A common thing that people like to say to you before adventures is: “that trip will change your life.” Sometimes this is true. The PCT certainly changed my life completely. But the more trips you do, the harder it is to have a truly outstanding, life changing adventure. Did the Arizona Trail change my life? No. It was a lot of fun, but it was just another hike in a long string of them.

And then there are some trips, like the Great Divide Route, that are so challenging and beautiful and sublime that you can’t not be changed by them. My relationship with bears will always be different. I will never look at a map again and be confined only to trails. But most of all, I learned that this is what I love the most. Pure, raw wilderness, where it’s easy to imagine that no one has ever walked before. Just me, Steve, and glaciers tumbling down from high mountain peaks. I still haven’t figured out all the ways that I’m different now. Coming back to society is always hard, but this time it’s even harder. Maybe it will take a while to learn all of the marks that the Great Divide Route left on me.

Steve crossing the ridge above Fay Lake

We had an interesting summer. We hiked almost 500km on the Great Divide Trail (which I will write about, I promise!) before fires shut us down. Heartbroken for our trail and the communities along it, we hung about, exploring new places in the Rockies, while we waited to see if we could pick up the trail further north. We felt strong, and ready to be humbled again by the route that turned us around last year.

Natanik Pass

Our hike on the GDR really started a few days south on the GDT. We’d signed up for a fly in work trip before our plans got derailed- the idea was to walk north of Jasper, then meet a helicopter on the top of Big Shale. The helicopter would have a work crew, who would bring our food resupply for the GDR. In exchange for the helicopter drop, we’d work hard for a few days before continuing north. Fires in Jasper, and on the access route to Section G meant that we could no longer hike in, but the trip leaders managed to find us a spot on the helicopter. We caught a ride north with Dan, then jumped on the heli for a short trip to a lake just below Big Shale. We worked hard clearing shrubby sub-alpine pines, cutting back tall willows, and blazing open meadows, until we ran out of fuel a day before schedule. Then, Steve and I said goodbye to the crew, who had a 7km bushwhack back to their cars, and headed north on the GDT to Kakwa Lake.

Dylan came with us. Our schedules wouldn’t have quite aligned if we’d left the work trip earlier as we’d originally planned, but now we could hike together for at least the first few days. To say that Dylan is an accomplished hiker is an understatement. He has completed many long distance trails and attempted a few FKTs- if we were going to hike together I was pretty sure it was less a case of us attempting to keep up, and more dependent on him slowing down for our company. We made it past Sheep Creek after leaving the rest of the crew a few kilometers before Casket Camp, and camped just short of Surprise Pass. I carried a surprise to cache on Surprise Pass (brought in on the helicopter by Dan- I was just the sucker who decided to carry it), which added a good few pounds to my pack, already heavy with sixteen days worth of food.

In the morning, the wind chased building clouds across the sky. Steve and I left camp before Dylan, racing bad weather to the pass. We couldn’t outrun the showers, which left us drenched before we crested the pass, while low clouds obscured the peaks around us. We quickly built a cairn, hid the surprise within, and then hiked as fast as we could towards the cabin at Kakwa, racing to stay warm. Dylan passed us easily. We traversed above Cecilia lake, stopping only for blueberries the size of grapes, then climbed up to Providence Pass, where our bear noise spooked a moose, who raced ahead of us through the willows as if they were air. Finally, soaked through and chilled, we reached the cabin. Smoke rose from the chimney- Dylan had beaten us there by an hour or two.

Kakwa Cabin normally has park hosts. These volunteers stay in their own cabin, and keep an eye on the area, while doing trail maintenance. This year, the hosts were Kim and Paul. They brought us fresh baked bread and popcorn, and shared their beer and wine with us, while we chatted about our experiences this summer. They even let us use their starlink to check the weather. They’d be the last people we’d see for eleven days.

The storm blew through overnight, and the early morning sun chased away the last strands of mist. We had two days of forecasted good weather, before another storm moved through. Dylan planned to stick with us through the bad weather, so at least he’d have someone to chat to if we ended up tent bound for a day. We headed out together, along with Kim and Paul, who hiked the first kilometer with us on freshly cleared trail. We said goodbye, then continued on, the three of us together. Kim and Paul had warned us that there had been plenty of grizzly sightings along the lake, so we made as much noise as we could, while hiking easily along the old tote road to the turn off for Jarvis lake. We made good time, turning onto overgrown singletrack before lunch. Even the “trail” to Jarvis, which we’d had trouble following in a few spots the year before, seemed easier this time around, though no less overgrown. We reached Jarvis cabin at mid-afternoon. This would be too early to stop on a normal hiking day, but it’s hard to pass up a night at a cabin when you know that kilometers of trackless wilderness stand before you, and that this is the most civilization that you’ll see for the next ten days. We spent an easy afternoon playing card games and watching porcupines under the shadow of Mount Ida.

We woke to rain drumming on the tin roof of the cabin. It was hard to leave, so we didn’t, drinking coffee and watching a blind old porcupine snuffle around the wood pile instead. Eventually the rain stopped around 8am, so we headed out. There was a bit of trail heading away from the cabin that led us as far as the burn before Moonias Pass. It was marginally easier than bushwhacking, so we tried our best to follow it. An extra set of eyes helped and we made much better time than the year before. Before we knew it, we were at the burn, climbing steeply to the tarns that dot Moonias Pass. The tarns are one of the prettiest places on earth- the bog cotton and marshy grasses were just starting to turn autumnal gold, and Ida, with her ruffled glaciers and stern, sharp peak, presided over everything. We ate lunch facing her majesty, then continued up past Moonias Lake and over the steep, rock strewn headwall. We chose a worse line than the year before and thrashed our way up, before finding an easier path through a long avalanche chute.

Then, we crested the wedge shaped ridge that separates Moonias and Fay lakes. There isn’t a spot on the route that isn’t stunning, but this place made my heart ache with its lonely beauty. Moonias Lake lay behind us, a sparkling blue pool in the horseshoe of a mountain, while Fay shone in front of us beneath a steep rockwall, cleaved by snowfields and avalanche paths. The first hints of crimson painted the alpine- summer is short this far north. We followed a gentle slope past Fay Lake, and into the first subalpine trees. The route was wet here: we followed meadows to make the best time, rather than wallow in thick brush. One meadow had the clear outline of bear paws still imprinted in wet moss. We yelled a little louder as we hopped from meadow to meadow, then climbed a short, dry ridge where old white bark pines stood tall. We camped here, in the shelter of the old trees, just a kilometer or so away from the Narraway River.

We hit the Narraway crossing first thing in the morning. We’d heard from Kevin, who’d hiked around half of the route a month before, that our crossing spot from last year wasn’t passable. The Narraway riverbed seemed to be mostly gravel bars- it shouldn’t be a surprise that they’d shift and change with the passing of the seasons. It didn’t matter too much though. We popped out of the woods just a few meters downstream from an easy crossing, where we followed gravel bars diagonally across the swirling water. The Narraway is still the biggest bogeyman for anyone attempting the GDR, but our crossing was pretty relaxed. We climbed away from the river through open forest dotted with white bark pine, then through closer and closer brush, before popping out into subalpine meadow. We stopped for lunch on the banks of a stream, then continued meadow hopping through progressively smaller and smaller trees.

I heard the huff first, then the sound of a heavy creature crashing through the trees. I turned, already yelling, to see three grizzlies maybe 100 meters away, huffing, panting and running. All three were a good size- perhaps a mum and cubs that should have left home a long time ago. They were beautiful bears- blonde fur rippled over fat and muscle. As we yelled, they took it in turns to break their retreat and pop onto their hind legs and stare at us. Their curiosity was obvious, and it’s possible they had never seen a human before. Despite it being an overall good encounter, we were still a little rattled. Three big bears felt like far too much for three small humans to deal with.

We continued on to an unnamed pass high above the Narraway. Clouds gathered, obscuring the peaks ahead, though we could still look back across the valley to the towering cliff walls above Fay Lake. As we crested the pass, the weather flipped, as if by a switch. Pulling on rain gear, we descended over pale cliff bands onto the broad shoulder of Watin Mountain. We hurried to catch up to Dylan, always a little ahead of us, as the rain chilled me through my jacket. Flashbacks to Morkill Pass on the GDT in 2021 played in my head. We’d been mildly hypothermic after hiking for far too long through weather just like this.

“We should stop soon!” Steve shouted ahead when we finally got close enough to Dylan for him to hear us. “Before this turns to snow and we get too cold!”

“Do you think it’s going to snow?” Dylan asked. In response, the fat drops falling around him turned opaque for just a second, sleet mixing into the falling rain.

We set up out tents in a stand of short trees, which offered little protection from the sleet, but did cut the wind a touch. We hid in our tents for a few hours, yelling back and forth, before the rain lessened just enough for us to dash out and cook dinner, before retreating back inside.

The storm cleared overnight, leaving fresh snow already melting on the highest peaks. We packed up and said goodbye to Dylan, who was carrying less food than us and feeling the need to move a little quicker. We circled Watin mountain, first on easy, open slopes, then on a steeper sidehill over talus and the spiky, shrubby trees known as krummholz. Kevin had reported this section as being slow going, but we found it ok (and we found many sections that Kevin had found easy challenging. Which just shows how big a difference just being a few meters away from another person’s line can make). As we rounded the shoulder, the meadows surrounding Waitin lake appeared. We saw the tiny figure of Dylan crossing one, and the familiar outline of a bear in another opening a few hundred meters away from him. The bear slunk off, and we continued on our way, making as much noise as possible.

We dropped down to cross Belcourt creek, then began the long climb up to Amisk lake and Natanik pass. These low sections were frustrating. We had been able to see Amisk lake from Watin shoulder, and it looked close enough to touch. Now, as we thrashed through brush and clambered over deadfall, it felt like it was on the moon. Finally we emerged from the forest into an open swamp, where beavers had created their own little watery ecosystem. We crossed the swamp on a beaver dam, then headed up on the east side of a small river draining from Amisk lake. Previous parties had found themselves on the west side, but the walking was easy to the east, and we followed a game trail to treeline. Amsik lake itself was gorgeous- a glacier powdered with fresh snow fed a tumbling double waterfall, running down into a clear blue lake. The wind howled up here, despite the sun, threatening to knock me over. We climbed the headwall behind the lake (much gentler than Moonias’s intimidating headwall) and crossed a gradual pass, towered over by giant, blocky peaks. It was easy walking to start with, down a gentle slope strewn with pale boulders, until we reached the beginning of the descent to Herrick Creek. It seemed that there was no good way down- the contour lines were intimidatingly steep all around us. We half slid and half downclimbed through a forested slope that was near vertical at times until we reached the creek. I pulled thorns from my thumb from grabbing spiky plants to slow my descent- not my favourite part of the trip. We traversed around beneath Herrick pass, then camped just before the next climb. A windy and cold night was forecast, and we didn’t feel like pushing our luck closer to treeline.

The wind howled all night, and in the morning, rain pattered on the tent. Steve checked the weather on the InReach- zero percent chance of precipitation today, he told me, despite the rain currently falling. We packed up and then climbed towards an unnamed pass under dramatic skies. The wind blew the rain away, though we kept our rain gear on due to the dark clouds flitting past. A moose ran through a meadow far below us, chased by her calf. We bushwhacked down to Paksumo pass, which seemed to take an eternity. Even when they were the same distance, the alpine sections flew by, while we crawled through the bushwhacks.

We ate our lunch, then climbed to begin a steep traverse high above a brushy valley. I’d been looking at this section on my maps for a long time, and dreading it. It turned out to be worse than I’d imagined. We sidehilled steeply, trying not to slide, over slick, half dead hellebore and wildflower stems. The only reprieve from the steep angle, which twisted our feet and hurt our ankles, was where grizzlies had dug up the plants for their roots, creating a bench just a few feet wide. It took us forever to crawl through this section, painfully slow, muscles aching from the unnatural angle. Finally, we crested a corner, and dropped down to a gentle slope. Exhausted, we stopped for dinner, then climbed up and over one more pass. We found a flat spot nestled in krummholz, under the already shadowed cliff of a peak high above us. White specks traversed the cliff: mountain goats. We watched them for a while, before the evening chill drove us into our tent.

We woke to more rain on the tent. Zero percent, the InReach told us again. We packed up and headed down a long valley. Alpine turned to sub alpine pines, interspaced with long, wet meadows. The trees closed in, and then we bushwhacked through deadfall, blueberry bushes, and the occasional willow. We were getting better at spotting the easy vegetation to move though- ferns and hellebore were best, then berry bushes, with willows being the absolute last resort. Our pace dropped to a crawl as the bushes rose around us. Finally, the edge of Warner lake led us to an ATV track and a wind scoured campsite lapped by white capped waves. This is the spiritual halfway point of the GDR- the only feasible bail point, though that bail is a long walk on a seldom traveled ATV route to a remote dirt road. We walked down the track for a few kilometers, enjoying being able to switch off for a short time. Then, we left the track. Finding a spot to leave was tricky. Willows taller than Steve rose along the edges of the track, their stems thicker than my arm. We pushed through them, into the more open forest beyond, then dropped down to follow a few meadows. We crossed a stream, then found our first cliff band. An easy scramble brought us to the top. I was grateful that my backpack was finally starting to lighten, though it still shifted my balance alarmingly in a few spots. We alternated bushwhacking uphill with following long, rocky ridges, avoiding further cliff bands. The sky darkened above us, the clouds turning pink and orange as the sun set, though the slope was still far too steep to stop. Finally, we crested a rise and set up the tent in the shelter of the pines.

We camped so close to treeline that it was easy walking in the morning. We traversed the mountain shoulder, ducking into a bowl to walk along a lakeshore lined with krummholz, then followed meadows to a gentle descent through open forest. We turned up another valley, crossing the squiggle of a river a few times to find the best walking through open meadows. We began our climb towards another pass, gentle at first, then steeper and steeper while the wind rose around us.

I heard the bear before I saw it. Another huff, then the heavy beat of paws on dirt. A flash of dirty brown fur, half hidden behind a thick pine just 30 feet away. Too close. I yelled. Steve, in front of me, turned, yelling. The charge was over before we really had time to register it was happening. The bear skidded to a stop just ten feet from Steve. My bear spray was in my hand, but with the wind blowing in my face and Steve standing between me and the bear, it was useless. Steve’s arms were over his head, trekking poles raised. The bear paused for a heartbeat, then turned and raced back twenty feet. It popped up to its hind legs, surveyed us for a second, then turned and ran back into the trees. We yelled after it, then turned to look at each other. My hands shook violently.

“I didn’t have time to grab my bear spray,” Steve said. “It was either look big, or grab the spray. But I knew you’d have yours. You always have my back.”

It took a while for me to stop shaking. We continued on to just below the pass, stopping for a while to try and collect ourselves at a small lake. Bear prints ringed the shore. After a snack, we headed over the pass. Immediately in front of us was a dark valley, thick with trees and brush. On the other side, a wall of mountains streaked with glaciers, and towering grey spires. A single gap in the wall was our next objective- a narrow valley between Weaver and Limestone peaks. But first, we’d have to cross the fearsome Framstead valley.

We knew there would be limited camping spots in the Framstead, and now, at midafternoon, we didn’t have enough daylight left to make it across. So we sat for a while, watching the light change on distant Weaver, then headed down a steep avalanche chute to find a camp spot just before Wapiti Pass.

The Framstead was as slow as expected. Normally, we can find a game trail. The moose and the caribou and the bears know the best ways to go, avoiding thick brush, cliff ledges and waterfalls. We failed completely at picking up more than the faintest game trail down from Wapiti pass to the river- as if the bushwhacking was so bad that even the animals avoided it. We searched for easier paths, choosing to walk through high ferns rather than spiky devil’s club. We reached the river in time for an early lunch, walking directly in the current for a short distance. We found a meadow, the only easy walking in the entire valley, and then climbed up towards the deep cleft between Weaver and Limestone peaks.

At an unremarkable spot on a Framstead tributary, we celebrated. This marked where we turned around the year before, running out of time and thwarted by thick brush. Now, technically, we’d walked every step of the GDR. We just had another four days hiking to get out. We climbed out of the valley, and stopped for an early dinner in an open meadow ringed with blueberries. It was only 4pm, but we were so hungry. We finished dinner and dropped down towards a creek thick with willows, planning to make it as far up the tight valley as possible before camp.

The route under Weaver was a choke point. Thick brush forced you to walk directly in the creek for a ways, and then once avalanche chutes and rock slides had wiped the hillside clean of vegetation, the distance between sheer rock faces was only a few hundred meters. Nowhere else to go. No way around. And there, standing directly in the river we needed to walk up was a massive bear. No wonder it hadn’t heard us coming- the river burbled and rushed around its ankles. Steve saw it first, and went for his bear spray. A hundred meters or so away, we had time to back up. However, in getting out of the way, we lost sight of the creature. No way of knowing if it had run harmlessly downriver around us, or if we’d be chasing it up the valley all night, camping right next to it.

I’ve been afraid on hikes before. This was a new level of fear. The bears on this trip had been insane. We were now at six grizzlies in roughly 150km. None of them were afraid of us- none of them even seemed to have seen people before. It was a far cry from earlier in the summer, when just talking to the grizzlies was enough to send them racing into the bushes. These bears seemed wilder, more unpredictable, and absolutely disinclined to get out of our way. And now, I just couldn’t face chasing this massive predator up a valley already streaked with long shadows. We turned and retraced our steps, to the wide meadow near where we had dinner, hoping there was enough space for wildlife to pass us by in the night without tripping over us.

I didn’t sleep much. No matter how tired I was, the only way to escape from the bears was to keep hiking. We worked our way up the valley, yelling until my voice was hoarse. We passed prints and diggings, but didn’t see the monster from the night before. Once we reached treeline, where at least we could see the bears coming, we stopped for a second coffee. Partially to combat our fatigue, but also since now we knew just how long our hike out would take. We were on the home stretch now, and we had plenty of food. The only reason to rush was our fear. Instead, we took a couple of deep breaths, made a coffee, and enjoyed the sweeping limestone cliffs sprayed with waterfall mist in front of us. We made good time up the rest of the valley, stopping for lunch on the pass overlooking the first Limestone lake, then picked our way along it fairly easily. The year before we’d done this stretch in cold rain that left me near hypothermia. This year, the sun baked down on one of the few truly warm days of the entire trip.

We passed grizzly cub prints still filling with water on the shore of the second lake, ramping our fear back up. On the third lake, I remarked how the logs in the water looked like bear heads. “I draw the line at being scared of water bears,” Steve said, making fun of me. “Ok, maybe we need to be a little scared of water bears,” he said a few minutes later as we crossed a massive wet puddle, turning to drips and pawprints where a large animal had left the water. We circled the marshy sinkhole which drains the lakes, then ducked into the forest on the other side to camp in a mossy grove. A storm rolled through overnight, waking us with a few flashes and growls, and just a light mist of rain.

The next day was easy walking as we retraced our steps from the year before, up a high ridge for a last glimpse of Weaver, before circling mountains and climbing high to a glacier streaked pass. The fear was still there, but now sadness crept in too. This was our last day without trails. Today, we’d reach the first cairns marking the historic Monkman Pass trail, and our first signs of people since that brief ATV road at Warner pass. Our trip was almost over.

We crossed the divide for a final time at a small cairn before the Monkman tarns, as sunrays streaked through scattered clouds. The evening light was magical, lighting distant glaciers like a spotlight, before flitting over the dark valley below us. We approached the tarns, where we’d camp for the night, as the clouds turned pink above us. A dark shape caught our scent and raced away. Not a bear this time- long antlers branched out, silhouetted against the dusk. Our first caribou of the trip. We set up our tent in the trees by the tarn. Our last night on trail. In the morning, we dropped down quickly towards treeline and Monkman lake. Cairns turned to trail markers, which turned into actual trail. It was easy to move fast without bushes and brush to hold us back. We sped through this section without feeling guilty. We’d spent time exploring the cascading waterfalls off of numerous side trails last year and our ride was waiting for us at the trailhead.

Kevin greeted us with a smile, a shoebox full of pizza, and a cooler full of beer and soda. He was the first person apart from Dylan that we’d seen since Kim and Paul at the Kakwa Cabin. We’d exchanged emails during the spring- he’d had questions about the access at Kakwa, and the parts of the route that we’d done, and I’d had queries about the sections that he’d completed. We sat by the river for a while, talking about our trip and eating pizza, before he whisked us off for a quick stop by Kinnuseo falls, before taking us to his home for showers and burgers.

The GDR really was the experience of a lifetime, though I hope to have many more future adventures in the same vein (though maybe without the bear charge). Challenging, remote, and terrifying, I’m not sure I can recommend it to other hikers. But for experienced people who are the right sort of crazy, there’s nothing else out there like it.