Yellowstone's Slough Creek Canyon

Slough (pronounced slew) Creek wanders down from the high Beartooth Range in Montana before passing into Yellowstone National Park. After entering Yellowstone, Slough Creek tumbles and meanders for about 16 miles before merging with the Lamar River, which in turn soon runs into the Yellowstone River. The valley is famous for its outstanding trout fishing, especially the fine cutthroat that are found from the First Meadow on up to the Park boundary. During the summer months, Slough Creek gets a lot of traffic from fishermen and the wagons that haul goods and guests into the exclusive Silvertip Ranch just north of the Yellowstone boundary. However, it's still a great backpacking and hiking destination, especially if you have time to spend a night or two.

I prefer hiking the valley either early or late in the season. The photo at the top of this page was taken during the 3'rd week of October in either 1991 0r 1992, during a rare late fall warm spell. I had the valley to myself, and didn't see a soul from the time that I topped the hill above the Slough Creek Campground heading in, until I got back to the trailhead coming out. In between, I saw a lot elk, beaucoup bear sign, and more buffalo than I wanted - I got treed during the night at my campsite when a large group of bison moved into the woods where my tent was pitched. It's an odd feeling to be hanging onto the side of a pine tree at 1 in the morning, with temps down around 25 degrees. The buffalo seemed at first like they were going to settle in for the rest of the night, but finally moved on before my legs got too numb to climb down from the tree. It was an interesting experience - for a little while, I was probably the only person in the world that was treed by buffalo.