Hypothermia in the hills
Posted: Mon Mar 16, 2009 1:10 am
My little story is about an elk hunt (unsuccessful) in Southwestern Montana, USA.
My hunting buddy and I decided to go hunting for elk in an area that I was familiar with. My Wife and I had worked with youth and taken them to a remote place in Southwestern Montana called Elkhorn Hot Springs. Since this name is not uncommon out West and it may be difficult for you to locate on a map, this Elkhorn is near the Montana town of Polaris.
Polaris is a most interesting metropolis, consisting of a two story log cabin that serves as a store, post office, and home, and the Polaris Bar. These are the only two buildings in the town, which serves are rural population of ranchers. The bar is somewhat noteworthy in that it has no water. Drinks are served in disposable plastic cups. The restroom facilities are located outside: A whitewashed wooden outhouse for the ladies and a dead cottonwood tree stump for gentlemen. Once, the county health authorities attempted to close the Bar down due to health code violations, and about half of the county (the largest in Montana) turned out to protest. The Bar remained in business.
About 15 miles up the road is Elkhorn Hot Springs. It is a very old spa with a hot water springs serving several hot pools of different temperatures. A lodge and a number of rustic cabins provides accommodations at a reasonable rate, and this is where we set up our base. The cabins are heated by wood stoves, but the cracks in the wall require warm sleeping bags. Early in the morning, we would get up to drive up the hill to Harrison Park, which is about 7200' in elevation (IIRC). Here's a link to a pic if you are interested: http://www.panoramio.com/photo/618915
After a number of years, I had finally been able to acquire a full set of woolen hunting clothes, which are much quieter when going thru the woods than the more common synthetic materials. My partner and I split up, each taking a different draw to hunt, and in the course of this I came to a small brook.
To digress for a moment, I should mention that during this time, this area was pretty cold. Temperatures at night up in Harrison Park could drop into the range of -57* C. The days are bright and sunny and not nearly so bitter, but usually well below zero also.
Anyway, I came up to this brook and, rather than trying to jump across the ~ 1 foot or so wide brook, decided to use a small piece of wood laying across it. Of course, it rolled me in and my foot went to the bottom of the brook. The thing about these little channels is that they can be surprisingly deep. This one was up to my knee.
I pulled my foot out right away, and at least I didn't fall over, but my leg was soaked. Given the very low temperature and my great distance from the truck or anything like a shelter, I immediately thought of hypothermia. My leg was bitterly cold. I went up a south-facing hillside and found that the temperature sun was not quite so bad. I took off my heavy woolen bib overalls and wrung what seemed like a couple of liters of water out of the wet leg, and hung the overalls up in a tree in the sun. I had on long underwear so, other than the one wet leg, I was OK there. Since I always wore two pairs of socks, I could remove one sock from my dry foot and was OK there.
In the dry high altitude, it took my bibs about 1/2 hour to dry out, during which time I "sunbathed" in my long underwear bottoms. Then, I was on my way.
That hunt proved to be quite an interesting little trip. I took my buddy on some side trips on the way home, including the ghost town of Coolidge and the remains of the huge Elkhorn Mine, built along with the last narrow gauge railway to be laid down in the USA. Here are a couple of links with pics and little historical summaries:
http://www.ghosttowns.com/states/mt/coolidge.html
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/mt-coolidge.html
On the first link, the 4th picture down is of what the mine mill looked like some years after I had been there, when it was more complete. The small size of the picture doesn't give any idea of how huge this mill was.
Another experience we had was a visit from a giant B-52 bomber. In those days, the B-52s were stationed at Ellsworth AFB near Rapid City, South Dakota. They would fly along the Montana - Wyoming border west, into Southwestern Montana, south through Idaho, and then back to South Dakota. Along the way, they had laser practice bombing ranges set up -- they didn't drop anything, but ran practice missions.
Anyway, we had split up that day and my partner had gone over the ridge to the next draw. in the afternoon, I heard a tremendous roaring that grew and grew in volume. I didn't know that the B-52s practiced in the area at the time, but guessed that it could only be one -- nothing else could make that much noise. I kept watching for the top of the tail fin to rise above the top of the ridge. If you have ever been up close to a B-52, you know that the vertical fin is very tall -- like a tall building. The fin, however, never appeared.
That evening, when my hunting buddy and I rendezvoused, I asked him about it right away and he told how this B-52 flew very low down the valley he was in and right over his head! How I wished that I'd have taken the long walk that morning!
And the elk? Well, in Montana, the old answer to the question of "Where's all the elk?" is, "Elk are where you find 'em." And on that trip, we didn't.
My hunting buddy and I decided to go hunting for elk in an area that I was familiar with. My Wife and I had worked with youth and taken them to a remote place in Southwestern Montana called Elkhorn Hot Springs. Since this name is not uncommon out West and it may be difficult for you to locate on a map, this Elkhorn is near the Montana town of Polaris.
Polaris is a most interesting metropolis, consisting of a two story log cabin that serves as a store, post office, and home, and the Polaris Bar. These are the only two buildings in the town, which serves are rural population of ranchers. The bar is somewhat noteworthy in that it has no water. Drinks are served in disposable plastic cups. The restroom facilities are located outside: A whitewashed wooden outhouse for the ladies and a dead cottonwood tree stump for gentlemen. Once, the county health authorities attempted to close the Bar down due to health code violations, and about half of the county (the largest in Montana) turned out to protest. The Bar remained in business.
About 15 miles up the road is Elkhorn Hot Springs. It is a very old spa with a hot water springs serving several hot pools of different temperatures. A lodge and a number of rustic cabins provides accommodations at a reasonable rate, and this is where we set up our base. The cabins are heated by wood stoves, but the cracks in the wall require warm sleeping bags. Early in the morning, we would get up to drive up the hill to Harrison Park, which is about 7200' in elevation (IIRC). Here's a link to a pic if you are interested: http://www.panoramio.com/photo/618915
After a number of years, I had finally been able to acquire a full set of woolen hunting clothes, which are much quieter when going thru the woods than the more common synthetic materials. My partner and I split up, each taking a different draw to hunt, and in the course of this I came to a small brook.
To digress for a moment, I should mention that during this time, this area was pretty cold. Temperatures at night up in Harrison Park could drop into the range of -57* C. The days are bright and sunny and not nearly so bitter, but usually well below zero also.
Anyway, I came up to this brook and, rather than trying to jump across the ~ 1 foot or so wide brook, decided to use a small piece of wood laying across it. Of course, it rolled me in and my foot went to the bottom of the brook. The thing about these little channels is that they can be surprisingly deep. This one was up to my knee.
I pulled my foot out right away, and at least I didn't fall over, but my leg was soaked. Given the very low temperature and my great distance from the truck or anything like a shelter, I immediately thought of hypothermia. My leg was bitterly cold. I went up a south-facing hillside and found that the temperature sun was not quite so bad. I took off my heavy woolen bib overalls and wrung what seemed like a couple of liters of water out of the wet leg, and hung the overalls up in a tree in the sun. I had on long underwear so, other than the one wet leg, I was OK there. Since I always wore two pairs of socks, I could remove one sock from my dry foot and was OK there.
In the dry high altitude, it took my bibs about 1/2 hour to dry out, during which time I "sunbathed" in my long underwear bottoms. Then, I was on my way.
That hunt proved to be quite an interesting little trip. I took my buddy on some side trips on the way home, including the ghost town of Coolidge and the remains of the huge Elkhorn Mine, built along with the last narrow gauge railway to be laid down in the USA. Here are a couple of links with pics and little historical summaries:
http://www.ghosttowns.com/states/mt/coolidge.html
http://www.legendsofamerica.com/mt-coolidge.html
On the first link, the 4th picture down is of what the mine mill looked like some years after I had been there, when it was more complete. The small size of the picture doesn't give any idea of how huge this mill was.
Another experience we had was a visit from a giant B-52 bomber. In those days, the B-52s were stationed at Ellsworth AFB near Rapid City, South Dakota. They would fly along the Montana - Wyoming border west, into Southwestern Montana, south through Idaho, and then back to South Dakota. Along the way, they had laser practice bombing ranges set up -- they didn't drop anything, but ran practice missions.
Anyway, we had split up that day and my partner had gone over the ridge to the next draw. in the afternoon, I heard a tremendous roaring that grew and grew in volume. I didn't know that the B-52s practiced in the area at the time, but guessed that it could only be one -- nothing else could make that much noise. I kept watching for the top of the tail fin to rise above the top of the ridge. If you have ever been up close to a B-52, you know that the vertical fin is very tall -- like a tall building. The fin, however, never appeared.
That evening, when my hunting buddy and I rendezvoused, I asked him about it right away and he told how this B-52 flew very low down the valley he was in and right over his head! How I wished that I'd have taken the long walk that morning!
And the elk? Well, in Montana, the old answer to the question of "Where's all the elk?" is, "Elk are where you find 'em." And on that trip, we didn't.
