Beartooths in August?

freeridinskier

freeridinskier

Member
This is probably the stupidist question anyone has posted on here. I am driving the Beartooth Highway tommorrow from Cooke City to Red Lodge, on my way from Cody (where I am now) to Bozeman (my home for the next 4 years.) Are there any spots to ski a few turns? Or is everything gone? Are there glaciers and snowfields that stay on these mountains up high year round? I will know tommorrow, but I thought I might get some advice. Thought it might be cool to ski in August, since I have never done that. thanks
 
There's snow there year-round, it just depends on how far you want to hike. There's a chance that the Gardener headwall could still have some snow on it and that's just off the highway right after you cross into Wyoming, so check that out for sure. Other than that you'll be hiking at least 4-5 miles into some of the permenant snowfields and glaciers at this time of the year.
 
Cool, I dont have time to hike in today, because I am with my folks, but anything close to the road I will definitly hit up. Thanks for the advice. Is this headwall on the left or right side of the road coming from Cooke City? thanks
 
It's on the right side just after the second summit. There will be a couple switchbacks going down, then a turnout on the right with a lake visible a ways down. If you make it to the montana border you've gone too far. I'm not sure if there will be any snow there though, I've never skied the pass this late in the year.
 
well I never made it today. My Jeep overheated going up from Cody to Cooke City. I was about 35 miles from Cooke City, so when I got to Highway 212 I went towards cooke city and came through Yellowstone to Bozeman. I didn't think I would make it up the steep grades over the beartooth pass. I made it to Bozeman successfully, and am going to try to get it fixed, so I can drive the pass before school starts in a week.
 
That'll be an expensive trip to just look at the pass. You should just go to Cooke City and hike to the Aero Lakes to catch 20" cutthroats if you're going to be in that area.
 
^Lower Aero lake. I camped at upper for three days last summer and didn't see a single rise, nor did I have so much as a strike.
 
Yeah, the upper lake is pretty empty. I missed one fish there and didn't see much else. After walking around the entire lake all I saw was two otters and one rise. The lower lake was a different story, however. I camped where the creek came in a couple weeks ago and you could hardly see the bottom. In fact, the first fish I caught was with my hands because it was in the way of where I wanted to go fishing. Here's the biggest one I caught:

1154742793Beartooths083.jpg
 
What a nice fish. I wish I would have known about this Aero lake this afternoon when I was in Cooke City. I think I am going to fish around Bozeman since my folks and I have been driving everyday since Wednesday, about 1800 miles total. Is it really that far to get to the pass if you are coming from I 90 south to Red Lodge? I am just curious for future reference.

As far as fishing around Bozeman, any suggestions? Last summer I fished the Galliton down in the caynon inbetween Bozeman and West Yellowstone, without much success. Seems like that stretch probably gets a little over fished.
 
It's about 2-2.5 hours from Bozeman to Red Lodge. As far as fishing goes, I only fish a few spots and those are secret..bwahahahaha! But yeah, I think there's still fishing restrictions so you can't touch the rivers after noon right now. Some spots you might want to check out would be Hyalite Creek, the Gallatin (in Gallatin Canyon toward Big Sky), and the Madison on the Bear Trap Canyon section. Just make sure you're done fishing by noon.
 
Low flows and high water temperatures. It puts too much stress on the fish if you're out there in the afternoon or evening when the water's really warm and the fish have been in the sun all day.
 
No skiing in Beartooths right now, I guess you could hike for miles but just got back and it blew ass, again it blew ass.
 
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