Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
5.3/15.2
Road crosses the 45th parallel of latitude.
5.8/14.7
To the west,
Snowslide Creek
cascades into the Gallatin River in an area that's
marshy except when the creek dries up in late summer. On the far side of the river along here,
you can see remnants of the original road through Gallatin Canyon.
6.4/14.1
Terminal Monument Creek crossing. The strange name of this creek stems from a
wooden post placed up the hill to the northeast that marks the northwest corner of the state
of Wyoming.
7.5/13.0
Gallatin River Bridge.
8.8/11.7 Bacon Rind Creek Trail
begins 0.3 mile (0.5 km) up the side road to the west.
After the first 2.5 miles (4 km), the trail continues out of the park into the Lee Metcalf Wil-
derness. The century-old name Bacon Rind Creek may have reflected breakfast around the
campfire or baiting bears by hanging bacon rind in a tree.
As you travel south, you begin to see the
snags,
standing burned trees left from the Fan fire
of 1988.
9.1/11.4 Fan Creek
and
Fawn Pass Trailheads.
Fan Creek flows into the Gallatin
from the northeast through a valley that nineteenth-century geologists thought looked like
a large fan, because of its radiating minor valleys. Both trails take hikers and riders into the
southern expanses of the Gallatin Range.
To see an undisturbed, beautiful mountain valley, you might follow the start of the Fan
Creek Trail for about 2 miles (3 km), turning northeast at the trail junction.
10.5/10.0
From this point south, we no longer follow the Gallatin River. The river flows west
from its source, then turns north here and meanders through the flat floodplain that you've
just traversed if traveling southward. This is also the Montana/Wyoming state line.
10.9/9.6 Bighorn Pass Trailhead.
The sign indicates a short side road primarily for un-
loading horse trailers. The Bighorn Pass Trail follows the Gallatin River almost to its source at
Gallatin Lake some 12 miles (19 km) away and 2,000 feet (610 m) up. Both the Bighorn Pass
and Fawn Pass trails continue across the high mountains and all the way to the Grand Loop
Road between Mammoth and Norris. Looking east up the Gallatin River here, you see Ban-
nock Peak (10,332 ft / 3,149 m), with Quadrant Mountain (10,213 ft / 3,113 m) behind it.
