Helena and John's CDT trail work

We planned to journey through western Montana this summer, and John loves doing volunteer trail work on the Continental Divide Trail with the Montana Wilderness Association, so he signed up for a week helping on the trail at Green Mountain.  I'm always happy parking myself at an RV park for a week, catching up on things and training on local trails.  It was an excellent respite from an otherwise-whirlwind several weeks.

Side question - Am I trying to shove more stuff into less time this summer, or are we just not keeping up as well as we used to?  It feels like we dropped ourselves onto an already-moving train... I suspect it will return to "normal" eventually, one way or another!

Anyway, for several days I got to explore Helena and the area around it.  Nice small town, lots of runners and outdoor people, interesting history and good food.

And a capitol building (maybe I'll remember this for future reference, seems like the only way I can keep state capitals in my brain is to actually visit and take a picture of the building):

Lots of historic buildings interspersed with gold rush-related history:

One of my 2 Tesla sightings in Montana!  (side note - we've seen many more in Wyoming while driving around the National Parks and Jackson)

My version of experiencing the CDT - on a training hike with a weighted pack, going south from MacDonald Pass:

Thank you for the boardwalk, trail work people!

Wildflowers are blooming all over:

I saw very few actual CDT markers, so it was memorable when one did show up:

Inspiration for John...

A lovely viewpoint and a good place to turn around:

One of the more interesting gate latches I've seen, although it took some wrestling to get the horseshoe off the rail:

I got some great beta from John's friend Dave about the Helena hike/bike shuttle, so I hopped on early one morning to get dropped off at the other end of the Mount Helena Ridge Trail.  Most excellent!

It's a lovely trail and well-maintained by local mountain bikers:

Sometimes I just can't think of a caption... or an explanation...

Heading into pine forest:

Top of Mount Helena:

With a great view of town just below:

The next set of photos is courtesy of John during his trail work week.  I always enjoy getting some perspective on what he experienced.

They use ponies and mules to pack in the group food, kitchen, and gathering tent (volunteers carry their own camping gear).  Always neat to see what the horses are capable of:

View from camp - quite lovely:

Training on hanging food to keep it away from bears:

Bill the cook and Sonny the trip leader preparing a meal:

John didn't take a lot of pictures of the actual work being done, I suspect because he was always in the middle of the actual doing of the work.  They took a faint old trail and made it solid and beautiful (and much less confusing):

John climbed to the top of Green Mountain several times for some wonderful Montana views:

Interesting rock and lichen patterns:

Rock outcroppings and more views:

Fun colors and shapes:

Not quite sure what happened here:

Fire-induced log patterns:

John's tent at the work camp:

Beautiful sunset in the mountains:

Forget-me-nots (or so John tells me):

Black and white and a bit of green coming back after a fire:

I love this shadow photo:

John saw a grizzly bear and its cub!  From about 200 meters away - and happily, John was on a ledge watching them below and the bears never noticed him.  This is a decent (only slightly cropped) photo of mamma bear:

Even more amazing, after the bears went out of sight John heard something scream and then a deer took off running with the grizzly chasing it.  Soon they were gone, no telling how that hunt ended up.  WOW!

Back to pretty wildflowers:

Interesting ridge patterns on a rock - John is quite observant:

Height perspective for a tall cairn:

Where does John keep finding these neat rocks?

Thanks for the great pictures, John!

On the morning that they hiked out, I parked the truck at their return point and ran a loop over to Alice Creek trailhead to see some of the wilderness they had been working in.  A view of the rocks John had been standing on a couple days before:

It's a lovely morning to run in the Helena National Forest carrying bear spray:

Following the Lewis and Clark trail:

Only one day before (and many years after) Captain Lewis came through this exact spot:

On to the CDT, through a small burn area and heading toward Green Mountain:

Cairn and CDT marker all in one:

Hello husband!  Great to see you!

The guys pointed back down the trail to their handiwork, so I did a test run on it and took a couple photos - very nice:

Yep, it's a real trail now:

They also built a couple cairns at the far end to ensure that everyone in the future can find it after crossing an open field.  Nice cairn, John!

Following the crew down the side of the mountain:

Well done, Mr. Trail Man!