricane on the highest peaks and ice and snow was being ripped off the highest points, migrating south, creating streamers of ice, some of which must have been many miles long. An airborne dune of shifting snow. If an airplane flew through these grainy ribbons of frost, I would imagine the paint being torn off the fuselage, followed by gale force winds ripping the plane to pieces. A mountaineer on those peaks would be hard pressed to survive that storm of howling, furious wind, and would be forced to make a hasty retreat.

The tundra and taiga at the lower elevations is vegetated with willows, birch, alder, currants, rose and dogwood, a colorful blend of red, orange and yellow. Many of the leaves had already blown away, and fall would soon recede to winter. Some of the stream courses were outlined by dark green spruce trees (20-30 feet in height) which stood tall over the shrubs. Scattered spruce trees dotted the tundra, in total disregard of symmetry and order.

I spotted two caribou, and one of them was an enormous bull. The caribou seemed to be wandering aimlessly, half hidden in cooperating willow, but about half and hour later, they formed up and loped to the east. The big horns in the lead. At another stop I heard a wolf howling in the distance, and scanning with my binoculars, located a wolf pack on a far ridge, in varied colors of black, white and gray. The wolves seemed to be quite engaged in meddlesome play and needless howling.

The first expedition to climb Denali Peak was on April 3rd, 1910, by a group of 4 miners. It's better known as the Sourdough Expedition. It is said they spent 3 months climbing the mountain, spending most of that time on rock and ice, with no other living plants or creatures to be seen, other than a wandering raven or two. As for me I will make no attempt to ascend Denali and will stake my claim to the taiga forest, in good company with caribou and willows. My Sourdough Expedition will be limited to cooking over a roaring campfire of dry spruce wood and climbing mountains, by hefting a pair of binoculars.