We left the mountains after a week in the Wind River Range near Pinedale, Wyoming. Our backpacking trip was great, but we were definitely ready to be finished (and shower!) when it was over. We spent five nights in the woods, and did a boulder climb on the second-to-last day, and got an awesome view of the Cirque of the Towers at the top of the climb. Bethany was just about leading the way the entire day, up the hill and back down again, and I was just struggling to keep up. It was a great experience and we got some good pictures at the top. We didn't take a ton of pictures during the week, but we got a bunch of the bouldering day. We both benefited tremendously from having spent two weeks hiking at high altitude before the trip started and as other people on the trip were adjusting to the altitude the first two days, we found ourselves firmly at the front of the "fast group" of the hike.

Unfortunately, we weren't as prepared for the mosquitos as we were for the altitude. We did not prepare ourselves for the swarms of mosquitos (the mosquitos let us know that they enjoyed the fragrance as they bit us), which only relented at the end of the trip, when we had tremendous thunder-hail-storms. Sort of a bummer, as we spent the final two afternoons playing cards in the tent, but at least we learned that our tent can stand up to the weight of hail on the roof.

During a break on the last few miles of the hike, the trip leader began to recruit Bethany to lead trips for the Sierra Club in the future. It's one thing to have someone tell you that they are impressed you kept up with the pace of the group, and its entirely another to have that person tell Bethany that she could take their place. A pretty big compliment!

When the trip ended we got in the car and headed towards Yellowstone. We got to Butte, MT around 8:30 last night, but learned that Butte is a pretty popular place on a Saturday night in the summer, and after checking with 8 hotels that had a total of one smoking room available, we drove west until we could find a place with a room...hence the Deer Lodge, Mt entry.