Lost Valley - Where the National Park Isn't
Here is a story that has been in the making for more than a year… In fact, I became so enthralled with this trip that I turned into a photo-book titled “Lost Valley — Where The National Park Isn’t’" which is releasing on November 15 on Adventure Buddies. This is an excerpt of it with some juicy nuggets, if you will. The book will be 64 pages long and features many, many more photos.
In the summer of 2021, my friend Isaac Johnston and I were so fed up with how crowded our backyard had become since the beginning of the pandemic that we had to do something about it. For reference, we both live in Montana’s Flathead Valley, which is known for being the gateway into Glacier National Park, and upon close inspection we realized that everyone was congregating in the same places. The spots that were on Instagram, AllTrails, and blogs…
The beauty of that is that if you just ‘pull up’ a map and start looking the opposite direction of these spots you land on an insane amount of space to roam free, un-encumbered by the droves of people also trying to have a nice time outside.
Our thinking was simple but effective: If there are more than 500,000,000 acres of public land within the U.S, why are we all stuck in the same 100,000 acres? Why don’t we go the opposite direction of Glacier National Park? And that’s exactly what we did.
DAY 1: #3 NO TRESPASSING
Because we’re walking straight south towards the river in an area that has no marked trails, we’ve had to jump a few fences. We still haven’t seen anyone, just wildlife.
In one of our fence jumping episodes, we’ve run into a man called Wacey Cathy who owns a cattle ranch. Instead of kicking us out of his ranch he’s offered us water and showed us around.
Since there are very few people down here they’re actually happy to meet us. The less of us around, the more we have time for each other it seems.
Funny anecdote about us trespassing into Wacey Cathy’s ranch — Isaac ended up coming back and making a film and photo series about their family. You never know where these trips will take you…
DAY 2: #6 RIVER FORD
Isaac thought it would be fun to ford this smaller arm of the river and I agreed. Since there was nowhere to go on the other side, he forded back and I got some photos. This is a common pattern of our trips together — his appetite for trying things always makes for good photos or at least stories.
DAY 2: Entry #10 BIG BOI CAMP
We sat up our second camp right on the shores of the river, as is tradition, so we can have unlimited water for drinking, cooking, and our evening tisanes. As we’re sitting on our pads, we hear a ruckus in the bushes below. There is no doubt, a large animal is approaching behind us and the night is falling…
DAY 3: Entry #16 WILDFLOWERS
Around mid-day the sky is entirely covered in clouds and the light is so gloomy it looks like its going to rain. Luckily, the dirt road we’re following is littered in mood-lifting wild flowers. Only a few miles to the end.
These images and journal entries, along with many more, will be included in the “Lost Valley — Where The National Park Isn’t” limited edition photo book that releases on Nov 15 on Adventure Buddies. If you’re subscribed to my newsletter (thank you), you will get an invite to order before everyone else. If you are not a subscriber, feel free to subscribe below to get the order email.
So, who’s planning to get the new book?!
