Here is Neil's take on the adventure of hiking Bomber Mountain:
"As for me, I am hobbling around the house today (and last night) because of my adventures. Thursday morning, Matthew, David, Dallin, and I packed up and went on a trip up into the Cloud Peak Wilderness area in the Bighorns. We started out at West Ten Sleep Lake Trailhead (elevation 9100 feet) and started hiking with all of our gear. It took us about 5 hours (including breaks) and at least 20,000 steps to get to our campsite at Misty Moon Lake (elevation about 10,300 feet with a population of 1 moose…We saw “Morris” every morning and every evening we were there hanging out on the other side of the Lake). On the way up we also hiked by Lake Helen and Lake Marian. We also crossed lots of small creeks and one river that was a little tricky without getting your feet wet. We got our camp set up and dinner and the boys were just getting fishing good when the rain started. It soon forced us to our tents (around 7 pm) and it rained for at least 5 hours, so we had an early bed-time that night. In the morning we had a little bit of ice on the tents as it was a cold rain. We could see fresh snow a little higher up on the mountains. Anyway, that morning we just took our day packs and hiked up to Bomber Mountain. That was quite an adventure. We hiked past several other lakes until we went over Florence pass and got to Lake Florence. Then we left the trail (and our fishing poles) and started heading up the mountain. Bomber Mountain has lots of boulders and cliffs on it. But we started hiking upward and upward towards the top. We got to cross water and found patched of snow that had not melted yet. We also got up into the fresh snow but there wasn’t much of that and it was melting. We got up high enough that we got “into the clouds”. It was kind of cloudy/sunny, so it would be foggy for a but, then sunny. Eventually, the sun won out and it turned into a nice day. Anyway, we made it to the top (12,000 feet) and were able the find the wreckage of a world war II plane that crashed there back in 1943. That is quite a story in itself, but of the plane would have had maybe 20 more feet in elevation, I think they would have made it over the mountain as most of the wreckage was very close to the top of the mountain. 9 soldiers, preparing to World War II lost their lives there. Anyway, I now know that it takes about 30,000 steps to get from the trailhead to the top of Bomber Mountain. Coming down the mountain, we got into a few situations that were “mildly precarious” but we went slowly and helped each other, and we made it safely down. We lunched near a stream/waterfall coming off Bomber Mountain near the bottom. It was a good place to refill our water bottles out of that clear stream (we had a water filter). After the high we fished our way back to camp. We caught a few fish but not many, but it was an enjoyable day. That night the boys caught quite a few fish at Misty Moon Lake. Worms were the best bait, but Matthew also caught some using spinners. We threw all the fish (Brook Trout) we caught back into the lake as we didn’t have any good way to cook any of the fish. Some of the Brook trout we caught were pretty big for brook trout as they typically are not very big. We had a little propane stove, but they don’t allow for campfires up as high as we were. (We were camped above the timber line as they weren’t any trees around…just lots of bushes. Our 2nd night was clear and dry although we did have frost on our tent in the morning. We packed up and started heading back. We did some more fishing on the way back. Anyway, we made it back to the truck, and we stopped in Worland for Hamburgers and Milkshakes as that sounded good after several days of eating backpacking type food. I think everyone had fun but after I got out of the truck in Powell, I could hardly walk as my legs had had plenty of time to stiffen up. A warm shower sure felt good.
One good news about this adventure was that I should win my “step challenge” for the week as those 3 days gave me a big lead in my challenge this week (I have about 135,000 steps so far this week). Unless someone goes off crazy today, I will win my step challenge this week with my Garmin step counter. Each week, the computer puts in a group of about 10 others who average similar number of steps each week (I am usually in a group whose goal is 100,000 steps). Anyway, I don’t win the weekly challenges very often, but every once in a while, I will. I frequently will be in the top three on Saturday, the next to the last day of the weekly challenge, but then I get passed on Sunday when I don’t get as many steps as I do on the other days. So I usually only win if I have a big lead on Saturday.
There were many other great things about our hike. We had a number of tender mercies. It didn’t start raining until after we had camp set up, the rest of the trip didn’t have rain, we made it safely up and down Bomber mountain with no serious injuries (David got his hand scratched). We got to experience some of Heavenly Father’s beautiful creations, our old white truck made it the whole way. There and back, even though it was having a few issues, and we got to spend time together. All in all, a good three days. I am not sure how many more trips of this kind, my old body has left in it as I have found that climbing mountains at such high elevation is not easy. The good news is that the boys could not easily lose me as I was huffing and puffing so loudly going up the mountain that I was easy to keep track of. When we were hiking along the trail, I would gradually get behind them, but they were good to stop every once in a while, to let me catch up."
Cloud Peak (left) and Bomber Mountain (right) as seen from Lake Helen.
If you are interested in the story of Bomber Mountain here is a link where you can read about it:
