West of Cody, WY Late April - Early May 2025 Backcountry Hiking Adventure

Since the beginning of 2022 through the end of 2024 I hit a disappointing dry spell of encountering any exceptional encounters with wildlife during my various backcountry hikes. The fall of 2024 I had spent 8 days of hiking around Cooke City, MT but due to the smoke from all the wildfires made a few days difficult to go hiking. One of the days I decided to drive over to Cody, WY since I had never been over there before. What prompted me to go over there was a discussion I had with one of the locals while having dinner at a Cooke City bar one evening. He had told me about how he encountered many Grizzlies during the year and that I should go drive around and check some areas around Sunlight Basin and North Absaroka Wilderness Areas.

The drive down HWY 212 to Crandall RD to Sunlight RD where it turns into Chief Joseph HWY going over Dead Indian Pass to Belfry HWY (120) was just amazing. After driving through Cody back up to North Absaroka Wilderness area along the SHOSHONE river I new I had to plan a adventure back out here late April / early May 2025.

My plan was to stay in Cody which was central to heading out to Sunlight RD, Bureau of Land Management (BLM) east of Cody where wild horses hang out, and heading about 45 west up into North Absaroka Wilderness. Using onX Backcountry maps I plotted out all the routes I would seek new adventures.

As normal I love the solitude of hiking the backcountry by myself where can become in-tune with the fabric of the local naturexxxxxx what is the term Tom. I had no idea how humbling / enriching this adventure would be.

Summary of experiences are:

  1. Becoming so in-tune with my environment leading to a surreal encounter with two Grizzlies.

  2. Encountering Moose, Black Bear, Grouse, Big Horn Sheep, and the Milky Way.

  3. Pushing myself to hike up some extreme steep climbs.

  4. Just sitting along side the SHOSHONE river listening to all the wildlife and the rushing waters of the river.

Overall, the experience with the Grizzlies was so surreal but yet so personally satisfying they never once took me as any threat. The trust I felt was just amazing. I realize some people will read my story and think I am out of my mind. Truth to be told, I am not afraid of any wildlife. My goal is to never present myself as any threat to them, disturb or disrupt any wildlife if possible but there are times when unexpected shit happens.

My Arrival

After flying into Bozeman, MT packing up the truck I rented I did my normal visit to Costco where I picked up supplies for two weeks. Then headed east on I-90 to Laurel, MT heading south (HWY 310) to Bridger, MT where I took MT 72 to Belfry, MT crossing over the Wyoming state line staying on WY 120 to Cody, WY.

Once I arrived at my hotel I unpacked preparing for the following days adventure. As I stated above, 3 key areas I wanted to venture out too, North Absaroka Wilderness, Sunlight Basin, and BLM. While out to dinner I wrestled with my gut feelings to which area I would focus on my first day out. My gut said go explore North Absaroka Wilderness area first as I had not been there before. As I went to bed I repeated in my head to eliminate all the noise from work and life and focus on synchronizing with nature (full on situational awareness) being prepared for whatever unexpected situations I would come across. That critical mental preparation would pay off beyond my dreams!

day one - North Absaroka Wilderness

It was Wednesday, April 30 where I woke up at 4:00 AM local time and was out the door by 5:00 AM (first light started around 4:45 AM). Luckily for me being my first time driving at this time heading west of Cody on North Fork HWY I had enough light to see many pockets of Elk and Deer along the road grazing on the ranchers cattle grazing land for the first 25 miles. Even thought the speed limit was 65 mph for the first 25 miles then dropping down to 50 mph I never went above 45 mph. The number of times where I had to slow down for Elk or Deer crossing the road was somewhat stressful.

As I left the ranchers grazing fields which funneled into the SHOSHONE river canyon area I would stop at several different trailheads just to check them out before proceeding to North Absaroka Wilderness trailhead. Once I made it to the trailhead parking (9:30 AM) I noticed the weather was changing where I could see darker clouds in the distance coming over the mountain range just west of me. Before heading out I made sure I had all the right gear as you never know what to expect in the high country.

The goal of the day was to just go out an explore to observe and gain a better understanding of the landscape and habitat. Once I climbed up to the first high spot overlooking the SHOSHONE river (heading north) I came across wolf tracks, Mountain Lion track, and Grizzly track on the trail ( it had rained the previous Monday). From what I could see the tracks were likely from Monday evening or early Tuesday as the mud on the train had hardened.

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While hiking I started to repeat to myself “eliminate all the noise from work and life, focus on synchronizing with nature”. The sounds of the birds, the smells, the sounds of the river below, predator tracks, and the approaching dark clouds retuned my mind into full on situational awareness of the environment I was in. Then I hit a fork in the train where one branch lead to the river below and the other headed up the mountain. I decided to head up the mountain to maintain a better visual of the full river valley. After crossing several creeks I noticed the trail was becoming much more slippery when I came across my first snow drift. Because the temperature was still around 30 degrees I was not too worried yet as I could still walk on top of the snow. Then as I went higher the density of the forest became very dense with larger areas of snow drifts with the slope becoming steeper. Knowing that once the sun reach its high point of the day the snow would soften up making it very difficult to cross on such steep slopes. I looked at my Garmin where it said only 2 miles in. Being on the causes side I decided to turn around and head back. As I hit the fork in the trail I noticed there was a game trail heading directly above me. So I decided to hike up it to a point where I could get a really nice view of the river valley looking north.

All of a sudden I could hear a group of Raven’s squawking very loud below me towards the river. Based on many past experiences hearing that kind of squawking meant they were on a carcass. I pulled out my mono-scope look down below me when I saw between the tops of the pine trees what looked like a Raven standing on an Elk floating down the river. I quickly climbed a bit higher where I could get a better view. I couldn’t believe it, yes it was an Elk floating down the river. I knew right away this meant only one thing. The dead Elk would end out on the river bank eventually and I needed to get down there as soon as possible. At this point I was about 700 ft above the river where it took me about an hour to transverse my way south to the rivers edge.

As I flowed the rivers edge I could hear the sound of the Raven’s getting louder and louder when I can around a bend and saw the Elk up on a very rocky bank of the river. My first thought was how did it get up there but after closer visual exspection through my 600 mm lens I could see the side of the Elk rib cage and been opened up. A Grizzly must of pulled up on the bank but where was it? Then I noticed several Bald Eagles circling overhead. I’m always amazed how news of a fresh animal carcass travels fast amongst the preditor community.